The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

MR. MacNeil: Good evening. Leading the news this Thursday, Presidents Bush and Gorbachev will hold a five day summit in the U.S. starting May 30th, the EPA says more than 120 million Americans live in unhealthy air. We'll have details in our News Summary in a moment. Judy Woodruff is in Washington tonight. Judy.

MS. WOODRUFF: After the News Summary we turn first to two trouble spots in Central America. Correspondent Charles Krause reports on Panama [UPDATE - AFTER THE FALL] and the huge rebuilding effort it faces after last year's U.S. invasion. Then following this week's hopeful news of a breakthrough in the fighting in El Salvador [FOCUS - SEARCHING FOR PEACE], we talk with its President, Alfredo Cristiani, and with a representative of the opposition leftist rebels, Salvador Sanabria. Next Tom Bearden on tough treatment [FOCUS - CRACK DOWN] for casual drug users, and finally Essayist Amei Wallach [ESSAY - LASTING IMPRESSION] on the art and times of painter Claude Monet.NEWS SUMMARY

MR. MacNeil: President Bush and Soviet President Gorbachev will hold their second summit in the United States between May 30th and June 3rd. White House Spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said the crisis in Lithuania will undoubtedly be an issue. The two leaders hope to sign a treaty limiting long range nuclear missiles, also on the agenda, chemical weapons, conventional forces in Europe, and U.S.- Soviet trade. Mr. Bush commented at a photo opportunity in the White House Rose Garden.

PRES. BUSH: It is very important that we have these conversations, dialogue is important, and I'm looking forward to seeing Mr. Gorbachev here. Conversations with Mr. Shevardnadze are going reasonably well and I will proceed in the Oval Office tomorrow. I look forward to that.

MR. MacNeil: The announcement came as Sec. of State Baker and Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze continued their meetings in Washington. Baker told reporters there was a lot of work to be done before the summit. Shevardnadze described the preparations.

EDUARD SHEVARDNADZE, Foreign Minister, Soviet Union: [Speaking through Interpreter] During this meeting, this first meeting, we have discussed the entire range of arms controls proposals. I believe the discussion was very constructive and substantive.

MR. MacNeil: Today's Baker-Shevardnadze talks included what Soviet Spokesman Gennadi Gerasimov called a serious hard ball exchange on Lithuania. In that Baltic republic today, about 50 Soviet soldiers occupied the state prosecutor's office. The troops stormed the building, armed with automatic weapons and dressed as police. It was the Soviets' second attempt to seize the office from the new Lithuanian government. At the same time, Lithuania's parliament sent a conciliatory letter to Mr. Gorbachev. It called for immediate talks and for the first time agreed to take into account the point of view of the Soviet constitution. Judy.

MS. WOODRUFF: The Bush administration's defense spending plans came under fire today from two Republican Senators on the Armed Services Committee. William Cohen of Maine and John McCain of Arizona said the administration was not reacting quickly enough to changes in East-West relations. They called for a leaner defense budget with cuts in the B-2 Stealth Bomber program and land-based nuclear missiles.

SEN. WILLIAM COHEN, [R] Maine: We have to recognize the emerging realities, military and political, and we have to reshape our defense structure in a way that will serve our three basic goals, and that is deterring nuclear attack upon the United States, preventing Soviet domination of the Eurasian land mass and maintaining open access to the seas and to project power.

MS. WOODRUFF: Defense Sec. Dick Cheney held a noontime news conference at the Pentagon. He rebutted the Senator's criticism.

DICK CHENEY, Secretary of Defense: What we put forward is I think a responsible plan that does, in fact, respond to the developments we've seen in the world in the last six months, does exercise due prudence and caution given the uncertainty that exists about the future.

MS. WOODRUFF: In Southern California today, an experimental rocket was launched. The Delta Wing Pegasus rocket was carried aloft beneath the wing of a B-52 bomber. At 40,000 feet it was released and fired its engines to put a Navy communications satellite into earth's orbit. Pegasus is designed as a low cost solution --

MR. MacNeil: The government released its annual report on the nation's air today. The Environmental Protection Agency said 121 million Americans still breathe pollution that exceeds federal health standards. The report examined data from 1988, which was the latest information available. It said smog problems worsened partly because of an extremely hot summer, but it concluded that overall, the last 20 years have shown considerable improvement in air quality. Also today a federal judge in Texas sentenced the former chairman of a savings & loan to 30 years in prison. Woody Lemons, the former chief executive at Vernon Savings & Loan, was convicted in December on 13 counts of defrauding the institution. Federal thrift regulators had asked the court to impose a stiff sentence.

MS. WOODRUFF: In South Africa today, Nelson Mandela flew to Cape Town for a meeting with Pres. F.W. DeKlerk. They agreed to reschedule formal talks between the government and the African National Congress. Those talks were recently postponed by the ANC because of police violence. Earlier in the day, President DeKlerk met with the leaders of two of the so-called black tribal homelands which South Africa set up several years ago as part of the apartheid system of racial segregation. Four other homeland leaders boycotted the meeting.

