U.S. Officials Due in Mexico to Lend Backing to Reformists

Secretary of State Warren Christopher, Atty. Gen. Janet Reno and other top Clinton Administration officials were due here Sunday night with a message of U.S. support for reformists in Mexico’s government and a plea that the presidential election in August be free and fair.

The Cabinet members’ two-day mission to Mexico was long planned as one of a series of regular meetings between the two governments, but it comes at a delicate time--in the middle of a Mexican presidential campaign in which the governing party’s initial candidate, Luis Donaldo Colosio, was assassinated.

Some U.S. officials worry that the governing Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, may be tempted to tamper with the election results if its new candidate, Ernesto Zedillo, appears in danger of losing.

Officially, the Clinton Administration says it is convinced that the PRI plans to carry out a fair election. Nevertheless, officials have gently warned the Mexican government that a tainted election could be disastrous--a message Christopher is expected to repeat in his round of meetings today.

Zedillo, a lackluster candidate so far, faces tough competition from Cuauhtemoc Cardenas, the leftist leader of the National Democratic Front. Many Mexicans believe that Cardenas outpolled the current president, Carlos Salinas de Gortari, in the last election in 1988 but was prevented from winning by ballot-tampering.

Christopher will not meet with any of the candidates, aides said, to avoid any appearance of U.S. meddling in the campaign.

The PRI has ruled since 1929, often through patronage and corruption, but Salinas has tried to make the party an engine of reform.

The outcome of the election is crucial not only for Mexico but also for the Clinton Administration’s approach to Latin America.

“The dogma of U.S. policy in Latin America is that free markets go along with a free society,” said John Bailey, director of the Center for Latin American Studies at Georgetown University in Washington. “The election in Mexico is a critical test of that policy.”

Last year, President Clinton embraced the North American Free Trade Agreement with Mexico in part because it was seen as a way to support Salinas’ political reforms as well as increasing trade between the two countries.

But if the PRI turns against the reforms, or if Cardenas wins the presidency and seeks to slow the pace of economic integration with the United States, the U.S. policy will have suffered a serious setback, Bailey said.

This week’s Cabinet-level meetings constitute the first such U.S.-Mexican conference since Congress approved NAFTA last year, and the implementation of the trade pact will be high on the agenda.

Participants include Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt and Carol Browner, head of the Environmental Protection Agency, who are expected to discuss the progress of a newly established Border Environment Cooperation Commission.

Reno is expected to repeat U.S. offers of cooperation in the investigations of the slayings of both candidate Colosio and Tijuana Police Chief Federico Benitez Lopez.