U.S., Haiti Keep Up Ties on Drug Flow : Caribbean: Junta officers have been accused of masterminding the island nation’s drug trade. But embassy official says providing them with information is necessary to try to stop trafficking.

The United States is providing drug enforcement information to Haitian military officers accused of trafficking narcotics and looks forward to continuing “working with them,” a U.S. Embassy official said Saturday.

At a briefing in the Haitian capital, the official said that to ensure future cooperation, it is necessary to work with the current military command to try to stop the drug trade, no matter the reputation of key officers.

In Washington, Drug Enforcement Administration spokesman William Ruzzamenti confirmed the U.S. ties to the current military rulers.

“We still have a presence in Haiti. We have two agents assigned there. We’re working with the government in control there to try to stop narcotics en route to the United States,” Ruzzamenti said.

“Quite frankly and honestly, we have gotten reliable and good support in the things we’re trying to do there.”

The embassy official, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity, said the only problem with the Haitian military’s drug policy is “a lack of money and equipment” caused by the international embargoes imposed to force the army to accept a return to democracy.

The government of exiled President Jean-Bertrand Aristide has called the Haitian military the mastermind and greatest beneficiary of the drug trade here, charges echoed by some diplomats and U.S. Congress members.

These sources say that without military approval and involvement it would be impossible to move the more than four tons of cocaine that U.S. drug experts say pass through Haiti each month from South America to the United States and Europe.

Diplomats and other drug experts have said that yearly profits to the Haitian military and their accessories range from $250 million to $500 million.

Among those accused of the drug ties is Col. Antoine Atouriste, head of the Center for Information and Cooperation, the military agency responsible for dealing with narcotics trafficking.

“I trust him,” the embassy official said of Atouriste, whose assets were seized by the United States on Wednesday for participating in and benefiting from the bloody coup that overthrew Aristide on Sept. 30, 1991.

Saying that “there is no concrete proof” tying Atouriste to illegal narcotics, the official added: “I look forward to working with him. The only reason he’s on the list (of about 40 people whose assets were frozen) is because he is a high-ranking officer.”

Although he acknowledged that the DEA has received several reports that ranking Haitian military officers are involved in the drug trade, he said that “they have not been verified.”

This flies in the face of a confidential DEA report provided to Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), which said that “corruption levels within the narcotics services (run by the Haitian military are) substantial enough to hamper any significant investigation attempting to dismantle a Colombian organization” in Haiti.

The embassy official said that Colombia’s Cali cartel has used airplanes to drop cocaine wrapped in waterproof coverings into Haitian waters. The narcotics are then retrieved and brought to the United States or to ports in Haiti, where the military is the only authority.

The report also told of the case of Tony Greco, a former DEA agent in Haiti who fled in September, 1992, after his life was threatened following the arrest of a Haitian CIC officer charged with drug running.

Greco received the threat in a phone call from a man who identified himself as “the boss of the arrested officer.” The report stated that the only ones Greco had given his private number to were army commander Lt. Gen. Raoul Cedras and Port-au-Prince Police Chief Michel-Joseph Francois, leaders of the 1991 coup and in effect the current rulers of Haiti.

Diplomats have said that the primary reason Cedras and Francois are so fiercely opposed to Aristide’s return is the potential threat to their drug profits.

From exile, Aristide has said that the military has been able to survive economic embargoes because of the proceeds of the illicit drug trade.

The embassy official at Saturday’s briefing said the Haitian military seizes drugs every week but that there is no accounting mechanism--and therefore no way to determine whether the army is reselling the narcotics.

“I don’t know what they do with seized stocks,” the official told reporters.

He also said the Haitian narcotics services provide little information to the DEA because they have no funds for intelligence or operations--not because of a “lack of will,” he insisted.

The official defended the policy of continuing to provide intelligence to the Haitian military because of the “need to maintain good relations” with the army to ensure future cooperation.

Claiming that the DEA cannot “operate unilaterally” in any country, the official said: “We depend on the Haitian government. . . . I would like to see the time when Haitian agents work in our office.”

In the meantime, the official said, the embargo and the world attention directed at Haiti because of the failure of the military to permit Aristide’s return have put a crimp in the drug trade here.

“There is a great deal of cocaine in this country,” he said, “but it is very difficult to get it out because all eyes are on Haiti.”

Also Saturday, there was some diplomatic maneuvering aimed at finding a political settlement to call off the international embargo and restore Aristide to power.

Cedras and Aristide’s prime minister, Robert Malval, met at Malval’s heavily guarded private residence, their first face-to-face meeting in 10 days.

A U.N. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, briefed reporters and said proposals were offered but that no agreements were reached, and negotiations will continue for the next couple of days.

It was believed that the plan would involve a strategy to get an amnesty law through Haiti’s Parliament. Under the U.N. plan, Parliament must approve a law separating the army and police, and U.S. diplomats were urging Aristide’s camp to propose a general amnesty law.

Aristide had already decreed an amnesty, but Cedras has said it could be withdrawn at any time. Cedras had requested a formal amnesty law.

Times staff writer Ronald J. Ostrow, in Washington, contributed to this report.