MR. MacNeil: Today's the day on which China remembers its dead each year, but Chinese troops sealed off Tiananmen Square to the public to prevent anybody from trying to honor the pro-democracy protesters killed there last summer. Instead, officials bussed in teen-age students to hear political lectures. Hundreds, perhaps thousands of pro-democracy protesters who occupied the square were killed last June when troops opened fire.

MS. WOODRUFF: East Germany's first freely elected parliament opened for business today. The first task was to formally dismantle the Communist system which ruled the country for more than 40 years. We have a report narrated by Roderick Pratt of Independent Television News.

MR. PRATT: One of the first motions of the new East German parliament was to declare the nation a democracy and prepare it for unification with its Western half. The 400 members then elected a new president of parliament, Dr. Sabin Bergman Cole of the Christian Democrats, a popular choice.As the new acting head of state was congratulated, members of the 11 parties represented in the parliament agreed that Christian Democrat Leader Luther Demezier would be asked to form a government. The country's constitution will also be rewritten to mirror that of West Germany and hopefully lay to rest the ghost of Stalin which has haunted East Germany for 40 years. Also on the agenda whether all members of parliament would be investigated to see whether any were former members of the feared Stasi secret police. But of more immediate concern a huge rally outside where thousands were protesting against the West German bank's plans for unifying the currency. The West German central bank proposed a 2 to 1 exchange, a move unlikely to advance plans for German monetary unification.

MR. MacNeil: In Colombia today, a truck packed with 900 pounds of explosives was found parked in a wealthy Bogota suburb near the homes of several top government officials. Police diffused the bomb. Yesterday, drug traffickers threatened to explode a bomb in the capital because the government refused to free two of their associates.

MS. WOODRUFF: That's it for our summary of the day's top stories. Just ahead on the Newshour, Panama three months after the invasion, moves towards peace in El Salvador, tough treatment for drug users and painter Claude Monet. UPDATE - AFTER THE FALL

MS. WOODRUFF: We begin tonight with a report from Panama, a country that feels that it has a special claim on American help. A package of direct aid and financial credits promised by the Bush Administration has been tied up in the legislative process. Pending on the outcome of last minute negotiations the Senate may take up the Panama aid package tonight or it may delay consideration until after the Easter recess. And as Correspondent Charles Krause reports from Panama City the delay is one of the frustrations that is building in Panama since the U.S. invaded last December.

MR. KRAUSE: Most Panamanians are still grateful to the United States for invading Panama and removing General Noriega. But the Euphoria of those first few weeks has given way to reality. It is clear that Noriega was not Panama's only problem. Since the invasion unemployment is up sharply. There has been an increase in robberies and other street crime. Many shops and businesses remain closed. Panama's economic recovery is taking far longer than most Panamanians expected. There is still hope but increasingly that hope is mixed with inpatients and frustration. That is perhaps the biggest change since the invasion. The new Government lead by President Guillermo Endara is widely accepted but there is disappointment with the slow pace of economic recovery and growing disillusion with the United States. Ricardo Arias Calderon is Panama's new Vice President.

VICE PRESIDENT CALDERON: As I walk through the City and visit different parts of the country the relationship of the people to those of us who represent the Government is a very positive relationship. People say hello with enthusiasm. They identify. But I do think there is impatience. After 21 years we want to do it all very quickly and we've moved very fast on the political front. There is full freedom of the press today. There is now a judicial system and a rule of law which we have not had for over a generation. There is also on the economic side a sense of anguish that things are not moving fast enough. Perhaps they couldn't but perhaps they could have moved faster if international help had been forthcoming more rapidly.

MR. KRAUSE: One of Panama City's poorest neighborhoods Choreo was destroyed during the fighting last December. Today what was Choreo has been cleared but not rebuilt. Right after the invasion thousands of Choreo's homeless moved to temporary housing at Balboa High School in the old Panama Canal Zone. Sanitation was primitive and conditions were squalid. The camp itself was barely tolerable. Today the Choreo refugees have been moved to Albrook Air Force Base. Here some 3000 of them live inside an old air plane hanger. Teresa De Arias the Vice President's wife has been appointed by the new government to coordinate aid for the homeless. Not long ago we asked her if conditions at the new Albrook Camp are better than they were at Balboa in December and January.

TERESA DE ARIAS, Refugee Coordinator: Yes substantially because Balboa was something that had to be put up over night. Her we have a good infrastructure that was paid by AID, we have bathrooms, well, toilets, showers, places to wash and hang the clothes. We feed them regularly twice a day so this is much better than Balboa. Still this is something only provisional. This is supposed to stay up only as long as it takes for them to find a permanent solution to finding a house.

MR. KRAUSE: And how long do you think that is going to be?

