Noriega’s Opponents Block Streets; Regime Claims U.S. Plans Invasion

Opponents of Gen. Manuel A. Noriega threw up burning barricades across scores of downtown streets here Tuesday as the unpopular leader’s government, beleaguered at home and abroad, attempted to arouse fears of American intervention by claiming that long-planned U.S. military maneuvers here are “a prelude to the armed invasion of Panama.”

Riot troops from Panama’s tough “Doberman” force, which uses a snarling dog as its symbol, chased fast-moving bands of mostly young demonstrators throughout the afternoon. They fired tear gas and shotgun pellets as the youths dodged from street to street, building and igniting hundreds of barricades made of junk, flammable trash and old tires.

A few protesters were beaten by police wielding rubber truncheons, and one Mexican journalist suffered minor wounds from shotgun pellets in the back, but no serious injuries or deaths were reported by late Tuesday.

As smoke and acrid traces of tear gas permeated the capital, Foreign Minister Jorge Abadia Arias, in an apparent diversionary move, called a press conference to denounce the relatively small-scale U.S. maneuvers that began in Panama last Friday.

Col. Ronald T. Sconyers, spokesman for the U.S. Army Southern Command, said the maneuvers have been planned since last year and are a routine annual exercise for Panama-based troops.

Another Southern Command source who asked not to be identified said that only 680 troops--mostly U.S. Army, with Navy and Air Force support--are involved in the exercise and that the Americans have conducted the same war games for the last five years. The Panamanian government, he added, was informed of the exercise through proper channels as required by the 1979 Panama Canal Treaties between the two countries.

From March 12 to April 12, a second maneuver, code-named “Total Warrior,” will bring elements of the Puerto Rican and Florida National Guards to U.S. bases in Panama, Sconyers said.

The Panamanian foreign minister charged that “These groups (the Guard units) are going to be mobilized on Panamanian soil without Panamanian authorization” in violation of one of the canal treaties. The accord calls for jointly planned maneuvers to train for the defense of the vital waterway.

The complaint appeared to be a diplomatic countermaneuver against Washington, which has accused Gen. Noriega of drug-related corruption and engineered the freezing of Panamanian funds in the United States, causing an acute cash shortage that forced banks in Panama to close last week.

In Washington, White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said that “there are a number of options under consideration” to exert U.S. pressure on Panama and that no decisions have been made.

Separately, the House Foreign Affairs Committee approved without dissent a resolution affirming U.S. support for ex-Panamanian President Eric A. Delvalle, who was ousted by Noriega’s allies in the Panamanian Legislative Assembly but is still recognized by Washington. The resolution also called for Noriega to step down.

In Miami, attorneys for the pro-Delvalle forces won a temporary restraining order in Federal District Court freezing Panamanian government assets in four Florida banks. The lawsuit, similar to actions taken against New York and Massachusetts banks last week, bars the transfer of Panamanian funds from Citizens and Southern International Bank, Republic National Bank of Miami, Barnett Bank of Florida and the Bank of New England International, based in Miami.

An attorney for Delvalle’s U.S. ambassador, Juan B. Sosa, said the amount of Panamanian assets in the four banks is not known.

Panama’s banks remained shut Tuesday, and both foreign and Panamanian bankers said they saw no prospect of reopening soon.

Hospital Demands Cash

With the money supply dwindling daily, merchants and service institutions have stopped accepting checks or giving credit, and many Panamanians face increasing difficulties in meeting essential needs such as food and medical care. One major hospital in Panama City even demands cash in advance for emergency treatment.

Thousands of retirees and Social Security recipients demonstrated and built barricades at dozens of locations Monday when they found that they could not cash their bimonthly checks. The government belatedly produced enough cash to pay most of them by late Tuesday. However, many said the affair only strengthened their hostility for Noriega, who was indicted by two federal grand juries in Florida last month on drug and money-laundering charges.

Tuesday’s clashes with riot troops grew out of a hastily planned peaceful demonstration by the Civic Crusade, an anti-Noriega alliance of business and professional groups that has spearheaded public opposition to the military-dominated government.

About 300 mostly middle- and upper-middle-class demonstrators gathered outside a Roman Catholic church in the downtown banking district to wave white handkerchiefs in what has become the popular gesture of defiance in this unusual revolution. But two army water cannon quickly pulled up in front of the church and hosed them down.

As if well planned, makeshift barricades went up around the area almost immediately, slowing the riot vehicles as they chased bands of young protesters.

By nightfall, dozens of square blocks of the downtown financial district and nearby residential and business areas were littered with the remains of smoldering barricades, which riot police had half-heartedly attempted to disassemble. Brush fires, ignited by the burning barricades, glowed in a number of grassy vacant lots.

Times staff writer James Gerstenzang in Washington contributed to this article.