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Y o lu m e X X V I , N tim b e i4 35
The Age of Jazz
Belafonte shows face in
Altman’s latest flik, Kansas
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C o in m il ted Io c u ltu ra l d iv e r s ity .,
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City.
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Guiding soul
Volunteers benefit
community kids in the
back-to-school frenzy.
Carol Ettman brings years
o f musical experience to
her original, heartfelt
blues.
See Metro, page BI.
See Arts <£ Entertainment, page B2.
c : 1 ' V IT l ' V
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■
ra n c e s S c h o e n -N e w s p a p e r
U n i v e r s i t y o f O r e g o n L it a r
E u g e n e , O re g o n
97403
CIA aided crack plague
t ’s been a shock to most and it
will take years before the Cen­
tral Intelligence Agency can
polish their tarnished reputation.
It has been confirmed that throughout the
1980s, a drug ring in the San Fransisco Bay
area sold tons o f cocaine to L A . street gangs
and channeled the profits to some ofthe CIA-
run Contras in Nicaragua.
Repeated attempts to prosecute the ring’s
kingpin were thwarted by the CIA, possibly
to cover up ties between the traffickers and
Contra leaders, the San Jose Mercury News
reported in a series ofarticles after a yearlong
investigation
The newspaper’s report, based on recently
declassified federal reports, court testimony
and interviews, also alleges that the drug
network was partially responsible for the
ongoing “crack” problem in Los Angeles.
The money pipeline was created after the
Cl A combined several armies to create 5,000-
m em ber anti-co m m u n ist FDN Fuerza
D em ocratica N icaraguense (N icaraguan
Democratic Force) in m id-1981, the newspa­
per reported.
fhe same year, the drug ring sold almost a
I
Clinton touts trade record
President Clinton’s whistle-stop train
trip took him to Toledo, Ohio today where
he touted his economic record. At aChrysler
Jeep Plant, the president watched as the
two millionth Jeep Cherokee rolled off the
assembly line. This particular vehicle, with
its right-hand steering, is intended for ex­
port to Japan. Clinton said it’s evidence o f
America’s economic might under his stew­
ardship.
ton o f cocaine to the Crips and Bloods,
notorious Los Angeles gangs, for $54 mil­
lion, former FDN leader and government
informant Oscar Danilo Blandon Reyes said
“There is a saying that the ends justify the
means,” Blandon testified in 1994. “So we
started raising money for the Contra revolu­
tion.”
The Mercury- News identified the primary
buyer as Ricky Donnell Ross, or "Freeway
Rick," a notorious South-Central Los Ange­
les dealer who bought powder cocaine, turned
it into crack and sold it wholesale throughout
the city and the nation.
Blandon spent 28 months in U.S. prison
for dealing drugs, the Mercury News said.
He was released from prison in 1994
to become a full-time informant for the fed­
eral Drug Enforcement Administration, a
job which has since paid him more than
$166,000.
While Blandon is now free in Nicaragua,
Ross was convicted o f conspiracy to sell
drugs and is scheduled to be sentenced in San
Diego on Friday.
How much o f the drug ring’s profits went
to the FDN before it disbanded in 1988 still
is unclear But in his testimony, Blandon
said, “whatever we were running in L.A., the
profit was going to the Contra revolution.”
Blandon’s boss, Juan Norwin Meneses
Cantarero, was a major drug dealer and smug­
gler who ran the FDN operation out o f his
homes in Burlingame and Pacifica in North­
ern California, the paper reported.
Although records show that the U.S. gov­
ernment was aware o f Meneses’ dealings
since 1974, the Mercury News reported that
he has never been in a U.S. prison
Meneses currently is serving time in Nic­
aragua after being arrested in connection
with a 750-kilo shipment o f cocaine.
Federal prosecutors blame the CIA and
other federal departments for Meneses’ rela­
tively sweet treatment in the U.S.. the Mercu­
ry News said.
