Honduras This Week Central America June1999

Southcom commander calls Americas a success story
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The "inspiring success story" of the Americas lies in the fact that all countries but one have functioning democracies and market economies, whereas 20 years ago much of the region was embroiled in civil war and under dictatorial rule, says Charles Wilhelm, commander-in-chief of the U.S. Southern Command (Southcom).

Testifying June 22 before a Senate panel, Wilhelm said that one measure of progress is the growing trade within the region -- and its growing importance to the United States. To illustrate, he noted that the United States does more business every year with Chile, a country of 14.5 million people, than with India, with a population of 952 million. In another comparison, he said the United States does more business with Brazil, with 164 million people, than with China, a country of 1,300 million.

Latin Americans, he said, currently spend 44 cents of every dollar on imports from the United States. By 2000, Latin America is expected to buy more U.S. goods than does Europe, and by 2010 purchase more U.S. goods than do Europe and Japan combined. U.S. trade with the region, Wilhelm indicated, is expected to increase even more with the creation of a hemispheric free-trade zone by 2005.

These figures "point the way toward a future," Wilhelm told the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, Peace Corps, Narcotics and Terrorism, in which Latin America and the Caribbean "play a very, very important part for our country."

Wilhelm noted that for many years, people in the United States looked to Latin America and saw only problems, such as coups, military dictatorships, communist-inspired insurgencies and economic crises. However, over the last 20 years, the Caribbean and Latin America have "embraced democratic governance," he observed. The military forces of Latin America are also contributing to this process by supporting civilian authority and the rule of law. In addition, he said, "human rights are accorded more respect, and in a region where military governments and coups were commonplace, great progress has been made."

Wilhelm said he did not want to discount the fact that Latin America still has many, many problems, such as the lack of a strong middle class in a number of its countries. He conceded that many of the region's new democracies are "fragile." But he noted that there is a growing realization throughout the Americas that drug trafficking, money laundering, and organized crime are undermining the foundations of democracy and impeding economic development.

"It is against these transnational threats -- and, specifically, illicit drug trafficking -- that Southcom has framed its operations strategy," Wilhelm said.

On the subject of Colombia, which has been ravaged by a decades-long armed insurrection, Wilhelm said he was "cautiously optimistic" that the country can overcome its problems. He based this on the inauguration of President Andres Pastrana last Aug. 7 and Pastrana's installation of a "new, first-rate team" to administer the country. Wilhelm gave especially high marks to the leaders of Colombia's armed forces.

Wilhelm said that although it didn't make the front pages of U.S. newspapers, "in a quiet, effective way" the armed forces of Colombia recently inflicted defeats on guerrilla forces in three provinces of the country.

He noted that while the government of Colombia seeks a negotiated settlement with the insurgents, Colombia's military leaders are pursuing reform and restructuring initiatives that will make its security forces increasingly competitive on the battlefield.

Using maps to offer a broad overview of the 32 nations and 411 million people which lie in his area of responsibility as Southcom commander, Wilhelm said that to compensate for the U.S. withdrawal from Panama by the end of 1999, the United States is establishing a new "theater architecture" to support Southcom's two primary missions of regional engagement and counterdrug activities.

Puerto Rico, he said, will replace Panama as this country's main operating hub for those missions. The U.S. Army South, he said, will rely on the more than 16,000 Army and Air Force Guardsmen and Reservists stationed in Puerto Rico.

Wilhelm said that by relocating in Puerto Rico, "in a great many ways, this is an ideal marriage" for Southcom. Puerto Rican guardsmen and reservists are bilingual, he said, making them equally effective whether conducting engagement activities with members of English-speaking militaries in the Eastern Caribbean, or with Spanish-speaking counterparts in Central and South America.

But Wilhelm also expressed concern over what will happen to Panama once U.S. forces there leave for good, in compliance with the 1977 Panama Canal treaties.

Wilhelm said he worried about the ability of Panama's local security forces to deal with incursions by Colombian insurgents into Panama's Darien and San Blas provinces, and about Panama's ability to protect the Panama Canal. In addition, he said, "we have detected recent indications of an upsurge in drug trafficking in and around Panama."