MRS. DE ARIAS: Not less than nine months.

MR. KRAUSE: Most of the refugees have no jobs and with unemployment estimated at near 30 percent they have little prospect of finding one. Choreo where they used to live was a slum but life at the Albrook Camp is only marginally better. In some respects it is even worse. There is no privacy and because Albrook is isolated from Panama City there is no easy escape. Those who live in the Camp are allowed to come and go but still police and MPs guard the gate. It cost the U.S. Military 113 million dollars to invade Panama and it's cost another 40 million to provide emergency food and other relief. Right after the invasion, President Bush asked Congress to approve another billion dollars' worth of economic aid, 500 million worth of direct loans and grants, plus another 1/2 billion dollars' worth of credit guarantees to jump start the economy. But three months later, that aid has still not yet reached Panama. As a result, the refugees remain without permanent housing, in limbo, and Panama's economy remains in critical condition. At Albrook, there's growing bitterness and frustration. Last week, the simple question, is Panama better or worse off as a result of the invasion, let to an angry shouting match. Much of the anger is directed at the United States. Archbishop Marcos McGrath speaks for many Panamanians when he says the U.S. response has been too slow.

REV. MARCOS McGRATH, Archbishop of Panama: Certainly it has been too slow. For instance, the invasion took place the 20th of December. It wasn't until well into December that economic sanctions had been lifted. It wasn't until several months later that Panamanian funds which have been frozen in the states were freed and some of them are not freed yet, and that's Panamanian money. And the money proposed for the rebuilding of Chorio, the damaged area, is now beginning to trickle in and this is a question of about 18,000 people who are in emergency circumstances which are difficult to bear and which are, some people say a time bomb. This is slow. By anybody's clock, it's slow.

MR. KRAUSE: U.S. Amb. Deane Hinton is well aware of the criticism but he's not very sympathetic to the critics.

DEANE HINTON, U.S. Ambassador to Panama: I say they don't understand how a democratic system works. They've got to learn. They'll learn about Congress, about separation of powers, and they've got to recognize that the advantages of that far outweigh the disadvantages. And they really should understand it since they've had a dictatorship. Now they have a democratic system.

MR. KRAUSE: But those in the church, those in the government, and those in the refugee camps who criticize the length of time it's taken to approve the aid package say they do understand how democracy works in the United States. What they fear is that the delay may discredit Panama's new democratic government. Mrs. Arias has said Panamanians may soon discover you can't eat democracy. What did you mean?

MRS. ARIAS: There were so many expectations, the fight against Noriega was so long, things deteriorated so much, that people were expecting that with democracy everything will be okay, and things are better. You can go to sleep every night knowing that no one will come and grab you from your home and take you anywhere and make you disappear, no one will beat you, no one will hit you, but still, the economic situation is still stagnant, we're still expecting, you know, the American help to get to Panama, because what we need is to put these people to work. We needs jobs. We need the stores to reopen, construction to start functioning and that's all we want, that's all we need.

MR. KRAUSE: That same view is heard not only from the government and from the poor, but also from the rich. Right after the invasion in January, we visited Auto Centro, a multi-million dollar auto parts business owned by Manolin Berrocal. Like hundreds of other big businesses in Panama Auto Centro had been looted by Noriega's so-called "dignity battalions". At the time, Berrocal told us the leaders had stolen over a million dollars' worth of his merchandise. He wasn't sure he'd be able to reopen. That was three months ago. Today Auto Centro is back in business, but just barely. Downstairs is open. The main salesroom upstairs is not. About 1/4 of Auto Centro's employees have been laid off. Others are working but only part-time. Berrocal blames many of his problems on the U.S. Army, which he says was negligent. It didn't protect Panama's principal business districts from the looters.

MANOLIN BERROCAL, Panamanian Merchant: Their priority was to get Noriega. Their priority was to neutralize the forces of Noriega loyal to Noriega, but no consideration was taken as to the inevitable consequences that would happen after such an intervention was made.

MR. KRAUSE: Berrocal is leading a group of businessmen who plan to file a claim for damages against the U.S. army. Last week, we asked him whether in retrospect, he thinks the cost of the invasion to Panamanians was worth it.

MR. BERROCAL: The cost. That's a good question. I would say the answer is yes and no. I would say it's a 50/50, it's 50/50 reply, because I agree 100 percent with what was done, but I disagree 100 percent with the effects of what was done, so let's leave it at that.

MR. KRAUSE: Amb. Hinton says he's not particularly worried about the impact on public opinion in Panama.

AMB. HINTON: I think the pro U.S. feeling or the euphoria you referred to was bound to erode if the aid had come or if it hadn't come. I mean, I don't think you can keep a popularity level of 95 percent, so it was going to come down. I don't think it has much to do with the process in the Congress.

MR. KRAUSE: But Vice Pres. Arias and many other Panamanians inside and outside the government disagree. They've been disappointed and shaken by the time it's taken Congress to approve the aid package.