“The Justice Department flipped out to
prevent us from getting access to people,
records
anything that would help us find
out about it,” said Jack Blum, former chief
counsel to the Senate subcommittee that in­
vestigated alleged cocaine trafficking to the
Contras. “It was one o fth e most frustrating
exercises that I can ever recall.”
Dole unveils drug ad
Three hurt in
Amtrak derailment
Amtrak officials say a passenger train
slammed into an empty logging truck and
derailed, injuring at least three people. The
accident happened this morning near
Roxbury, Vt., about 15 miles southeast o f
Montpelier.
Hijacking ends peacefully
Police say the hijacking o f a Sudanese
Airways plane has ended peacefully at
London’s Stansted airport. A police offi­
cial says the hijackers were Iraqi nationals
who were apparently seeking political asy­
lum. He says there may have been as many
as eight o f them, and that seven have been
arrested.
More than 800 passengers aboard a
cruise ship in the Greek isles have been hit
by food poisoning. Greek officials say
doctors are treating the passengers aboard
the ship, but that hospitals have been put on
alert in case any o f the passengers require
further treatment.
Hood To Coast'
The annual charity run from Mt.
Hood to S e a sid e , took p lace la st
Friday and Saturday. The runners did
a relay race to win m e d a ls like th o se
show n on th e participants above.
FRONT
S E C T IO N
EDITORIAL
A2
F o rm
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CIA tied to
New Black
Holocaust:
Nation’s media finally runs|
with story
bv
P rof , M c K inlf . y B urt
s disturbing as this news may |
be, we find it equally as fright­
ening that, given the persis­
tent rumors and allegations of the I
past decade-’’that the U.S. govern­
ment is America's biggest drug deal-
er"-none ofthe respective White Hous­
es, or even a “Family Values” Con-1
gress reacted at an expected level of |
alarm. Now, this!
I he belated response from our vaunted I
free press whose “vigilance guards the I
liberties o f us all”, is no assurance at all I
that the entire story has been told I have at
hand the 1993 best-selling book written by
Michael Levine, former Drug Enforce-1
ment Agent, “The CIA and the Cocaine/
Crack Epidem ic,” (T hunder’s Mouth I
Press, N Y ). 1 assure you that our daily
press is pisi scratching the surface. Too,
busy with the O.J. Simpson trial?
(p 123) “A DI A agent in I egucigalpa, I
Honduras documented that the Honduran
m ilitary-which was then helping Oliver!
A
North and the CIA to support the anti- 1
Saiidinisia ( onlras in N icaragua ( 1 9 8 2 )-,
was the source o f more than 50 tons o f ,
cocaine smuggled into the United States in
a 15-month period or half the U.S. con-|
s u m p tio n ! ”
A former student o f mine who is on the |
local police force and who has two teenag- 1
cis had die following comments, "that’s I
the quantitative analysis, let’s look at the
qualitative’ analysis. Do you realize!
what’s being said here in terms o f an
unprecedented war conducted upon itsown I
citizens by a government gone mad. And I
I'm not just thinking of m> own daily!
conlronlalions with hopped-up kids who!
have been poisoned by these obscene bar-1
barians, allegedly the product of our finest I
universities; medical, education and other |
Republican presidential nominee Bob
Dole and his running mate Jack Kemp are
in Santa Barbara, California, for a day o f
quiet campaigning. But beginning today in
selected markets across the country the
Dole campaign is launching a new ad that
blasts the Clinton administration’s policy
on illegal drugs.
Food Poisoning
outbreak on ship
• • v.
W *
CLlu'
After an emotional opening day at their
national convention. Democrats turn their
attention today to adopting their platform
and defining the issues that separate them
from Republicans.
•
A lm usi 2S. 1996
Passing a life line
See Arts & Entertainment, page B3.
Democrats sound
centrist theme
z.
Inhumane child labor exposed
hough reliable statistics are
rare, available information sug­
gests that the number of work­
ing children remains extremely high. No
region ofthe world today is entirely free
of child labor.