"It will be necessary to completely reassess our security relationship with Panama as our forces depart," Wilhelm said. "We have voiced strong support for increased security assistance funding for Panama to enable the maritime service to strengthen its capabilities, and we are prepared to intensify our engagement with the Panamanian Public Forces to assist them in meeting other emerging security challenges."

U.S. treasury says there will be drug money laundering crackdown
WASHINGTON -- The United States is stepping up enforcement of money laundering laws that are being violated through the Black Market Peso Exchange, administration officials tell Congress.

"Money laundering is critical to the survival and growth of these organizations," Under Secretary of the Treasury James Johnson said of the Colombian drug cartels that convert dollars into pesos and pesos into dollars in a complex laundering scheme.

"If there are those ... willingly facilitating this criminal system, they should know that we will be vigilant" in enforcing the law, Johnson testified before the Senate Caucus on International Narcotics on June 21.

The Black Market Peso Exchange is used by money launderers to avoid the close examination U.S. banks impose on large banking transactions. Peso brokers are given credit in exchange for pesos from Colombian importers. The Colombian currency is then used to buy dirty dollars from cartels, providing the drug traffickers with clean pesos.

The brokers then use the dollars to buy goods for the importers who accept the goods as payment for the pesos. The "Peso Exchange" often affects U.S. companies that do not know they are involved in money laundering when they export indirectly through distributors, Johnson told the panel.

Bonni Tischler of the Customs Service said that U.S. companies like Whirlpool and General Electric have already cut off sales through independent distributors in Colombia, but Johnson added that the U.S. government intends to do more.

"Our response has three components," he said: enforcement, international cooperation, and the private-sector involvement system that was recently developed by a special Black Market Exchange Working Group.

Coordination by law enforcement agencies is critical, Johnson said. Thus far, direct and undercover operations have seized vast amounts of drugs and money and have resulted in thousands of arrests and prosecutions. Stepping up this regime is the law enforcement side of the equation, he added.

Beyond enforcement, he noted, "further gains depend greatly on extending this fight to the international arena." The business community in Colombia lost much of its international market because the Peso Exchange fuels the contraband market. The contraband is financed by drug money and thus offers subsidized prices "courtesy of the narcotics traffickers," Johnson observed. "There is growing recognition among governments that they must deal firmly" with these criminals, he said.

The private sector can be more involved as the Treasury Department and other agencies help businesses understand more about how the criminals work. For example, Treasury conferred with bankers in the Miami area to help employees identify suspicious activity such as repeated deposits made by the same people, including deposits smaller than those requiring a report to the Internal Revenue Service.

"We are seeing the results," Johnson told senators. Banks reported 27 suspicious actions during 1997, but that number rose to 118 during 1998 and 98 by the middle of 1999. "This collaboration will be vital," Johnson said. But he noted that it is "a two-way process. Companies need to know that their business" is being infiltrated by the Peso Exchange. "We ... would like to hear from the business community" about their efforts to stop those activities, he said.

In Geneva, Switzerland

Child rights advocate speaks at U.N. meeting on contemporary slavery
Bruce Harris, executive director for Latin American Programs of Casa Alianza/Covenant House Latin America, this week delivered a speech on child commercial sexual exploitation, organ trafficking of children, and child labor, at the 24th session of the United Nations' Working Group on Contemporary Forms of Slavery.

During the meeting, which took place June 23-25 at the Palais des Nations, in Geneva, Switzerland, Harris also talked about the work carried out by Casa Alianza against child commercial exploitation in its different forms.

Casa Alianza -- the Latin American branch of New York-based Covenant House -- is a non-profit organization dedicated to helping street children in Mexico and Central America, where 7.5 million children and teenagers are engaged in extremes forms of child labor, including sexual exploitation for commercial purposes.

The five-member Working Group on Contemporary Forms of Slavery was created in 1975, to review developments in the field of slavery, the slave trade and slavery-like practices, the traffic in persons and the exploitation of the prostitution of others, phenomena that affect children worldwide. More recently, the group underlined the existence of new forms of slavery "more complex and evil than ever," such as child sexual commercial exploitation, child labor, and sex tourism.

"Only in Guatemala, international adoptions are known to make up around 95 percent of all adoptions, generating more than US$20 million a year," commented Harris, who has become an internationally known defender of the rights of homeless kids.