VICE PRES. ARIAS: The quantity that has been committed by the Bush administration is adequate. The timing thus far, and I would have to say the timing of Congress has not been responsive to the dramatic needs of the Panamanian people.

MR. KRAUSE: Beyond the timing and the delay, Archbishop McGrath says he's been shocked by some of the statements made during Congressional debate.

ARCHBISHOP McGRATH: To hear prominent politicians in the states now affirm that Panama is not a prime political interest to the United States is really cutting, it's unbelievable. That's not a good way to win friends for the future.

MR. KRAUSE: There is every likelihood the administration's billion dollar aid package will be approved by Congress, but passage has been delayed in part because aid for Panama has had to compete with aid for Eastern Europe. That worries many throughout Latin America. They wonder, whether the United States, having proclaimed its opposition to dictatorship, will make good on its commitment to help build democracy in Panama and elsewhere throughout the hemisphere.

MS. WOODRUFF: Correspondent Charles Krause. Coming up on the Newshour, movement towards peace in El Salvador, tough times for casual drug users, and the art and times of Claude Monet. FOCUS - SEARCHING FOR PEACE

MR. MacNeil: We turn now to another Central American country receiving major American support, the nation of El Salvador. It is taking tentative steps to peace after a civil war that has left more than 70,000 Salvadorans dead. Yesterday with the help of the United Nations, the conservative government and left wing guerrilla opposition signed an agreement to work to a cease-fire and eventual peace accord. We'll talk with El Salvador's President, Alfredo Cristiani, and Salvador Sanabria, a representative of the opposition guerrilla front, but first some background. A candidate of the right wing, Alfredo Cristiani was elected President of El Salvador last year. His party, Arena, has long been accused of having ties to El Salvador's death squads, but Cristiani has tried to project a moderate image since his election.

PRESIDENT ALFREDO CRISTIANI, El Salvador: [March 21, 1989] That's the message that we have asked, do not prejudge our government, but rather judge them by the acts after it starts.

MR. MacNeil: Last fall, hoping to destroy the Cristiani government, the FMLN, the left wing guerrilla opposition, launched its most daring offensive in and around the capital of San Salvador. The fighting was the most impressive show of force by the rebels since El Salvador's civil war began almost 10 years. Nearly 500 soldiers, civilians, and guerrillas were reported killed. Salvadoran government forces, armed and trained by the United States, eventually repelled the guerrillas. But one action during the offensive has caused great embarrassment to the Cristiani government. It took place on the campus of the University of Central El Salvador in San Salvador. Six prominent Jesuit priests and two of their housekeepers were dragged from their beds and murdered during the night. Soldiers and officers were arrested and charged, but have yet to be tried. Then came the elections in neighboring Nicaragua this February and the defeat of Daniel Ortega. His Sandinista government had long backed the Salvadoran rebels with supplies and provided them safe haven. Although there have been numerous attempts at a truce between the guerrillas and the government all efforts have failed. The latest agreement worked out with the United Nations in Geneva calls for a cease-fire and an end to the armed conflict through political means as speedily as possible. The accord called for promoting moves for democracy, respect for human rights and legalizing the FMLN as a political party. I talked with President Cristiani from San Salvador earlier today. Mr. President, thank you for joining us.

PRESIDENT CRISTIANI: It's a pleasure.

MR. MacNeil: What were the forces do you think that brought you and the FMLN into serious negotiations now?

PRESIDENT ALFREDO CRISTIANI, El Salvador: Well, I think there are external factors, starting from perestroika in the Soviet Union to what is happening to Eastern European countries, and more closely the peace process and the pressure that it applies to armed conflict, the election in Nicaragua obviously is another factor, and internally the result of the November 11th offensive, which was both a failure, militarily speaking, from the standpoint of the FMLN, and secondly, there was no popular support for that offensive. Therefore, they're creating and generating a new set of circumstances that I believe are the most favorable we have had during the decade.

MR. MacNeil: Of course, the FMLN say the opposite about their offensive. They say that they demonstrated both to you and Washington that they could not be defeated militarily in that offensive.

PRESIDENT CRISTIANI: Well, obviously the offensive is probably a battle in a war. I think that the war militarily speaking is something that can be won but with a lot of sacrifice and in the long-term. The offensive obviously was a failure since their objective was to overthrow the government and beginning with the assassination of the President of El Salvador, so they're -- and again, they expected popular uprising to support them which did not happen so, therefore, the basic elements of that offensive, even though they did prove they could create and generate quite a lot of destruction in urban areas, the main objectives of that offensive were not achieved, and therefore, the battle was not really won by the FMLN.

MR. MacNeil: How do you feel about some of the demands the FMLN are making going in, for instance, that there should be agreement to reduce the size of your army to bring it under civilian control and to purge it of right wing officers and influence, what is your initial reaction to those demands?

