ABOUREZK FIGHTS TO END AID TO FOREIGN POLICE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-01208R000100200037-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 2, 2011
• Sequence Number: 37
• Publication Date: September 22, 1974
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/06/04: CIA-RDP90-01208R000100200037-1
2 2 SEP 1974
By Jack Nelson
Lai Anceles Times
Shortly after taking office
as South Dakota's junior
senator in January, 1973,
James Abourczk was visited
by a secretive stranger who
refused to give his name to
E-n d 1
0
t
id
i
rllla. ' acttot; directed from
Cub9. One of Its most nota-
orei~
ble successes was ~'in Vene-
t
zuela in 1963 when guerrilla about whether to try to
re-
forces' tlue atened ? to ? shoot store it on the Senate floor
a Caracas policeman every
day.
The police academy pro-
the :senator's secretary. vfded lveapons and training
The visitor spilled, out1 , which enabled, the Caracas
what the senator later de- f police-force to defeat the
scribed as "horriblo stories"
of police abuse bf political i
prisoners in Brazil. .
guerrillas and the following
year :`Venezuela was able to
conduct national elections
d
"He was a Brazilian and which the guerrillas ha
he identified himself to me," thbourezk's. lam ndmtt;'
Abourezk told a reporter re-
cently. "But I cannot name which is opposed by law en-
him because he would at. forcement?a'gencies, will be
most certainly be killed." debated on the Senate floor;
Among other things,' the within the'nezt week'or..~0;
Brazilian said that U.S. aid when' the Senate takes ;-'up I
in the training ofPDrazilian the Foreign Assistance Act. -
police had caused despair
among dissenters who had
been jailed for political rea-
sons.
"This was a morally crush-
1ng thing for dissenters,", I of U.S.-aid to foreign. polio
Abourezk said, "and he told forces. ?
me it might give the politi- Abourezk points out that.a_
gal prisoners some ? hope if
someone in the Senate would passage deleted from his
speak out against the aid." original amendment by Lie
Since the Brazilian's visit, committee because of an ob-
a 43-year-old ligence b'y the Central Inte.
AbourezkDemocrat, hat led- a biParti- under which leaves a
tnnnhnte nrier which funds
son fight to abolish all U.S. i not covered by the Foreign
aid for the training of for- Assistance Act could be
>ign police. . used to continue such train.
lie recently pushed: inc. Abourezk's original
through the Senate. Foreign amendment would have prn?
Relations Committee ? an hibited the use of funds
amendment to the 1974 For- made available under the
dgn Assistance Act that act "or any other law" for
would prohibit further this- training of foreign police of-
bursement of federal funds,) ficers.
for training of foreign po- I The Foreign Relations
lice officers at the Interna- committee deleted the
phrase "or any other law"
tiorlal Police Academy in after CIA Director William
Washington. E, Colby, in a letter to corn-
The academy, which has mittee Chairman J. W. Ful-
trained police officers from bright (D _Ark.), objected to
77 countries, operates under that phrase specifically and
the public safety office, of said that the amendment
the Agency for Internatonal generally would have an ad-
Development. verse impact "on the Cen-
The program was started tL-al Intelligence Agency's
in the Kennedy administra- relationships with forei
South and internal se .
tion to assist Central . and se-
South .. American countries curly services."
' Abourezk said that, aI-
u combating urban. guezr,
though the deletion of refer-
--- ences to "any other law"
leaves'a loophole he fears
the CIA will use to continue
L.S. aid for foreign police
forces, he is undecided
If the Senate passes hi$
amendment,," approved by
the committee, it will mean
but not necessarily the end
Abourezk, who has heard
nothing from or of his Bra.:
zwan informant since -the
1973 visit, has charged that
AID funds here are being
used to "train police for for-
eign dictatorships, many of
whom imprison their own
people for political reasons
and employ torture."
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/06/04: CIA-RDP90-01208R000100200037-1