"If you are an enterprising foreigner in Honduras, you can set up a bar and offer little Honduran girls for sex to the other visiting tourists. Or in Costa Rica, if you are a tourist, you can buy sex from little girls, but often only in the morning as they have to go to primary school in the afternoon," he added.

In his presentation, Harris described the worrisome boom of child sex tourism in Costa Rica and Honduras, where more and more visitors are coming each year exclusively to have sex with minors. Attacked by a complex network that involves Internet sites, local hotels and bars, taxi drivers, and "professional" pimps, numerous poor girls and boys -- as young as 10 years old -- are falling victims to those sex predators, as they find in prostitution their only means of survival.

As part of the work of Casa Alianza in Costa Rica, the infamous pimp "Tony Max" -- who had been running, with his American wife, a very successful prostitution ring for tourists in San Jose -- was finally tried, convicted and given an eight-year jail term for aggravated pimping. But due to flaws in the Costa Rican legal system, this pervert is still free and will probably face a re-trial.

Harris also referred to the different forms of child trafficking that exist in Latin America, such as illegal adoptions, abduction of babies, trafficking of children and adolescents by prostitution networks, and trafficking of children by the military.

In terms of child labor, Harris pointed out that of the 250 million child laborers in the world, 30 million live in Latin America and the Caribbean, according to statistics by the International Labor Organization (ILO).

In Guatemala, for example, 200,000 of the 756,711 children and teenagers who belong to the Economically Active Population do not attend school, and work is their main reason for dropping out of school when they reach the sixth grade.

In its last meeting, the Working Group on Contemporary Forms of Slavery recommended, among others, to urge states to strengthen the monitoring, prosecution and punishment of police and government officials who are responsible for complicity in trafficking and the exploitation of prostitution.

Harris, an Englishman, was invited to Geneva by the Board of Trustees of the United Nations Voluntary Trust Fund on Contemporary Forms of Slavery. Based in Central America, Harris has headed the Latin American programs of Covenant House since August 1989.

Large U.S. company to locate business center in Costa Rica
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- One of the world's largest manufacturers of health and beauty supply products, the Procter & Gamble company, has announced that a restructuring of its global operations will include the building of a regional business center in Costa Rica.

A company spokeswoman said construction of the $60 million Global Business Services center will begin in several months, after a site in San Jose has been selected. The center will be "up and running" in three to five years, the spokeswoman said, adding that eventually the center will provide about 1,500 jobs.

The center will offer in one central location such business activities as finance and accounting services, customer order services, employee services involved with payroll and travel management, purchases, and information technology. The company said this "strategic work center offers the greatest opportunity to meet the quality needs of customers in the most efficient and timely manner."

The Ohio-based company chose Costa Rica over 20 other sites for a number of reasons, the spokeswoman said, including the country's progressive government, the "reasonable level" of foreign investment in the country already, the percentage of Gross Domestic Product spent on education and the teaching of English-language skills, the country's high literacy and graduation rates, the number of people with technical and computer skills, and the number of students enrolled in engineering and business courses.

Costa Rican president Miguel Angel Rodriguez, who joined a Procter & Gamble official in San Jose for the June 10 announcement for the center, said the company "honors Costa Rica with its decision and brings with it a new way of organizing business. This is a destiny tied with our capacity as a country to open ourselves up and attract quality companies -- and in Procter & Gamble, we couldn't hope for better."

The spokeswoman said Procter & Gamble employs 110,000 people worldwide and does business in 140 countries. Its products include soaps, cosmetics, aftershaves, cleansers, toothpaste and potato chips. The company will also have similar global business centers in Newcastle, England; Brussels, Belgium; Prague, Czech Republic; Kobe, Japan; Manila, Philippines; Guangzhou, China; and in Singapore.

Costa Rica's local trade promoter, the Costa Rican Coalition for Development Initiative (CINDE) is accepting job applications for Procter & Gamble at its reception desk in San Jose or via e-mail at <rcarvajal@cinde.or.cr>

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In San Jose, Costa Rica

Two women arrested for running underage prostitution house

Members of the Costa Rican Public Prosecutor's Office for Sexual Crimes, along with the Police Information Center (CIFP), last Friday (June 11) conducted a raid on an underage prostitution house, in San Jose, that resulted in the detention of two Guatemalan women expected to be charged for also running an underage prostitution network.