PRESIDENT CRISTIANI: Well, first of all, I think there is really no need for Alfredo agreement. It is obvious that if we can get a solution to our conflict that the armed forces of El Salvador will be reduced. And they certainly know it and everybody does support that, because it is not logical to keep such a big armed forces once there is no need for it. Secondly, with respect to the armed forces, they have issued an official statement last week in where a lot of these speculations with respect to whether the armed forces respond to the executive or does not respond to the executive and whether the armed forces support our efforts with respect to the peace process were cleared. They came out with a statement, a very clear statement, saying that they firmly supported the democratic process, they strongly supported our peace efforts, and that as a democratic institution responded to its commander in general which is the President of the republic, so we have no problems in that respect either. With respect to purging officers of the armed forces, I think that the army has an ongoing process of becoming more and more professional and those that engage in activities beyond the law will not be condoned within the armed forces. They also state that in their own manifesto last week. So I think that there's really no problem if we can look at it rationally now. If we, like the FMLN has done in the past, present it as an obstacle because of the way they want to treat these factors, well, then it might be a problem, but we have no problem for talking and looking for agreements in any of the issues that they presented in a letter to the five Central American Presidents just two days ago.

MR. MacNeil: Where do you see the difficulties in those negotiations? What is the biggest obstacle to agreement from your point of view?

PRESIDENT CRISTIANI: Well, I think the first one that we must overcome is whether the FMLN is seriously looking for a political solution to the conflict. In the past, we do not see seriousness in that respect and they simply used it as a propaganda scheme to enhance their military possibilities. Obviously situations have changed, are very much different. We do hope that now their attitude is to seriously look for a solution to the conflict with rational positions and not irrational positions or impossible positions that we cannot meet because of its unconstitutionality. Secondly, I think that if there is a good will from their point of view, there is the fact that there must be a simultaneous beginning of what can be called a peaceful El Salvador with respect to consolidation of its democratic process and not trying to present one in front of the other as a condition and then I think, then we have a good case in front of our hands, and hopefully if that is correct, I hope that 1990 will be the year of Salvadorian peace.

MR. MacNeil: Just before we finish, on the matter of the murder of the six Jesuit priests, you told our program in January that there was a very good case, strong case against Col. Benevides who had been charged. But then the Washington Post quotes you a couple of weeks ago as saying he's unlikely to be convicted. Can you explain the difference between the two statements?

PRESIDENT CRISTIANI: Yes, I would like to clear that and make, present our case like we really see it. There is a lot of opinions and speculation as to how much the President of El Salvador can guarantee with respect to condemning or absolving any involved in the Jesuit crime and the Supreme Court of El Salvador is an independent organ not responding to any pressures from the executive organ, which is the President of the republic. What I stated, that it now depends on the judicial system as to whether he will be convicted or not. We added also that we feel that all of those officers and members of the armed forces are guilty, that there is a strong case, and we feel that a conviction is what should be the result of the judicial process, but we cannot guarantee the process going either way. That is what we tried to present but obviously it was, it seemed like it was presented as to, that I had some sort of pressures and we were going to allow Benevides to go free. It is not up to the President of El Salvador to either condemn him or allow him to go free, and we think that there is a strong case, there are proofs and obviously the judicial process might even come up with further proof that will condemn all of those involved, including Benevides.

MR. MacNeil: Right. Well, Mr. President, thank you very much for joining us today.

PRESIDENT CRISTIANI: Thank you, a pleasure.

MR. MacNeil: Now we get the views of the FMLN, the Ferobunda Martin National Liberation Front, which has been fight the El Salvador government for over a decade. With us is Salvador Sanabria, a Washington representative of the FMLN. Mr. Sanabria began his political career as a student leader in his country and now travels between the U.S. and El Salvador. Mr. Sanabria, thank you for joining us. President Cristiani believes that the Soviet perestroika and the Nicaragua election are factors in bringing you to the table. Do you agree with that?

SALVADOR SANABRIA, FMLN Spokesman: Well, certainly, all the changes happening around the world, but mostly the effects of the November 11 offensive last year are the main factors to make possible this agreement that was signed in Geneva April 4th. Also another factor that is important to mention is the will in the United States Congress and the will expressed by Sec. Baker a few days ago that it's time to bring peace to the conflict in El Salvador.

MR. MacNeil: Do you feel that you are losing support because of changes in the Soviet Union, because of changes in Nicaragua, that you no longer have that encouragement, financial support, armed support at your back?

MR. SANABRIA: Well, the FMLN in these last 10 years have struggled, has not depended on any foreign powers outside El Salvador. Most of our support has come from the population and international solidarity movement in the Western world, so the effects of the changes in the Soviet Union and the changes in Nicaragua really does not have a serious impact in our logistical support, but the lessons in Nicaragua and the changes in the Eastern world are a good lesson that winds are in favor of real democracy and that's why we are a struggling El Salvador.

