Panama Update Archives
| November 1999 Back to Panama Update New Government Tries Out its Legs Since the inauguration of Mireya Moscoso as Panama's first woman president on September 1, her administration's actions have been a mix of returning political favors and new initiatives consonant with the party's aspirations. Moscoso has put a brake on the series of privatization measures carried out by the previous government of Ernesto Pérez Balladares, by pledging not to privatize the country's water utility, IDAAN. The new government did fire 55 IDAAN employees (out of the agency's nearly 2,800), leading to a work stoppage in November. The government has also put forward legislation to repeal a controversial censorship law passed during the military dictatorship, and to fire the chiefs of the port authority, public registry and the Interoceanic Region Authority. The latter is run by former World Bank vice-president Nicolás Ardito Barletta and is responsible for all lands transferring to Panama under the canal treaties. Moscoso has also appointed Juan Jované, a progressive economist who worked in Nicaragua during the years of the Sandinista revolution, to run Panama's social security agency, which manages the country's public hospitals. The new president's approach to relations with the United States, as Washington prepares to turn over the canal, is ambiguous. Moscoso's ambassador in Washington is Guillermo Ford, vice-president of Panama from 1990 to 1994, who has pledged to maintain "open doors" to U.S. investment in Panama. Moscoso met with President Clinton for half an hour on October 19, and reportedly raised four points. First, she urged Clinton to attend the official canal transfer ceremony on December 14, an event which "many people in the administration... are looking for a way out of," according to one U.S. official. Moscoso reassured Clinton about the security of the canal and canal operations, to which he reportedly responded that he is not worried. Finally, Moscoso raised the thorny problem of cleanup of explosive firing ranges transferred to Panama this past June and August. Test of U.S.-Panama Relations A special test of the "new relationship" between the two countries during and after the canal transition is the problem of cleaning up explosives and other hazards left by the United States on military bases and firing ranges. When Moscoso spoke to the United Nations on September she expressed "confidence that the differences existing on this point will be resolved in a reasonable time." Foreign Minister José Miguel Alemán was more direct. "We have to be firm and demanding with the United States that it must fulfill to the letter what was agreed in the canal treaties so that, regarding what they cannot repair, they give us the economic support that Panama requires," he said. La Prensa reported that during the presidents' October 19 meeting, Moscoso asserted that the United States has not fulfilled Canal Treaty obligations to remove hazards to human health and safety from military installations before withdrawal. Clinton replied that the U.S. position is that it has complied with its treaty obligations, but that he was aware that Panama differs on this point, and that his government would make a greater effort to resolve the problem. But that is not how the meeting went, according to the State Department's Panama desk officer, James Benson. Benson told Panamá Update that Moscoso raised the issue in very general terms, and that Foreign Minister José Miguel Alemán said that Panama was awaiting the results of a technical study, which would determine whether Panama believes the United States has fulfilled its treaty obligations. Benson reported that Clinton told Moscoso that "we'll be working with the government of Panama on environmental issues," but not necessarily on the cleanup problem. Panama has hired the prestigious Washington law firm Arnold & Porter to represent its interests in cleanup negotiations. But many people believe that time is running out to address the ranges, which the Defense Department admits still contain more than 100,000 pieces of unexploded ordnance. Moscoso fired or transferred many of the officials who had worked on the issue for years under the previous government and appointed new people who need time to get up to speed on the problem. There is no legal reason why the United States cannot undertake cleanup of former installations in Panama after the Canal Treaty expires on December 31 of this year. The Clinton administration made just such an ex gratia agreement with Canada in 1996 for $100 million to clean up six former U.S. military sites. However, internal Defense Department policy and attention on the canal transfer will make it politically much more difficult to conclude a cleanup agreement with Panama after 1999. The real question, notes Panamanian activist Gisele McCray Brito, is what priority Panama is giving to negotiation of a cleanup agreement. "If the affected country is not interested in the health of its citizens, then [the U.S. Congress] will not worry about the people of host countries," she wrote. According to one Panamanian official, who requested anonymity, the new government is interested in tying cleanup of the ranges to other discussions with the United States about security agreements. Both range cleanup and Panama's security strategy were reportedly on the agenda for high-level meetings between the two governments in Washington on November 22 [see related story]. Chemical Discoveries The problem of chemical weapons abandoned by the United States in Panama also took a dramatic turn in July after the discovery of what appear to be nerve agent projectiles in Empire Range, an explosives range located on the banks of the canal which was transferred to Panama in August. One of the projectiles, thought to have contained sarin gas, is in the possession of Panama's Foreign Ministry. Another 40 of the same projectiles were taken away by U.S. authorities, according to a Panamanian police source who accompanied cleanup operations on Empire Range. The discovery has potentially large implications, as it gives Panama new evidence for a request to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), located in the Hague, to inspect former U.S. military sites suspected of containing chemical munitions. The OPCW is the international agency established by the Chemical Weapons Convention for enforcing the Convention, which has been ratified by both the United States and Panama. According to documents released to the Fellowship of Reconciliation under the Freedom of Information Act, the U.S. Army Tropic Test Center planned to test 29 sarin-filled 115-millimeter rockets in 1964-1966. The United States also shipped an unknown quantity of sarin projectiles to the Canal Zone in June 1957, according to the Defense Department's chronology of chemical weapons shipments. Movement records show no return shipment of the projectiles. Panamanian officials prepared a formal note to the OPCW in August about the finding of sarin projectiles, which outgoing Foreign Minister Jorge Ritter reportedly signed two days before leaving office. The new government, however, has not disclosed whether the OPCW has responded to the note. Sources: La Prensa 9/13; 10/20; 11/19/99; El Panamá América 11/13; 11/21/99;Los Angeles Times 11/11/99; U.S. Southern Command, "Executive Summary: 1999 Range Clearance Activities," May 3, 1999.
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