The operation, which was carried out with assistance from officers of the Costa Rican Judicial Investigative Police (OIJ), began at 10 p.m. and lasted about five hours. Ten girls aged between 13 and 17 years old were found to be working in the house and a 2-month-old baby, abandoned by its mother, was also discovered.

As a result of the initiative Guatemalans Zaida Rodas and her daughter Solotof Rodas were detained and taken to the Buen Pastor prison for women; it's alleged that they are responsible for the running of the underage prostitution ring located in the vicinity of the San Jose's Social Protection Committee.

Zaida Rodas has, according to police sources, been arrested once before for the same crime, but was given a conditional release. However, she and her daughter are now expected to face new criminal charges.

Casa Alianza, a non-profit advocacy group for children working in Mexico and Central America and which has its headquarters in San Jose, Costa Rica, welcomes this latest initiative by the Costa

Rican authorities and applauds the professional conduct of the CIFP and the Public Prosecutor's Office. The organization hopes that this will be the first of a series of initiatives designed to crack down on the grave problem of child prostitution in Costa Rica and bring to justice those who exploit innocent children for their own financial ends.

Huge increase predicted in Latin American Internet use
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The number of Latin American Internet users is expected to grow to 34 million people by 2000, a 485 percent jump since 1997, says the chief economist of a firm that provides financial services and information in Latin America.

At a June 2 press conference, Gregory Keough, founder of Zona Financiera, said that figure compares to the 72 million people in the United States now using the Internet, and 250 million worldwide. He noted that the IBM company projects a 50 fold increase in the use of the Internet for transactions in Latin America from $200 million today to more than $10,000 million a year in 2003.

Keough said Internet use is at the "beginning of the curve" in growth penetration in Latin America. This means, he said, that only about five percent of the homes and seven percent of the businesses in the region have personal computers, which is considered a key to allowing people to go on-line.

Keough, who was the subject of a feature article in the May issue of Forbes Magazine for starting Zona Financiera in 1997, said Internet use in Latin America is growing because it allows people there for the first time ever to "comparison shop" for products on-line. His company, headquartered in Falls Church, Virginia, with offices in five Latin American countries, offers a place where Spanish and Portuguese-speaking users of the Internet can comparison-shop for a mortgage, a car loan or insurance, as well as check stock quotes and financial news.

Previously, Keough said, if someone wanted to get the best deal on a mortgage loan or obtain interest rate information from a bank, it was necessary to call or go to every single bank for that information. On the Internet, however, a person can comparison-shop at the click of a mouse switch. In addition, he added, the Internet allows people to transact a loan on-line.

Keough said surveys show that Internet users in Latin America average about age 29, and the average Internet user is on line about 9.7 percent of the time per week, which is less than in the United States, but three hours more than in Europe. Some 76 percent of the users are employed, he said, which is "good news" because that means they usually qualify for financial service products. Another key statistic, he said, is that 83 percent own a credit card, allowing a customer to purchase products on-line.

Surveys also show, he said, that 71 percent of Latin American users have been on-line for over a year. That means, Keough said, that Latin Americans "are getting on-line and staying on-line. They're not trying out" the system and then abandoning it.

But perhaps the most "astounding" statistic, he said, is that almost 30 percent of Latin American Internet users have made a purchase on-line.

"That's pretty incredible," he said, "because in the United States it took us a long time to get up" to that number. "I think it goes to a basic fact that we've seen" about Latin American consumers -- that they are twice as likely to transact a purchase on line than consumers elsewhere in the world."

Keough said that internet growth "presents opportunities" for Latin America in allowing countries of the region to rapidly interact with each other and with other parts of the world in sharing information and resources."

Keough noted that not all parts of Latin America demonstrate the same rate of increase in Internet use. Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, and Venezuela have the fastest growth rates, he said, but noted that other countries, such as those in Central America, "are not lagging that far behind." Internet use in Central America is at about 250,000 people, with Costa Rica making up the bulk of that figure.

Conference will examine global services trade with Americas
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The Organization of American States will be one of the sponsors of a July 8-9 conference on liberalizing trade in services in the Western Hemisphere as part of the process to create a Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) by 2005.

Sponsors say the conference, to be held in San Jose, Costa Rica, has three main goals: to examine critical issues under the World Trade Organization's General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) negotiations; to analyze the approach that various sub-regional agreements in the hemisphere have adopted toward services liberalization; and to explore the services discussions at the FTAA level.

