U.S. Paid Panama Plotters $1 Million, Noriega Says

Panamanian strongman Manuel A. Noriega charged Wednesday that the junior officers who tried to oust him in a coup last week had been recruited by the U.S. government and had been paid more than $1 million to launch the uprising.

In an interview late Wednesday, Gen. Noriega also alleged that Panamanian businessmen and Nicaraguan Contras served as bagmen for U.S. officials and relayed messages between the United States and the plotters.

“The United States was involved before, during and after the coup,” Noriega said. “They (U.S. officials) had to make the contacts, woo them, convince them. It’s a lot of work before you’ve hooked the fish. But they were the hook and the useful fools were the fish.”

Noriega spoke to two U.S. reporters during a party celebrating the 21st anniversary of a coup led by Gen. Omar Torrijos. Torrijos, who became a national hero for negotiating the Panama Canal Treaties with the United States, died in a mysterious airplane crash in 1980 and Noriega rose to power three years later.

Noriega insists the U.S. aggression against him stems from the government’s desire to break the treaties that give the canal to Panama in the year 2000, and to keep political control over Panama because of its strategic location.

During the party, held at Torrijos’ old offices, Noriega’s friends and government officials were shown a videotape of the Oct. 3 uprising in which a dozen helicopters and a Hercules transport plane--all allegedly belonging to the United States--flew over the headquarters. The tape appeared to have been shot early in the five-hour uprising before loyalist troops arrived to retake the compound.

U.S. officials have said they learned about the coup attempt 48 hours before it began and sent U.S. troops to seal off roads leading to the headquarters while the uprising was in progress. Defense Secretary Dick Cheney had said the U.S. Southern Command was given the authority to take Noriega from the rebels if they could do so without a show of U.S. military force, but he said that the order was given after the coup began to fall apart.

Noriega said that in the investigation after the uprising, Panamanians have discovered a bank account in the name of Capt. Erick A. Murillo, one of the alleged coup leaders, with more than $1 million.

“There was a lot of money there for a normal Panamanian. Six zeroes. It was a million-dollar account,” Noriega said.

He alleged that U.S. officials gave Murillo the money “for bribes,” but he declined to identify which bank the account was in.

Murillo, of the elite Battalion 2000, was one of 10 officers the government said was killed during the uprising. Sources close to the military have since said that the 10 were executed after giving themselves up.

Before the interview, reporters were strongly advised by a Noriega aide not to ask the general about the alleged executions.

The government originally reported 37 soldiers were detained following the coup attempt. Noriega said, however, that 77 soldiers have been detained.

Noriega also said that one of the detained rebels had $700,000 in cash that he had been using to “bribe the troops.” He refused to identify the soldier but said he is still in custody.

The coup was masterminded by 17 members of the Panama Defense Forces, Noriega said. He also said that several of the rebel leaders attended the Nicaraguan Military Academy before the 1979 fall of Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza and that some of their Nicaraguan classmates conspired in the Oct. 3 coup attempt in Panama.

Specifically, Noriega said that Maj. Moises Giroldi Vega, the reputed leader of the coup, and Capt. Edgardo Sandoval had attended the Nicaraguan military school. He said Sandoval was a classmate of Luis Alfonso Moreno Payan, a Nicaraguan member of Somoza’s National Guard, who later joined the U.S.-backed Contras under the name Mike Lima.

Noriega and his aides said that Moreno Payan has stayed at Sandoval’s house several times in recent years, including a five-day visit six weeks ago.

“The Contras put them (the coup plotters) in contact with the United States,” Noriega said.

He said other Contras and Panamanian businessmen with U.S. interests also were involved but did not reveal any more names.

He also accused Everett E. Briggs, who has been serving as senior director of Latin American affairs on the National Security Council, of involvement in the conspiracy, because Briggs visited the country shortly before the uprising. Briggs has served as ambassador to Panama and then as ambassador to Honduras, where the Contras were based. The charges could not be independently confirmed.

Nicaragua’s current army chief of intelligence, Lt. Col. Ricardo Wheelock, was in Panama on Wednesday attending an official holiday celebration. He said he was “just vacationing,” but there was some speculation that he is helping Noriega rebuild his intelligence network after the failed coup.

Among those arrested after the coup attempt were three members of Noriega’s military high command, including his intelligence chief, Col. Guillermo Wong. Asked about Wong’s alleged role, Noriega said the colonel was “on the telephone to a Col. McDonald in Washington during the attempt. . . . He joined in this.”

The other two members of the military command who have been arrested are the personnel chief, Col. Julio Ow Young, and Lt. Col. Armando Palacios, a member of the joint committee with U.S. forces. Noriega declined to discuss their alleged roles.

“We are looking for men who are traitors, accomplices or cowards. They (those in detention) are among the above,” Noriega said.

Asked how he could protect himself against another coup attempt, when so many people from his inner circle have betrayed him, Noriega said: “The world was created with good men and bad. Abel didn’t know Cain was going to kill him. . . . The significance of this is that the Defense Forces now wears long pants. How do you consolidate an armed force? On the basis of your errors.”