MARINES PREPARE PERUVIAN EXERCISE

WASHINGTON -- About 600 Marines will exercise for the first time in the
Amazon Basin of Peru, but Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo said Saturday
the maneuvers are not a precursor to building a U.S. military base in the
South American country. The Peruvian Congress has authorized the Marine
operation at the Peruvian navy's Nanay base on the banks of the Amazon near
Iquitos, 650 miles northeast of Lima. Previous significant U.S.-Peruvian
operations have been in the Pacific and not inland.

Peruvian press reports maintain the Marines aboard the dock landing ship
USS Portland would be testing areas in Peru for a military base to help
Colombia fight drug traffickers and the leftist guerrilla group, the
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia.

"I want to categorically deny that the exercise of some U.S. military
forces in the Peruvian Amazon are related to a building of any U.S.
military base in Peru," Toledo told Associated Press Television in a Friday
night interview.

Iquitos is the easternmost Peruvian city in the Amazon region, about 120
miles in a straight line from the southern border of Colombia. The region
is a haven for guerrillas and drug traffickers.

Toledo said the Marines will start a routine nine-day operation today with
the Peruvian navy, both along the Pacific coast and in the Amazon Basin.
The USS Portland is to enter the Amazon in Brazil.