Pubdate: Wed, 28 Feb 2001
Source: Washington Post (DC)
Copyright: 2001 The Washington Post Company
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Author: Karen DeYoung, Washington Post Staff Writer

BUSH BACKS COLOMBIA ON TRADE

President Bush said yesterday that he will push for the renewal and 
expansion of a regional trade agreement sought by Colombia to boost its 
economy and provide alternative jobs for people involved in illegal drug 
cultivation and trafficking.

"Absolutely . . . I'll be pushing it," Bush told reporters before he sat 
down for a 45-minute meeting with Colombian President Andres Pastrana at 
the White House. "I'm a free-trader."

But while he will "be glad to help Colombia in any way to make the peace" 
and to bolster its economy through trade, Bush said, he will decline an 
invitation from Colombia's largest guerrilla group to observe its peace 
negotiations with the government. "This is an issue that the Colombian 
people and the Colombian president can deal with," he said.

Both sides declared themselves pleased with yesterday's meeting, Pastrana's 
first at the Bush White House. Pastrana briefed Bush on the status of Plan 
Colombia, his government's military and social development program to 
eradicate hundreds of thousands of acres of coca and heroin poppies, the 
raw materials of cocaine and heroin.

The plan calls for the Colombian army to defeat opposing armies of leftist 
guerrillas and right-wing paramilitary forces who control drug-producing 
areas, allowing the government to provide security and development aid for 
the local populations. The United States has contributed $1.3 billion to 
the effort, primarily for military training and equipment.

Despite widespread acknowledgment of the high volume of Colombian drug 
exports to this country, the U.S. military involvement has strong critics 
who question the Colombian army's human rights record and who fear that 
U.S. involvement could escalate. But the Bush administration has voiced its 
support for continuing aid, and it is expected to allot substantial funds 
for Colombia in its budget.

During his four-day visit here, Pastrana sought to refocus the discussion 
over U.S. involvement in Colombia away from drug trafficking, guerrilla 
wars and human rights. Instead, he emphasized the importance of increased 
trade and foreign investment to his country's long-term stability. He won 
Bush's support for renewal of the Andean Trade Preference Act, a 1991 
program due to expire in December.

Colombia also wants the pact, which eliminates U.S. tariffs on 6,000 
products from the Andean region, expanded to include textiles, apparel and 
other leading exports. Without the agreement, Pastrana has said, Colombia 
could lose hundreds of thousands of jobs to exports from Caribbean 
countries that benefited from a separate trade deal last year.

Emerging from its worst recession in 60 years, Colombia has a 20 percent 
unemployment rate, and Pastrana has said that the only way to keep more 
Colombians from turning to drug cultivation or joining the guerrillas and 
paramilitaries is to provide them with jobs in a strong economy. A senior 
Bush administration official said that Pastrana also "talked about his 
government's plans to attract more investment in the energy sector." 
Colombian exports to the United States totaled $7 billion last year, nearly 
twice the value of U.S. exports to Colombia.

Bush, who said it was "my honor to welcome a friend of our country to the 
Oval Office," said he and Pastrana had also discussed efforts to reduce 
demand for drugs in the United States. "I explained to the president that 
we're fully aware of the narcotics that are manufactured in his country but 
also told him that many of them wouldn't be manufactured if our nation 
didn't use them. And we've got to work together to not only help Colombia, 
but help our own country," Bush said.

In brief comments to reporters after the meeting, Pastrana said he had 
suggested that the United States participate in a group of foreign 
observers monitoring his government's talks with the Revolutionary Armed 
Forces of Colombia, the country's largest guerrilla group. "We think it's 
important," Pastrana said.

The European Union and several Latin American countries plan to participate 
in a March 8 meeting with the guerrilla organization, known by its Spanish 
initials FARC, and both the United States and Cuba are invited. But the 
United States has refused all contact with the FARC since the group 
acknowledged killing three American humanitarian workers in 1999.

White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. and national security adviser 
Condoleezza Rice attended Bush's meeting with Pastrana. It was conducted in 
English, which Pastrana speaks fluently. But Bush ended the pre-meeting 
photo opportunity and question session by shooing reporters out of the Oval 
Office with a shout of "Adios."
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