Shunpiking Online Vo.4 No.2 Ecuador to end contract with US military base

QUITO (18 February 2007) - ECUADOR will not renew a contract that allows the Pentagon to use the Manta Air Base, said Foreign Minister Maria Fernanda Espinosa on Sunday. The agreement was reached in 1999 and expires in 2009.

In response to an earlier statement by Admiral James Stavridis, head of the Southern Command, who said that negotiations were underway, Espinosa told reporters, "I don't know who they are negotiating with because it's not with me or the armed forces."

"President Rafael Correa has said from his first day in office that he will not renew the lease of the Manta Base (located 260 kilometers southwest of Quito on the Pacific Coast)," said Espinosa.

The agreement authorized the United States to use the base for a ten-year-period with troops and airplanes that the White House said would be fighting drug trafficking.

Stavridis had said last Wednesday in Lima, Peru that the United States was talking with Ecuador about the future of Manta, but he admitted that the decision is in the hands of the Ecuadorian people.

Foreign Minister Espinosa told the foreign press that ending the US contract for the use of Manta will not affect the fight against drug trafficking being carried out by Ecuador, an effort she said has shown proven success.

Espinosa also called on the United States not to link its Law on Preferential Tariffs and Drug Eradication with the renewal of the contract for the Manta Base, informed Argenpress.