The conference will also include workshops devoted to financial services, electronic commerce, and telecommunications.

The sponsors, who also include Costa Rica's Ministry of Foreign Trade and the Inter-American Development Bank, say that in raising awareness of these issues in the Western Hemisphere, the conference "aims to serve as a building block" to the World Services Congress, scheduled to take place this November in Atlanta, Georgia.

Topics at San Jose will include the prospects for growth in the services industry in the Americas, creating the climate for hemispheric investment in services, integrating domestic service sectors into the world economy, developing regulatory principles for service industries, and examining the link between services and investment in multilateral and regional trade negotiations.

The conference is targeting an audience of government officials from the hemisphere who are responsible for service negotiations, along with leading private-sector executives from prominent service industries, representatives of national service coalitions, and academics. Sponsors estimate that about 150 people will attend the conference.

Scheduled participants from the United States include William Yue, a senior advisor at the Department of Commerce, who will speak on the North American Free Trade Agreement's innovations with respect to services liberalization; Pierre Sauve, from Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government; and Robert Vastine, president of the U.S. Coalition of Service Industries.

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Foreign ministers' statement on FTAA process
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Creating the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) remains "the firm determination" of the governments of the Americas, according to the three countries serving as the tripartite leadership of the Summit of the Americas Implementation Review Group, whose acronym is SIRG.

In a June 7 statement issued from Guatemala City, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, Chilean Minister of Foreign Affairs Jose Miguel Insulza, and Canadian Minister of Foreign Affairs Lloyd Axworthy said they are satisfied with the progress being made to complete negotiations on building the hemispheric free-trade zone, which would stretch from Canada to Argentina, by 2005, the target date set at the 1994 Summit of the Americas in Miami and reiterated at the 1998 Summit in Santiago, Chile.

Albright and Axworthy were participating in a meeting in Cologne, Germany, on the Kosovo situation when the statement was released, but they gave it their full endorsement, a State Department official said.

The statement "essentially commends the progress being made on implementing the Plan of Action" developed at the 1998 Summit of the Americas in Santiago, Chile, the Department official said. "It also commends the SIRG itself for its overview and evaluation of compliance" with Summit mandates -- such as in education, civil society, corruption, and prevention and control of consumption and

trafficking in drugs and psychotropic substances. The SIRG has been assigned the task of developing themes that hemispheric heads of state may wish to examine at the next Summit of the Americas to be held in Quebec City, Canada in 2001.

Nine negotiating groups and three committees have been meeting in successive rounds in Miami to advance the Summit negotiations, the three foreign ministers said, "with a view to drafting an annotated outline or report on each of the areas by the time this first stage is completed in September 1999." In turn, these documents will be submitted for consideration at the FTAA hemispheric trade ministerial to be held in Toronto, Canada this November, the ministers said.

In addition to the SIRG, the Summit process is being implemented with the assistance of the Organization of American States, the Inter-American Development Bank, the Pan American Health Organization, the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, and the World Bank.

C.A. to receive $9 billion for reconstruction

STOCKHOLM, Sweden -- The international community has agreed to pledge US$9,000 million for the reconstruction of the Central American countries affected by Hurricane Mitch and for the Guatemalan peace process.

The announcement was made by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the World Bank, which stated in a press release that a substantial part of the amount is concessionary financing and includes debt relief, redirection of existing projects and special projects with priorities given to the task of reconstruction and transformation of the hurricane-affected countries.

It was also announced that the Central American Bank of Economic Integration (CABEI) will continue its present line of financing to the region, particularly to the private sector.

High-level delegates from over 50 delegations representing donor nations and communities as well as multilateral lending and development agencies took part in the meeting of the Consultative Group for the Reconstruction and Transformation of Central America, which took place in Stockholm May 25-28.

IDB President Enrique V. Iglesias said, "This is an outstanding example of solidarity by the international community, in support of a region that had moved from war to peace, from dictatorship to democracy, and was suddenly struck by the tragedy of Hurricane Mitch."

