MEESE TO BOLSTER AFGHANS ON VISIT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000504030008-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 20, 2012
• Sequence Number: 8
• Publication Date: March 14, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000504030008-5
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ON PAGE
WASHINGTON TIMES
14 March 1986
Meese to bolster
Afghans on visit
By John McCaslin
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
President Reagan has asked At-
torney General Edwin Meese to
carry a message of encouragement
to Afghan freedom fighters later
this month.
Mr. Meese plans to deliver the
message during a special trip, under
tight security, to a refugee camp in
Pakistan near the Afghanistan bor-
der.
He will address the mujahideen
rebels and read a message from Mr.
Reagan, according to Justice De-
partment spokesman Patrick Kor-
ten.
Mr. Korten said he did not know
what the message would say.
The region which Mr. Meese will
visit is near Afghanistan's Kunar
Valley, a strategic mountainous area
where some 10,000 Soviet troops last
June launched their largest offen-
sive in the 7-year-old war.
The camp Mr. Meese will visit on
March 26, at the end of his two-week
fact-finding trip into the flow of il-
licit drugs in the region, is about an
hour's drive from Pakistan's
northern city of Peshawar, but an
administration official said that, for
security reasons, he would not pin-
point the location.
The U.S. delegation will include
John C. Lawn, director of the Drug
Enforcement Administration;
Charles Blau, associate deputy at-
torney general; Francis Keating, as-
sistant secretary of the Treasury for
enforcement and operations; Mark
Dion, deputy assistant secretary of
state for international narcotics mat-
ters; and Fred Colgan, deputy direc-
tor of the White House Drug Abuse
Policy office. The FBI will send sev-
eral agents along for security.
Photo by Janes Fiedler Jr.?M Washtnptoa Times
Attorney General Edwin Meese lli
The delegation will leave Satur-
day aboard an Air Force jet with
stops planned in Thailand, Burma,
Pakistan, India and Italy.
"The trip is a presidential mis-
sion;' said Mr. Korten. "Its main pur-
pose is to deal on an international
level with the worldwide narcotics
problem."
In Bangkok, Mr. Meese will sign a
mutual legal assistance treaty with
Thailand that U.S. officials hope will
improve joint investigations on nar-
cotics, organized crime and terror-
ism matters.
Justice sources said the attorney
general will express concern to the
Thai government over a region
known as the "Golden Triangle;' one
of the world's major sources of her-
oin production.
Over the vast several Years the
United States has encouraged -
through covert action - the free-
dom fighters in Afghanistan and-is-
believed to have provided well above
$200 million in assistance. Last May,
the Senate unanimously approved
$15 million in direct humanitarian
aid to the Afghan rebels.
The Soviet Union has been unable
to quell the unrest since seizing the
country in December 1979, although
they have closed off most of the bor-
der.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000504030008-5