U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who has urged Latin American states to do more to fight terrorism, on Wednesday raised the touchy issue of using the military to combat terrorism and organized crime. Rumsfeld, in a speech to a meeting of Western Hemisphere defense ministers in Quito, broached the subject cautiously, saying each country must decide carefully how to approach it. Many of the countries in the region have restored democracy only recently after long periods of human rights abuses under military rule and are wary of giving their armed forces a greater role in domestic security. Argentina, for example, has barred the armed forces from local policing. "Much work remains to better secure our region" from criminals and terrorists, Rumsfeld said. "Terrorists, drug traffickers, hostage-takers and criminal gangs form an anti-social combination that increasingly seeks to destabilize civil societies," he said. He noted that since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks the United States had had "to conduct an arduous yet essential re-examination of the relationship between its military and law enforcement responsibilities." "Of course, every country will address this task in its own way, according to its own history, constitutional principles and sovereign choices," Rumsfeld added.
