23/05/01 UNITED STATES CIA Tainted by Jordan-L. America Link
"http://www.intelligenceonline.com/detail/detail_ART/p_detail.asp?DOC_I_ID=1 927831&Context=BOI&ContextInfos=can_art_SommaireINT&CodeAffilie=A_INDIGO"
New allegations concerning the CIA's alleged connection with cocaine dealing in Latin America are bubbling to the surface in the wake of fresh elements in the investigation into the so-called Jordan-Latina Connection, a traffic in arms to Peru and Colombia by Jordan go-betweens. The traffic is said to involve CIA agents in both Latin America and the Middle East and government officials in Peru and Jordan.
As Intelligence Newsletter revealed last September (IN 389), the trade consisted of delivering weapons to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerillas and to the Medelin cartel in exchange for cocaine.
The military gear was officially ordered by Peru from Jordan in 1998 and was flown by a chartered Ukrainian IL-76 from Amman. However, when the aircraft landed at Francisco Secada airport in Iquitos in Peru's Amazon region the weapons were off-loaded and later air dropped to FARC guerillas in Colombia' s Caqueta province. The plane returned laden with cocaine from FARC and made fuelling-up stopovers in Guyana, the Canary Islands, Trinidad, Azores, Grenada, Surinam, Algeria, Mauritania and Cape Verde. The Peru-FARC deal reportedly involved a Lebanese-Armenian international arms dealer named Sarkis Soghanalian, who is currently serving a jail sentence in Los Angeles for bank fraud.
Although Soghanalian denies he knew about the weapons diversion to FARC, Peru's former president, Alberto Fujimori and his intelligence chief Vladimiro Montesinos were reportedly involved. Montesinos, who was code-named "The Doctor" by the CIA who is now on the run - helped organize the traffic by delivering fake end-user's certificates for the Jordanian authorities.
People close to an investigation into the affair allege the CIA was fully aware of Montesinos' activity and that the CIA may have benefited financially from the distribution of cocaine in the Middle East.
What could have led the CIA to turn a blind eye to the traffic? According to legislators who testified before the Senate's intelligence committee, the CIA might have reckoned the weapons delivery to FARC would help continue the spiral of violence in Colombia and thus justify Washington's Plan Colombia, a program aimed at gaining more military and intelligence influence in the entire Andes region.
INTELLIGENCE NEWSLETTER N° 406
_________________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com