CHIAPAS—Two U.S. army officers linked to the U.S. Embassy, Assistant Army Attaché Thomas Gillen and First Sergeant Elizabeth Krug, were detained on July 26 for over four hours by a group of Tzotzil Indians from the town of Los Plátanos in the municipality of EI Bosque, Chiapas after they refused to allow the villagers to inspect their van. Claiming diplomatic immunity, the two U.S. officers declined to disclose the reasons for their presence in the area.
Gillen and Krug were freed once Chiapas state officials intervened, but not before the incident made headlines in the Mexican press, prompting a meeting between Mexican Foreign Relations Vice Minister Carlos de Icaza and Charge d’Affaires of the U.S. Embassy, Charles Brayshaw. A press bulletin issued by the Ministry of Foreign Relations soon after the meeting demanded that U.S. military personnel inform the Mexican government of their travel plans.
Ironically, the incident came in the midst of a governmentsponsored public-opinion campaign attacking U.S. nationals for intervening in Mexico’s internal affairs. The Zedillo Administration’s attacks on pro-Zapatista U.S. solidarity activists has led to dozens of expulsions over the past months-the most recent being that of San Diego schoolteacher Peter Brown, who was arrested on July 24 and expelled the following day for participating in a schoolbuilding project in the proZapatista community of Oventic in the municipality of San Andrés Larráinzar.
The Mexican government has repeatedly denied any U.S. role in its counterinsurgency operationsin southern Mexico. In recent statements made to Mexico City weekly EI Financiero Interna-cional, however, Donald Schultz, an expert on Latin America at the U.S. Army War College and an employee of the Strategic Studies Institute, declared that several U.S.Aeased countemarcotics helicopters have been used in the war in Chiapas. “One cannot limit the uses to which the Mexican gov-eminent puts our counternarcotics training, ” said Schultz. “It can be put to use just as easily in coun-terinsurgency operations.”
Since 1994, the United States has sold and donated over $235 million worth of arms and equipment to Mexico, including 103 UHHI “Huey” helicopters, four surveillance planes, as well as night-vision, electronic-control and satellite equipment. In recent years, moreover, the number of Mexican generals, soldiers and pilots receiving counterinsurgency training at the U.S. Special Forces (Green Berets) base in Fort Bragg, North Carolina has risen dramatically.
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Latin American Weekly Report is published weekly by Latin American Newsletters. For free samples and subscription information: Latin American Newsletters, Dept. 96A1 1, 61 Old Street, London EC1V 9HX, England, E-mail: WROlartin.flech.cauk.
El Financiero International is a weekly newspaper based in Mexico City, Mexico. For information: El Financiero, Lago Bolsena 176 Co. Anahuac, Mexico, D.F. 111320, (213) 747-7547. Website: http://www.financiero.com