The international community's support will help finance plans to rebuild damaged infrastructure, launch social programs and implement important reforms in Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala and El Salvador, which suffered massive human and economic losses due to the floods and landslides triggered by the hurricane in October. Assistance will also be directed to Costa Rica in recognition of the indirect effects of the hurricane, namely, massive emigration from neighboring countries. In addition, support will be given for the strengthening of the disaster prevention system and environmental protection programs.

The Central American leaders who addressed the meeting expressed satisfaction for the recognition by donors of their progress in the 1990s, while indicating that the support offered will allow them to rebuild, not the same, but a better Central America.

Central American authorities said they were committed to upholding their hard-won peace, macroeconomic stability, the rule of law and good governance. They also noted that, notwithstanding the international community's ample support, the responsibility of their recovery would rest with their own nations.

Honduran President Carlos Flores addressed the meeting and explained the needs of his country and his commitment with the principles that guided the preparation of the Plan.

Honduras, where 5,657 people died, over 8,000 missing and more than 1.5 million people suffered losses due to the hurricane, presented a five-year, $4.0 billion reconstruction master plan. The proposal consists of programs and projects to repair and improve the infrastructure, rebuild the industries and revive the farming sector, reform social programs such as health and education, establish risk management policies to prevent disasters and manage public resources transparently and efficiently.

Donors urged Honduran authorities to continue to engage the participation of civil society in the reconstruction efforts, building on the very active involvement of such groups during the hurricane emergency.

Mitch's impact on Honduras' export crops and industry, coupled with the high costs of reconstruction, is widening its fiscal and trade balance deficits. In view of the shortfalls foreseen for 1999-2000, the success of the Honduran economic program will rest largely on the availability of sufficient external resources, including new grants and confessional loans, as well as significant debt relief, a paper prepared by the IDB, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank said.

Nicaragua put forward a five-year, identifying need of $2.5 billion, of which $1.3 billion have been prioritized. The plan included important steps of consultation and involvement of civil society in its formulation. The plan focuses on four areas: social sectors, infrastructure, rural development and governance.

Nicaraguan President Arnoldo Aleman highlighted Nicaragua's need for confessional assistance and accelerated debt alleviation under the initiative for Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC), and called for greater access to world markets for Nicaraguan exports.

Donors concurred that debt reduction is essential to Nicaragua's future sustainability and development prospects. They also referred to the need for Nicaragua to increase its capacity to absorb aid, establish transparency mechanisms and recommended that the government establish specific targets and deadlines for implementing programs. Several donors also stressed the importance of strengthening Nicaragua's Comptrollers office.

El Salvador presented a comprehensive 10-year, $1.81 billion plan that seeks to address natural hazards by improving watershed management and proposes to use rural development programs as a means to target better assistance for the poor and avoid raising environmental risks.

Donors congratulated El Salvador for preparing an excellent plan in close consultation with its civil society and with the coming administration of new President Francisco Flores, who endorsed the plan put forward in Stockholm. They also recommended a strengthening of regional cooperation to manage shared river basins.

Guatemala's reconstruction plan included programs with an estimated cost of $830 million and was incorporated as a complementary part of the program to implement the 1997 Peace Accords. The Guatemalan government also offered donors a frank and full update on their country's current macroeconomic situation and the status of the agreements that put an end to more than three decades of civil war.

They also discussed results of the recent referendum with Guatemalan authorities and representatives of the civil society, who reaffirmed their commitment to the peace process. Donors welcomed this statement and encouraged the government to continue with every possible effort to keep the peace process in track.

The international community explicitly and unanimous recognized Costa Rica for the broad amnesty granted to Central American immigrants, mostly Nicaraguans who lived in a irregular migratory situation in that country. Donors also encouraged the use of Costa Rican expertise and environmental protection, disaster prevention, early warning and emergency release as a moral for the rest of the region.

During the Stockholm meeting a series of workshops were held to discuss key issues such as transparency and governance, social and environmental vulnerability and decentralization and local development. Working groups on other issues of regional interest, such as trade and migration, were also held here this week.

Government officials from beneficiary and donor countries, representatives from international organizations and leader of non-governmental organizations and civil society groups took part in those workshops, which generated a useful framework and practical recommendations for countries to fight corruption, abate natural hazards and build stronger, more accountable democracies.

Proposed follow-up national meetings will be organized early in 2000 in Tegucigalpa and Managua. Regional issues will be discussed at a Regional Consultative meeting that will be organized in 2000 in Madrid, thanks to a generous offer of the Spanish Government.

