Approved For Release 2003/09/0|f:j5(lAtROP^
v6L.296frlMER94
1001900750004-7
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U.S. fears
in Mexico
Tentative ID made
of decomposed body
By James Bock
Mexico City Bureau of The Sun
MEXICP CITY - the body of a
kidnapped American drug agent has
. apparently been found at a Mexican
ranch, U.S. officials here said yester-
day-
.
Ambassador John Gavin
said
a
“preliminary
identification”
left
only “a
frail and flimsy hope” that
the badly decomposed body was not
that of Enrique Camarena Salazar, a
37-year-old veteran drug agent. Mr.
Camarena was kidnapped February
7 by four armed men outside the U.S.
Consulate in Guadalajara.
Another
body
recovered
at
El
Mareno, a ranch 90 miles southeast
.
of
Guadalajara,
was
tentatively
identified as that of Alfredo Zavala
Avelar, a Mexican pilot involved in
..... the joint U.S.-Mexican drug eradica-
tion program who was kidnapped the
sStjie
day
as
Mr.
Camarena
in
Guadalajara.
El Mareno was the site of a shoot-
oat on Saturday that
left
five per-
dead after Mexican police raid-
ed
the ranch
looking
for
the drug
agent and the pilot. No trace of the
Igtpg men was reported, however,
^yesterday.
The bpdieSj which had been dead
at least 15 days, were badly decom-
e
and
the
preliminary
identi-
m of Mr. Camarena was made
from clothing, Kir. Gavin said.
U.S.
officials were present, he said, when
the podies w
:ere examined at a hospi-
tal in Zamora, about 20 miles east of
the ranch.
Tpp bodies were to be flown to
Guadalajara
last night
for positive
identification
based
on
dental
records and other forensic materi-
als, the ambassa3or*sal^
Mr. Gavin sa(d there were “con-
flicting reports” concerning how and
when the bodies were found.
He\saidl).S.
officials were told
that a search for the kidnapped men
had been abandoned 'at
the
ranch
Tuesday night, but that “very
^ early
in the morning they told us the bod-
ies had been found/’
A U.S.
SeeMEJ&CO, 4A, Col. 5
-f
THURSDAY
MARCH 7. 1985 _
THURSDA^ARCh^^l985
Kidnapped U.S. agent
feared dead in Mexico
ease
MEXICO, from 1A
no American officials were present
when the bodies were discovered.
A Red Cross volunteer in Zamora,
Jaime Arizaga, said in a phone inter-
view that he and three others were
called to the ranch at 5 a.m. yester-
day, but arrived to find the bodies in
plastic bags atop a
patrol car and
the
ranch
sealed
off
by
Mexican
Federal Judicial Police.
Mexican television reported that
the bodies were found buried in plas-
tic
bags
in
a
lemon
grove,
their
hands and
feet
tied, and
that they
had been badly beaten. One report
said the two men had been tortured
and buried alive.
The Mexican Attorney General’s
Office
provided no immediate
de-
tails.
The Saturday raid on the ranch
was launched after Mexican authori-
ties
in
Guadalajara
received
an
anonymous
tip
that
the
two men
were
being
held
there,
Mr.
Gavin
said. A Mexican
police agent was
among those killed in the shootout.
No evidence
of drug
trafficking
was found at the ranch, but “we still
believe major drug traffickers were
involved in the kidnapping, ’’said Lee
Johnson, an embassy spokesman.
Mr. Gavin said the United States
was
receiving
“good
cooperation
from the Mexican authorities at this
time.”
U.S. accusations last month that
corrupt Mexican officials were stall-
ing the Camarena investigation put
severe strains on U.S.-Mexican rela-
tions.
The U.S. mounted Operation
In-
tercept,
a
10-day program
of
ex-
haustive
car-by-car
searches
that
nearly
paralyzed
commerce
and
tourism along the 1,700-mile border,
to catch Mexican officials’ attention.
Only
a
February
telephone
call from Mexican President Miguel
de
la Madrid Hurtado to President
Reagan, protesting Operation Inter-
cept, began to restore normalcy to
U.S.-Mexican relations. U.S. officials
said they believed the border opera-
tion helped inject vigor into the Ca-
marena investigation.
The episode’s effect on the coun-
200®I^mtid(3iAe«DRfi£9aMaag00
of a
meeting
next week between
Mexican Foreign Minister Bernardo
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Kidnapped
agent
Enrique
Ca-
marena Salazar is believed dead.
Sepulveda
and
Secretary
of
State
George P. Shultz in Washington.
A shootout yesterday morning at
a highway
checkpoint
in
northern
Mexico left five police officers dead.
They
were
reportedly
machine-
gunned by drug traffickers protect-
ing a truckload of marijuana.
Mr. Gavin called the drug
fight
an “ongoing war” and said,“There is
a very real possibility that our own
agents may once again suffer these
kinds of attacks.”
The United States closed nine re-
mote crossings on the Mexican bor-
der last weekend because of threats
on American officials.
Mitterand seeks to raise
French speakers’ profile
President
Francois
Mitterrand
yesterday launched a crusade to ex-
pand
the
influence
of
the French-
speaking world in the face of a grow-
ing Anglo-Saxon onslaught.
Mr.
Mitterrand, who speaks
no
foreign
language,
hosted
the
first
meeting_ of
the Francophone High
28 French-speak-
ing writers, political figures and art-
ists.