Managua is hosting this week a meeting of the Consejo Centroamericano Intersectorial (formed by the ministers of foreign affairs, defence and interior, and the chiefs of the military and police forces). On their agenda is an issue which the US government has been pushing strongly: arms control and limitation throughout the subregion. Indeed, there is a strong possibility that after their deliberations the council members will hold a meeting with the US Undersecretary of State for political and military affairs, Lincoln Bluenfields.
The US has made it clear that it considers the conventional military forces of the subregion obsolete and would like to see them replaced by smaller, highly mobile forces trained to deal with terrorism, drug trafficking, gunrunning and natural disasters. It would also like to see the Central American arsenals cleared of any weaponry from surface-air missiles (SAMs) on the grounds that they might fall into the hands of terrorists.
The arms corridor
A recent discovery of a large hoard of assault rifles and machineguns in Panama's province of Coclé - the second one found in that area in under a year - has highlighted the fact that the subregion continues to act as a conduit for the arms-for-drugs trade with Colombia.
Panama has also just illustrated how difficult it will be to put a lid on this trade. A Panama city court has just thrown out charges against the Israeli national Shimon Yelinek for his alleged role in helping divert to Colombia via Panama, in late 2001, a shipment of about 3,000 AK-47s and some 5,000 rounds of ammunition from Nicaragua. Yelinek was cited in an investigation into the matter conducted by the OAS: he is accused of having furnished a forged Panamanian end-user certificate for the operation.
The judge based his decision on his conclusion that nothing Yelinek was accused of doing harmed the Panamanian state, and that neither Nicaragua nor Colombia had initiated any diplomatic action that might have threatened Panama. Moreover, he said, the events investigated took place in Nicaragua, beyond Panama's jurisdiction. The chief prosecutor's office is appealing the ruling.
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