Drug Scandal Taints Panama’s Reform Chief
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Less than seven years ago, American troops invaded Panama and ousted Gen. Manuel Antonio Noriega and the drug-dealing army that he commanded. Now, with a friendly Government in power and the hand-over of the Panama Canal looming, the United States finds itself again facing a familiar quandary here. Since taking office in 1994, President Ernesto Perez Balladares has repeatedly pledged to crack down on drug trafficking here, and even followed through with some actions against Colombian cocaine cartels. But he has been reluctant to respond to a trail of evidence that ties powerful figures in his own ruling party and Government to local companies that, American officials say, are deeply involved in money laundering and cocaine smuggling. Those connections have come to light after the collapse here early this year of the Agro-Industrial and Commercial Bank, or Banaico, leaving more than $50 million unaccounted for and thousands of ordinary depositors broke and angry. Banaico, a target of several drug investigations in the United States including a conspiracy to buy a fleet of planes for use by Colombian smugglers, is said by American law enforcement officials to have been a focal point of money laundering in Panama’s flourishing off-shore banking center. The bank’s vice president and secretary was Mayor Alfredo Aleman Chiari, the chief campaign fund-raiser for Mr. Perez Balladares and a close friend of the President. In addition, according to public documents here, the largest nominal shareholder in the bank is a holding company whose chairman, Ricardo Alberto Arias, is Panama’s Ambassador to the United States and acting Foreign Minister. Mr. Aleman was also one of the owners of an air cargo company indicted in the United States in 1994 on three cocaine-trafficking counts. That company’s legal counsel, who also advised Mr. Aleman on many other of his business ventures, was Gabriel Castro, who is now director of the Panamanian Government’s National Defense and Public Security Council and, as such, in charge of the country’s efforts to combat money laundering and drug trafficking. In separate interviews here, both Mr. Aleman and Mr. Castro denied involvement in any wrongdoing, and they have not been charged with any crime. “All of this is purely political, and nothing more than an attempt to do damage to the President,” Mr. Castro said. “It is not only unjust, but malign, and there is not a trace of evidence” to support any allegations of illegal activities. The scandal has erupted at a delicate moment in relations between the United States and Panama, and finds American officials divided on how it should be addressed. On Dec. 31, 1999. the United States is scheduled to give up control of the Panama Canal to the local authorities and to withdraw from its bases the last of the 7,500 troops still stationed here. Since last September, however, the Clinton Administration and Mr. Perez Balladares have been gingerly exploring the possibility of retaining some sort of American military presence after the turnover. With numerous bases and communications tracking stations already installed here, some Administration officials say that Panama is an ideal place to monitor Colombia’s drug cartels and, if necessary, to take action against them. As President, Mr. Perez Balladares leads the Revolutionary Democratic Party, founded in the 1970’s by Brig. Gen. Omar Torrijos as a way to institutionalize military rule and foment Panamanian nationalism. After General Torrijos’s heir, General Noriega, seized power in the early 1980’s, the party largely became a means to distribute the spoils of power, intimidate opponents and steal elections. From the Southern Command’s headquarters here, the United States observed all this, but did little to rein in General Noriega, who was helping the Reagan Administration’s military and intelligence efforts in Central America and Cuba. It was only after General Noriega’s second in command turned on him and General Noriega took an anti-American stance that the relationship frayed, leading to the invasion in December 1989 and the collapse of the Revolutionary Democratic Party. Under Mr. Perez Balladares’s leadership, however, the party has been revived and has sought a more cooperative relationship with Washington. In the most recent of its annual reports on drug trafficking, in March, the State Department described Panama as “a financial and commercial center with a location that is ideal for narcotics smuggling and illicit financial transactions.” But American officials have also praised Mr. Perez Balladares’s efforts to clamp down on those activities, and say they view his Government as a reliable partner. In particular, American officials say, Panama should be commended for the arrest here in April on drug trafficking charges of Jose Castrillon Henao, whom they describe as the director of maritime shipments for the Cali cocaine cartel in Colombia. For nearly a decade, Panamanian officials said, Mr. Castrillon Henao operated untouched here through front companies and bank accounts, including some at Banaico. Most of the attention in that scandal, however, has focused on Mr. Aleman, a wealthy businessman and investor who was the main fund-raiser in Mr. Perez Balladares’s come-from-behind campaign in 1994. At the moment, Mr. Aleman is the ruling party’s liaison to the business community and is heavily involved in several large real-estate ventures. During the Noriega era, though, American law enforcement and intelligence officials had identified him as part of a small group of civilians who were business associates of General Noriega and other corrupt members of the high command. American officials have said members of that group, including Mr. Aleman, were involved in illegal activities ranging from drug trafficking to arms smuggling. In the interview, Mr. Castro said that he was “proud to be a friend” of Mr. Aleman and that it was wrong to assume Mr. Aleman was involved in wrongdoing just because he had once been close to General Noriega. “If you look in Panama for all the people who did business with Noriega and his regime, you’re going to find that the only one who didn’t was Mother Teresa of Calcutta,” he said. When Mr. Perez Balladares took office, he appointed Mr. Aleman chairman of the National Bank of Panama, the nation’s most important financial institution, and his presence there alarmed American officials. Early in 1995, Mr. Aleman resigned. American and Panamanian officials said he did so after the Panamanian President was warned that unless his friend left the National Bank, the State Department would be unable to certify to Congress that Panama was making a serious effort to control narcotics trafficking, a step that would have resulted in suspension of American aid here. The United States acted in part because of an indictment that had been handed up in Chicago in May 1994 against Trans Latin Air, or T.L.A., an air cargo company in which Mr. Aleman was a major stockholder. According to the indictment, which has already resulted in several convictions, T.L.A. was one of many ” ‘front,’ ’shell’ or ‘dummy’ corporations” used by Colombian cocaine traffickers “to conceal their purchase, ownership, control, use and operation of aircraft used to transport illegal narcotics.” According to Justice Department documents supporting the Chicago indictment, many of those transactions were financed through Banaico, where Mr. Aleman was a director and vice president and secretary. In the interview here, Mr. Aleman said his role at the bank was “merely incidental.” As a member of the board, he said, “I never participated in the operational part of the bank, was not aware of its daily activities” and never saw any signs it was involved in money laundering or other illegal ventures. As for the air cargo company, he said its only mistake was to agree to lease a plane from a company that turned out to be controlled by drug smugglers. As the details of business dealings of Mr. Aleman emerge as a result of an investigation by the newspaper La Prensa, opposition parties and the press have begun to suggest that his relationship with Mr. Perez Balladares may also be tainted. Citing the example of Colombia, where aides to President Ernesto Samper have admitted accepting millions of dollars in campaign donations from the cartels, there have been calls here for an investigation into the sources of the campaign funds Mr. Aleman funneled to the President. Mr. Aleman acknowledged making a substantial personal contribution to the campaign, whose exact amount he declined to disclose, and said that, all told, he raised “about $2.5 million.” But, he added, that money “came 100 percent from Panamanian businessmen,” and the donations he himself made came out of his own pocket. “There is no reason in the world that would make me act as an intermediary for anybody,” he said. “I don’t need to do that. I have my own money, to do with it whatever I want to do.” Source : query.nytimes.com |