US TRAINED MEXICAN 'TORTURE SQUAD'

An elite anti-drug force is accused of using skills learned at Fort Bragg,
North Carolina, for killings and kidnappings

It was around 2am when a dozen US-trained commandos stormed the low,
breezeblock wall surrounding Victoria Lopez's dusty backyard. Led by an
officer later identified as Lt Col Julian Guerrero, the hooded soldiers -
who wore dark uniforms with no insignia - smashed in her bedroom door while
she cowered in a corner with her three youngest children.

"I knew they were soldiers because they wore military boots," Dona Victora
said. "But they never identified themselves."

Having wrecked much of her furniture, the troops left in search of her
eldest son Salvador, one of around 30 boys and young men picked up that
night on suspicion of having relieved a drunken soldier of his pistol.

Twenty-nine of them later straggled back to this poor community near
Guadalajara, the victims of torture which in one case required three weeks
in hospital. But Salvador Jimenez Lopez never came home.

His battered corpse was recovered nearly a week later from a shallow grave
a few miles away. Several months later his mother has yet to see the post
mortem report. But a witness said that Salvador's tongue had been torn out.

Dona Victoria's uninvited guests belonged to the Gafe (an acronym for
Air-Mobile Special Forces Group). Their commando skills were acquired
courtesy of the US taxpayer.

Mexican military planners created the Gafe in the aftermath of the 1994
Chiapas debacle, when a few thousand poorly-armed indigenous guerrillas
showed the army was ill-equipped to fight a modern "low-intensity" war.

Under a 1996 agreement with Washington, Gafe officers are trained in
"counter-narcotics" operations by the 7th Special Forces Group at Fort
Bragg, North Carolina. The stated aim is to supplement the rather
ineffectual efforts of Mexico's corruption-prone police.

The US defence department insists: "Counter-drug training differs in
object, scope and nature from counter-insurgency training." Some military
experts regard the difference as minimal.

In any case, said Raul Benitez, a Mexican defence specialist: "They are not
just for the drug war. They are for everything. Depending on the particular
threat that exists in the region, that's what they specialise in."

US official sources say Gafe training includes "a substantial human rights
component". But in one three-month period last year in the state of Jalisco
(where San Juan de Ocotan is located), the official state human rights
commission received 16 complaints about operations apparently involving the
unit.

In every case, the soldiers wore masks or face paint and no insignia. They
raided hotels and restaurants without presenting search warrants, and
frequently kidnapped suspects.

The complaints were given to the national human rights commission, which
has yet to take any action. The commission, often criticised as ineffectual
in relation to the army, will not return phone calls on the subject.

The worst incident with which the Gafe has been linked is the Colonia
Buenos Aires case, named after an inner-city district of Mexico City. Last
September, a military-led police raid resulted in the kidnap of six youths
whose tortured corpses later turned up in two different, remote locations.
A report in the La Jornada newspaper cited anonymous police sources saying
the killings were carried out by Gafe members illegally infiltrated into a
since-disbanded, elite police unit. The Guardian traced one of the sources,
who initially agreed to talk then backed out. "If I tell you about this,"
he said, "they'll track you down and demand to know who gave you the
information. These people are very dangerous."

Twenty-eight Gafe members, including 13 officers, are in military custody
pending an investigation into the San Juan de Ocotan incident. But the
victims and their relatives have little confidence in military justice.

The Pentagon admits that some of those involved had received training at
Fort Bragg. Officials described the incident euphemistically as one in
which, "some soldiers sought retribution for an alleged theft of a watch".

The Buenos Aires incident is also said to have been triggered by the theft
of a watch.

Victoria Lopez has refused the army's offer of compensation until
Salvador's killers are brought to justice. "My son wasn't an animal but a
human being," she said.