MR. MacNeil: Do you agree with Cristiani that this is the best opportunity in 10 years?

MR. SANABRIA: We think so. The agreement signed in Geneva, it is a good start, this time with the participation of the United Nations mediating between both parts and having as the first chapter of the agreement says as a main goal to achieve the end of the armed confrontations, the promotion of democracy and unrestricts human rights for the civilian population, so we think those are the goals, why we've been struggling all these years, and we'll give the benefit of the doubt to Mr. Cristiani and also we'll give the benefit of the doubt to the El Salvadoran army that has been exercising power over the government and other institutions of the Salvadorian states for the advance of negotiations.

MR. MacNeil: You just heard him say that the army supports the peace process?

MR. SANABRIA: The army made public in a statement a few days ago in which they say all the good things that are happening to the country are because of them and that they are not remain the main obstacle for peace in El Salvador, but on the other hand, the attitude of that army has been to increase repression in our country, to exercise veto power over the government delegation at the table of negotiations, so we have to see the way the army supports this new agreement and really give a free hand to Mr. Cristiani to make a step forward in this negotiation process.

MR. MacNeil: How do you, what did you think of Mr. Cristiani's response to your demands about the future of the army?

MR. SANABRIA: We believe the main --

MR. MacNeil: He kind of indicated it isn't much of a problem. What do you think?

MR. SANABRIA: Well, that remains to be seen. We believe the main obstacle to democracy and achieving peace in El Salvador still is the Salvadoran army so a real change in the mentality of that army has to happen. Before that mentality change can happen, the size of the armed forces have to be reduced, the security forces have to be dismantled, and the civilian police have to be created, and the mentality of the armed officer corps has to be that, that one of supporting real democracy in El Salvador, so I think the big task for the real challenge for Mr. Cristiani will be to control the behavior of those armed forces in the country.

MR. MacNeil: You have, the FMLN has declared that it will refrain from attacks. Now does that extend throughout the period of these negotiations?

MR. SANABRIA: Before this agreement was signed in Geneva, the FMLN declared unilateral acts of good will which include that we will refrain from attacking civilian members of the government that are not part of military or paramilitary operations, and second, we will halt economic sabotage against the telephone system, against commercial establishment and against public transportation system. So those unilateral measures of good will are still enacted and they will remain through the negotiation process.

MR. MacNeil: Well does that mean you will continue to attack army units?

MR. SANABRIA: Certainly this war has not ended. The Salvadoran armed forces have not refrained from launching offensive operations against FMLN forces so we have the right that while there is no political agreement to end this conflict to exercise the military pressure over those armed forces.

MR. MacNeil: In other words, the fighting between their army and your guerrillas goes on until the Geneva talks are successful, is that correct?

MR. SANABRIA: During the talks there can be measures of success. Probably there could be a possibility of a cease-fire. Around the coming elections next March 1991, that we believe have to be elections in which conditions as the one that took place in Nicaragua should be the stick in which to measure the government attitude and political will by those in the government and the armed forces to allow political oppositions to exercise their right through elections to achieve power.

MR. MacNeil: So you don't think you'll have an agreement before those elections next March?

MR. SANABRIA: Our will and our hope is that there is an agreement before those elections. The FMLN have made clear that it wants to become a political party and to participate in a democratic system in El Salvador, so our hope and our goal is to achieve real democracy through these negotiations.

MR. MacNeil: Mr. Sanabria, 10 years, an estimated 70,000 plus Salvadorians dead, suppose you do come to agreement now. What do you think has been achieved by the war you have been waging for those 10 years with the cost of all those dead?

MR. SANABRIA: The way the FMLN sees itself through these 10 years of a struggle is that we are the guaranty, the force to change in El Salvador. Before this war broke out, El Salvador was under 50 years of military dictatorship. If at the end of this conflict, the Salvadoran people can guarantee peace with democracy, that struggle has been worth it, and we believe that through these negotiations, proving the political will by both the FMLN and the government and with the support of the international community and the Salvadoran people, El Salvador can end this conflict by establishing a real democracy for the country.

MR. MacNeil: Well, Mr. Sanabria, thank you very much for joining us.

MR. SANABRIA: Thank you very much for inviting me. FOCUS - CRACK DOWN

MS. WOODRUFF: Next a look at a controversial Arizona program designed to reduce the demand for illegal drugs. As Tom Bearden reports, it could becomea model for a national program if it works.

MR. BEARDEN: She wants to make sure she's buying good drugs. The trouble is the man selling it is a cop. This sting operation is part of Maricopa County, Arizona's master plan to attack drug abuse. So is this. [PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT]

MR. BEARDEN: That new look can be quite a shock. People with good jobs and families, many whom have used small amounts of drugs for years without police problems, are unceremoniously tossed in jail. They get the complete treatment, fingerprints, mug shots, body searches, hours of confinement before trial, crammed in the holding cells. Do Drugs, Do Time wants people to know about that too. [PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT]

MR. BEARDEN: Highly publicized drug busts, jail time, TV advertising, educational programs in the schools, all designed with one purpose in mind, reduce demand for drugs. In the past, that usually meant a crackdown on dealers, but Phoenix Police Chief Ruben Ortega says his target is the people who use drugs.

