Summit Nations Boast of Agreement, but Frictions Tear at Happy Facade : Americas: Disagreements between U.S. and its Latin neighbors threaten to water down conclave’s final declarations.

“Agreement” is the happy buzzword at the Summit of the Americas in Miami, but nagging differences persist between the United States and its Latin American neighbors.

For example, Latin American countries declined to include an extensive U.S. anti-narcotics proposal in the summit’s final documents, to be approved Sunday. A political analyst from the region said officials of Bolivia, Peru and Colombia “hit the ceiling” when the State Department made the tough proposal.

The three countries are the main producers of cocaine, and they have long been at odds with the United States over how best to stop trafficking of the illegal drug. Jaime Aparicio, an official of Bolivia’s Foreign Ministry, said Friday that the U.S. document contained proposals that were unacceptable, such as using chemical herbicides.

Aparicio said the document also proposed no increase in U.S. aid for “alternative development” to reduce farmers’ dependence on crops of coca leaf, the raw material of cocaine. This is one of many points of disagreement between Washington and Latin American countries.

Others include illegal immigration, labor and environmental standards and trade protectionism. While governments have agreed on a declaration of harmony and accord, friction has been frequent in pre-summit negotiations.

“There are differences on each one of the items of the agenda,” said Gert Rosenthal, who heads the U.N. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean. “You could probably say there is broad agreement, but if you go down the list one by one, there are differences on each one.”

As a result, the final declarations will contain many watered-down versions of punchier points proposed in preparatory meetings. Open bickering will be avoided, but hemispheric harmony will be far from complete.

In their most resounding decision, the 34 presidents and prime ministers meeting here will agree to work for hemispheric free trade. In negotiations over wording of that agreement, however, Latin Americans resisted U.S. efforts to link labor and environment standards to the trade issue.

Without such “linkage,” many Democrats in Congress may have trouble selling the idea of hemispheric free trade to their pro-labor and pro-environment constituencies. Many Latin American governments, on the other hand, contend that hard-to-meet standards on these issues could be a barrier to progress toward free trade.

Immigration is another source of anger for several of the summit participants. Mexico and the Central American countries plan to protest what they see as an anti-immigrant backlash in the United States. They want a formal condemnation of California’s Proposition 187, which denies education and other public services to illegal immigrants.

“It (Proposition 187) is a flagrant and massive violation of human rights, especially for children,” Guatemalan President Ramiro de Leon Carpio said upon arriving here.

In another potential clash with the Clinton Administration, the Central Americans hope to link trade and immigration. To stop the flow of illegal immigrants north, they will argue, the United States must give preferential treatment to Central American products, such as textiles.

Otherwise, these governments maintain, Central America’s tiny economies, which in some cases are still recovering from U.S.-backed wars, cannot compete and will not be able to provide the jobs to keep citizens at home.

“The United States is going to have to realize that if they don’t want (illegal) immigrants, they are going to have to become a partner in progress for our people,” said President Armando Calderon Sol of El Salvador.

Both El Salvador and Nicaragua will be seeking special dispensation for their refugees who live in the United States. Nicaraguan President Violeta Barrios de Chamorro will ask President Clinton to extend the visas of about 100,000 Nicaraguans who were granted temporary permission to live in the United States during Nicaragua’s civil war.

A similar program that gave temporary haven to tens of thousands of Salvadorans expires at the end of the month, and Clinton last week refused Salvadoran government requests for an extension. Calderon Sol indicated that he will raise the issue again.

Another high-sounding summit conclusion will call for efforts to strengthen democracy, which has been trampled in the past by numerous Latin American dictatorships. While none of the leaders at the summit took power by force, Latin American governments blocked a U.S. proposal for measures to defend democracy.

“The United States wanted more forceful language,” Rosenthal said. “The Latin Americans had no substantive difference with it, but it sounded as if the United States was going to have a role in monitoring political development.”

Even though “anti-imperialism” in the region has faded since the end of the Cold War, governments remain sensitive to any hint of domineering behavior by Washington. Meddling by the United States, the CIA and other U.S. operatives in Latin domestic affairs, such as the backing of Contra insurgents in Nicaragua during the 1980s, is a fresh memory for many Latins.

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In fact, some analysts say, if the Clinton Administration had made a forceful invasion of Haiti instead of a brokered entry to restore elected government in September, many presidents might have refused to attend the summit in protest.

While free trade is the central theme of the summit, trade disagreements with the United States abound. Latin American countries that export steel, garments, leather goods, flowers and other products to the United States bridle at U.S. regulations that result in “countervailing duties” on imports that are judged to be subsidized.

Meanwhile, Argentina and other agricultural exporters complain that subsidized U.S. farm products compete unfairly on world markets.

The U.S. embargo against Communist Cuba is another divisive issue. Several countries, including Mexico, Costa Rica and Colombia, support dialogue with Cuba, rather than isolation, as a way to bring about democratic change. They will urge flexibility on the embargo.

But Eduardo Gamarra, a political scientist at Miami’s Florida International University, said nothing causes more trouble between the United States and Latin America than narcotics. U.S. pressure on governments to take drastic measures against drug production and trafficking is resented, and also ineffective. Senior U.S. officials have gone so far as to accuse the president of Colombia, Ernesto Samper, of accepting drug money in his election campaign.

“There’s more cocaine coming to the United States than ever before, and there’s more corruption than ever before,” Gamarra said. “This is still the primary bone of contention between the United States and Latin America.”