Although the internationally recommend­
ed minimum age for work is 15 years and the
number o f child workers under the age o f 10
is far from negligible, almost all the data
available on child labor concerns the 10-14
age group.
The greatest numbers were found in Asia-
-44.6 million (13%)—followed by A frica-
23.6 mi 11 ion (by far the h ighest rate at 26.3%)-
-and Latin America-5.1 million (9.8%).
The International Labour Office’s (ILO)
doctrine on child labor is clear: it should be
abolished.
International labor standards reflect that
Children producing for export are
conviction, but observance o f those stan­
substantially few er than th o se
dards needs to be reinforced.
em p lo yed in activities gea red to
While ratifications o f child labor stan­
m e e tin g d o m e stic n eeds.
dards are set to increase, to date only 49 o f
ILO’s 173 member countries have ratified
where over half o f al, working children are to
the Minimum Age Convention, 1973 (No
be found.
138).
The beliefthat childhood should be devot­
O f the 49 ratifications, only 21 are from
ed to education and training, not work, is
developing countries, and none from Asia,
alreadv reflected in Convention No. 5 ( 1919),
T
HOUSING
EDUCATION
A6
A4
FAMILY
A6
S E C T IO N
which prohibits the work o f children under
the age o f 14 in industrial establishments.
Because child labor is so linked to other
key obstacles to economic and social devel­
opment, technical cooperation is a necessary
element in efforts to eradicating it.
“Trade unions,” the report continues, “are
the logical leaders for bringing child labor
abuses to light.”
The good reputation o f companies, ev en
of entire sectors, can also be at stake. Bad
publicity tying a product to child labor can
ruin years o f marketing efforts.
Big companies can avoid such risks by
“setting high standards on workers’ rights
and the use o f child labor, not only for
themselves but also for the contractors they
work with and the sub-contractors o f the
latter." f'hey can thus become a model o f
others.
“In this respect,” says the report, “recent
initiatives by important firms to establish
their own codes ofconduct or sourcing guide­
lines which prohibit the direct or indirect
employment o f children in producing their
products merit more general extension to
both national and international companies
Continued to page B6
urban facilities are devastated.”
And that was just a white cop; I can’t |
quote her what a ‘brother’ in the ranks
had to say. But, far and wide across this!
nation, millions of Americans have been I
shocked beyond belief by the treacherous
actions o f a government they loved, trust-1
ed, revered and fought and died for They
are sickened, and are letting it be known on
the internet, on talk shows, by e-mail and!
fax, by letters and phone calls to their I
congresspersons and letters-,o-the-editor I
at their daily newspapers; seminars, focus |
groups in planning.
And it is no, all jus, empathy for an I
unfairly maligned group o f their fellow |
citizens (though there is plenty o f that).
Several o f my neighbors have said, "there!
goes Mr. Dole’s tax cut, these crazy esca-1
pades are going to cost Uncle Sam a bun-
dle”-th e n adding plaintively-"I mean!
cost ‘u s’ a bundle." I know what is,
implied if the future in Portland is indica­
tive o f the national situation. I've had to |
refer several callers to the bar association,
people wanting the "name o f a good I
law yer'-w ith the idea o f seeking mon-l
etary redress for lost loved ones or proper-|
ty or both.
As I was polling my sources around the I
country for this article. I heard from a
correspondent close to the Attorney Gen-1
eral *. O ffice of a southern state. O ffic ia ls!
are seriously considering filinga suit against
the government; litigation similar in nature
I to the ‘tobacco com pany’ suits in al
number of jurisdictions. Such a suit also!
would ask for repayment o f massive ex­
penditures in law enforcement, medical!
facilities and support o f social institutions-1
-all directly attributable to the federally-
sponsored crack/cocaine epidemic
METRO
ARTS & ENT.
RELIGION
CLASSIFIEDS
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