RUBEN ORTEGA, Phoenix Police Chief: Somewhere between 70 to 75 percent of the consumers of these drugs were ordinary people that could afford to buy them, at all levels of society, everything from the construction worker right up to the professional, be he a doctor or an attorney, and everyone in-between, and so we began to realize that we had not begun addressing that part of the problem of making the majority of the drug users responsible for that drug usage and responsible for breaking the law.

MR. BEARDEN: And his target includes all levels of drug users.

MR. ORTEGA: If you have one marijuana cigarette in your possession, it's a felony, so that gives us a tremendous hammer, so to speak, on those people that we arrest to motivate them to get into the program, because if they don't, the alternative is they'll have a felony conviction.

MR. BEARDEN: Do Drugs, Do Time gives a first time offender the chance to avoid a felony wrap by signing a confession, paying a fine, and attending drug counseling sessions.

SPOKESMAN: When I was busted, the guy pointed a gun at my head and I've never had that experience up until that time.

MR. BEARDEN: Counseling is provided by a private company called TASC. The initials stand for Treatment Assessment Screening Center. Barbara Zugor is its executive director.

BARBARA ZUGOR, Counseling Director: We keep these people extremely busy. There is an awful lot of urinalysis surveillance and the urinalysis surveillance starts out at two to three times a week and then as the program progresses, it is a random type situation all through the year, which means at least four urines a month. It keeps a client honest, it keeps a client from slippage back into the drug culture.

MR. BEARDEN: The client also has to pay for treatment, anywhere from $600 for possession of a small amount of marijuana, to nearly $3,000 for cocaine. County Prosecutor Richard Romley is one of the most vocal supporters of the plan.

RICHARD ROMLEY, County Prosecutor: The people that have been identified in this program are those that are the most amenable to treatment. They are not hard core addicts, they are not the ones injecting drugs, they are the ones that have flirted with drug use, and we think that the program of being put in jail, having that door slam behind them, the financial penalty, the time commitment, and so forth, that it's going to make a difference.

MR. BEARDEN: But will arresting people and sending them to counseling reduce drug demand? Some of the people in the program are highly skeptical.

SPOKESMAN: I know many streets around town that you could just go to and buy it from anybody, you know. There's more than 10 people in two blocks. What I think they're counseling mainly is just getting people to stop buying from people they don't know.

MR. BEARDEN: Appearance Court Judge Alan Lobue has doubts too.

JUDGE ALAN LOBUE, Appearance Court: It might make a dent. It's not going to be much of a dent in my opinion.

MR. BEARDEN: Bottom line, Do Drugs, Do Time is not going to have a significant or major impact on the drug situation in this city?

JUDGE LOBUE: In my personal estimation, no.

MR. BEARDEN: Louis Rhodes is the executive director of the Arizona Civil Liberties union.

LOUIS RHODES, ACLU: I don't think there's any proof that prosecuting users leads to reduction of demand. We tried that during prohibition. We tried it during the drug war. New York State went to tough prosecution laws, tough penalties in the 1970s. I mean, this drug war has been going on for 20 years now.

MR. BEARDEN: Rhodes and others dispute the claim that casual drug users generate 70 percent of demand. They say it's more like 15 or 20 percent. And even if it was 70 percent, they say busting them is just unworkable.

MR. RHODES: If you think about it, you would have to arrest, 20, 30 or 40 million people. That isn't possible. That's a crazy way to fight this battle.

MR. BEARDEN: But Zugor says the program will succeed because it combines punishment with treatment.

MS. ZUGOR: I think that part of the punishment is the treatment and I think that's what makes it successful. The punishment certainly is every individual is booked into the main jail and fingerprinted. So no one receives a summons. Everyone literally spends anywhere from two hours to twenty-four hours in jail. That is also the catalyst to motivate somebody into treatment. The punishment also is if you don't take this particular program, you will definitely be assured of a felony conviction.

MR. BEARDEN: But that isn't entirely true. Some of those arrested have refused counseling, in effect, telling the prosecutor to take his best shot. The ACLU's Louis Rhodes.

MR. RHODES: In many cases, they've never even been charged. I mean, it simply disappeared. They fought it by refusing to go along with it and now eight, nine months later, nothing's happened.

MR. BEARDEN: Some of this counseling group's members knew about that, but others didn't.

DRUG USER: They said if I did not go through this, I would be charged and have a sentence of 5 1/2 years in jail and like a $120,000 fine plus, you know, jail sentence. You know, in actuality, I'm sure if I didn't go to this thing, I wouldn't have got no jail time at all.