World Bank to hold development conference on Americas
WASHINGTON -- The World Bank will hold its fifth annual Conference on Development in Latin America and the Caribbean in Valdivia, Chile, from June 20-22; this year's theme will be "Decentralization and Accountability of the Public Sector."

According to a Bank press release, about 350 people are expected to attend, including ministers of finance, governors of central banks, and government leaders from the region.

The conference will be co-sponsored by the Bank's Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) Regional Office, in conjunction with Chile's Ministry of Finance. Private-sector representatives, staff from international and non-governmental organizations, journalists and academics will also participate, the Bank said, adding that prominent fiscal specialists, political scientists and policymakers have agreed to take part in panel discussions.

The conference will explore such subjects as: making local governments accountable to average persons in cities and villages; making decentralization compatible with macroeconomic stability; equity and decentralization; and recent developments in subnational tax regimes.

Breakout sessions will feature discussions on decentralization, education, decentralized environmental management, public health, road systems, local property taxes, integrated management of local sanitation, access to credit markets by states and municipalities, and capacity-building for local delivery of services.

Among those expected to attend are Guillermo Perry from the World Bank; J.A. Ocampo, director of the Chile-based United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean; Eduardo Aninat, Chile's Minister of Finance; Ramon Borges from the John Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies in Washington; Ronald MacLean, former mayor of La Paz, Bolivia; and Rene Safirio, the present mayor of Temuco, Chile.

The World Bank will also host a conference June 17-18 in Buenos Aires, Argentina, about international economic integration.

According to organizers, the "Conference on Integration and Contagion" will highlight new research and analyze the policy options available to Latin American countries, and examine the performance of the global financial system during the recent economic crisis that struck Asia and other parts of the world.

Organizers say the conference will center on three main themes: the international transmission of shocks through trade links, the transmission of shocks through financial links, and policy responses to these shocks.

The aim of the conference, organizers say, is "to create a forum where academics, policy-makers, and business leaders will meet and discuss their views on these issues."

Among those scheduled to make presentations at the conference are Nouriel Roubini from the White House Council of Economic Advisors; Ricardo Hausmann, chief economist at the Inter-American Development Bank; and Shahid Javed Burki, regional vice president of the World Bank.

More U.S. troops withdrawn from Panama Canal
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- About 500 additional U.S. military personnel have been withdrawn from the Panama Canal, as the United States prepares to transfer control of the 81 kilometer-long waterway to Panama on Dec. 31.

With the latest withdrawal May 25 of the 245th Support Battalion from Fort Clayton, on the Pacific side of the Canal, the United States now has fewer than 3,000 troops in the region, according to Larry Winchel, a spokesman for the U.S. Southern Command (Southcom) which has jurisdiction over U.S. military operations in 32 countries in Central and South America.

The U.S. withdrawal from the Canal is "proceeding on schedule" in accordance with the 1977 Panama Canal treaties under which control of the Canal shifts to Panama by the end of the 20th century, Winchel said.

Winchel said in an interview from Southcom in Panama that the withdrawal is "going very well, and the government of Panama is making good use" of the buildings and other facilities that the United States is leaving behind.

By the end of 1999, all Southcom personnel are scheduled to be out of Panama and moved to new quarters at Fort Buchanan, Puerto Rico, Winchel said. Between now and the end of the year, he added, the United States will maintain a "caretaker force" until the U.S. flag is lowered at the Canal for the last time.

According to the "Tropic Times," the U.S. army newspaper at Fort Clayton, the 245th Battalion "faced many unique challenges, from compliance with the Panama Canal Treaty to deployments throughout Latin America in support of nation building, counterdrug and peacekeeping operations."

Ever since the 245th was activated in 1995 in Panama, said the paper, the unit has participated in local humanitarian projects such as helping with community construction projects in Panama City. In 1998, the paper said, the unit also provided logistical support to the multinational observer mission helping to keep the peace along the border between Ecuador and Peru, and in 1999 provided hurricane disaster relief to Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala in the wake of Hurricane Mitch.

"Without hesitation," said the paper, "the soldiers and equipment from this unit deployed to the devastated countries to rebuild the infrastructure and reestablish the basic necessities such as food, water, and shelter."

The paper also noted that another U.S. military unit, the 5th Battalion, 87th Infantry Brigade, which has been in Panama since 1987, was "inactivated" May 20. The paper noted that the brigade was created "to be functional in the unique environment" of the jungle conditions of Panama.

Charles Taylor, commander of the unit, said in an inactivation ceremony that the 87th "served in Panama specifically for force protection and defense of the canal." The inactivation, he said, "will mark . . . the close of what was started" in 1903 when United States construction of the Canal began.

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Bushnell named U.S. ambassador to Guatemala

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- President Clinton will nominate Prudence Bushnell as ambassador to the Republic of Guatemala, the White House said in a May 12 press release.

Bushnell, of Virginia, is a career member of the Foreign Service. She joined the Foreign Service in 1981 after a successful training career in the public and non-profit sector. Assignments in Dakar, Senegal, and Bombay, India, were followed by a tour at the Foreign Service Institute directing the Department of State's executive development program.

Bushnell, who is presently ambassador to Kenya, was born in Washington, D.C., and educated in Germany, France, Pakistan and Iran. She holds a Liberal Arts Degree from the University of Maryland and a Masters Degree in Public Administration from Russell Sage College.

New attitude saves sea turtles in El Salvador
For centuries, olive ridley sea turtles have lumbered ashore on El Salvador's Pacific coast, laying dozens of eggs in nests dug on a stretch of beach now called Barra del Santiago. Some 45 years ago, they bumped into the first humble human habitations on the beach. As more houses appeared, fewer nest were made and these were quickly plundered by people, their domestic animals, and natural enemies. Like sea turtle populations everywhere, the olive ridleys of Barra del Santiago are now in grave danger of disappearing.

What will save the turtles, according to Francisco Rivas Mendez, president of Asociacion Amigos del Arbol (Friends of the Tree Association, or AMAR), is a change in attitude among the 5,000 people that share Barra de Santiago with sea turtles. AMAR has worked in the area for 10 years, fostering a new attitude toward sea turtles and other bounty from the sea and surrounding mangrove forests.

Knowing it would be impossible to forbid people to take turtle eggs, the groups worked out a compromise with residents. During the May through November nesting season, the community designates certain days when no eggs at all may be taken. Only people from the community with permits may harvest eggs on the other days. According to Rivas, "The environmental division of the civil police and the national marines patrol the beaches to ensure everyone has the required permits."

From each nest of about 95 eggs, collectors give AMAR two dozen, the rest are sold in markets throughout El Salvador. In exchange for the eggs, AMAR, offers such goods as fishing supplies, machetes, or clothes.

AMAR quickly reburies the eggs in protected nests, taking as much data as they can on how many were buried and under what conditions, and how many healthy hatchlings dig their way out 45 days later. Most of the hatchlings are set free in the sea often by fishermen who carry them out beyond the dangerous surf, with its predatory birds circling above and hungry fish patrolling below. AMAR has released about 40,000 baby turtles over the years, says Rivas.

AMAR keeps some of the hatchlings in tanks for environmental education programs with local schoolchildren and a December celebration that has become an important tradition in Barra del Santiago. Called the "Christmas Gift to the Sea," the festival includes the community's prayers of thanks to the sea estuaries, and mangrove forests for providing sustenance. In a parade of boats, fishermen release the tank-nurtured to cheers and applause.

Brazilian biologist Claudette Mo, who has studied olive ridleys in Costa Rica, says that it is difficult to assess whether this kind of program really benefits sea turtle populations. "The perfect solution from the turtles' point of view would be to have a pristine nesting beach, with no human presence al all," she says. "However, this is not possible...so I do believe we should minimize impact by both creating new attitudes and guarding at least some percentage of the nests."

Rivas reports that the residents of Barra de Santiago no longer kill sea turtles and keep the beaches much cleaner than they were 10 years ago. "People watch the beach and tell us where the nests are and if eggs are stolen," he adds. AMAR, which is supported in part by the initiative for the Americas fund, the Environmental Fund of El Salvador, the U.S. Agency for International Development, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, is also offering women in the community courses in sewing, ecotourism, and boat repair. Rivas hopes that with economic alternatives, residents will eventually be able to leave the turtles in peace. -- EC0-EXCHANGE

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