MR. BEARDEN: You know that?

DRUG USER: Yeah, I basically knew that, but it was the fact of the matter I didn't want to take the chance.

SPOKESMAN: So I heard you right, Bill, you said that if people refuse this program, they still get scott free?

GROUP MEMBER: In some cases, yes.

DRUG USER: In most cases.

SPOKESMAN: I don't think that's right at all. I think if they refuse the program, they should get the full, you know, the full punishment.

MR. RHODES: In fact, one of the things that astonishes me the most about this program is that they're arguing that the law is so important to be enforced that a lot of people should be arrested and then they're turning around and saying, but we don't particularly want to prosecute them under the law, we want to create an alternative system. If the law is worth enforcing, I would suggest the law should be enforced.

MR. BEARDEN: Prosecutor Romley knows that by itself, Phoenix can have little impact on the national drug trade.

MR. ROMLEY: What will it do for us within our valley if we don't get it on a national basis? We tried. We tried.

MR. BEARDEN: But he is encouraged that the Bush administration is considering Do Drugs, Do Time as a national model for community action. Meanwhile, the drug sweeps, TV advertising, and counseling will continue for at least another year. Supporters say it'll take that long to gather enough information to declare success or failure. ESSAY - LASTING IMPRESSION

MR. MacNeil: Finally, our regular Thursday night essay. Tonight, Amei Wallach, art critic of New York Newsday, has some thoughts about the comeback of an impressionist.

MS. WALLACH: What do you see when you look at this painting by Claude Monet? Do you see hills reduced to triangles of jagged paint, slashing across the canvas, do you see an ancient oak at the river's edge, defiantly gathering every golden ray of sun, or do you see a parable of age and endurance by an artist in a nation that had lost a war and its glorified self-image? Until lately, if you'd asked most scholars, they'd have told you there was only one right answer to the question. You were supposed to see the hills in the 24 paintings Monet made of the Cruise River Valley as triangles of paint, period. It was beside the point to enjoy the scenery or look for symbols. Art, the scholars of the '60s and '70s said, was supposed to be about the materials it was made of, paint, canvas, and shapes, plus something called process. Process exposed the step by step changes the artist made in the materials, piling pink on blue, for instance, and how they added up to the finished work of art. Looked at this way, Monet was the original process artist. But fashions change. Now in the 1990s, scholars are once again paying attention to the tales paintings have to tell about an artist and a time. They acknowledge that oak is defiant, maybe even a stand-in for Monet, himself, or a symbol of France in the 1890s. They read paintings the way most of us read newspapers, for information. That's the impulse behind a perfectly glorious exhibition that's currently at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston en route to Chicago and London, Monet and the '90s, the series paintings, reunites paintings that haven't been together in a hundred years. It finds Monet at the age of 50 in a France still reeling from the defeat of the Franco Prussian War, government scandals and a shaky stock market. He'd just bought a too expensive estate at Geverney. But in 1890, he was an aging has been and so was the impressionist movement he'd helped invent. Young post impressionist whipper snappers like George Serra were stealing the show with paintings that bent nature to their own purpose. The outside world was just an excuse for experimenting with paint and patterns on canvas. This exhibition argues that Monet resurrected himself by identifying his art with national yearning. Through ambition series like the Haystack paintings, he made impressionism the internationally recognized pride of France and himself its grand household world master. The Haystack, squat and stalwart, withstanding wind and weather, stands for the French land and its age old agrarian values. The Poplars, known as trees of liberty during the French Revolution, were also an emblem of high French taste, aristocratic, elegant, exuding Elan. In Ruan Cathedral, he was not only melting stone like ice cream in light and color, he was also reminding his countrymen of history, tradition, and their old, almost forgotten faith. But it was on the Normandy coast of his own childhood that he achieved the perfect blend of national metaphor and his own need. He began with a wide angle, moving closer in to concentrate on one massive, jutting form. There a cloud of purple resolved itself in succeeding painting into a customs house, clinging to the edge of a cliff. The customs house, like Monet, himself, like France, endured, despite all odds, gloriously. It's a relief to welcome the world, the artists and history back into the way we look at paintings. It enriches them. But you know something, bottom line, the only thing that really matters is the magic of the work. Monet and his paintings live triumphantly because of how he put paint to canvas. The rest is just a footnote. I'm Amei Wallach. RECAP

MS. WOODRUFF: Again, the main stories of this Thursday, President Bush and Soviet President Gorbachev will hold a five day summit meeting in the United States beginning May 30th. In Lithuania, Soviet troops occupied the offices of the state prosecutor, and in this country, the Environmental Protection Agency said more than 120 million Americans live in areas with unhealthy air quality. Good night, Robin.

MR. MacNeil: Good night, Judy. That's the news tonight. We'll be back tomorrow night. I'm Robert MacNeil. Good night.