US Admits Role in Missionary Deaths

Ben Fenton (UK Telegraph) reports, "A PERUVIAN air force jet that shot down a light aircraft carrying American missionaries, killing a woman and her seven-month-old daughter, was directed on to its target by a US intelligence aircraft that mistook it for a cocaine smuggler, Washington officials said yesterday."

US admits role in missionary deaths
By Ben Fenton

A PERUVIAN air force jet that shot down a light aircraft carrying American missionaries, killing a woman and her seven-month-old daughter, was directed on to its target by a US intelligence aircraft that mistook it for a cocaine smuggler, Washington officials said yesterday.

The bodies of Roni Bowers, 35, and her adopted daughter, Charity, were brought back to America last night. Their deaths have caused acute embarrassment in Washington, drawing attention to its role in the war against drugs in South America.

The American embassy in Lima said last night that flights aimed at intercepting cocaine-smuggling planes were being stopped until an investigation was completed. Suspicion was growing that the specially equipped Cessna Citation jet was being operated by private contractors on behalf of the CIA.

The White House was forced to admit America's role in the shooting down of the missionary plane over the Peruvian Amazon jungle last Friday morning after Jim Bowers, the dead woman's husband, who survived the flight, told his family that a second aircraft had been involved in the attack.

An administration official said the American plane was involved only in identifying the plane as suspicious, which it did because no flight plan was filed for a journey through an area often used by drug runners. But it was the Peruvian air force that decided to fire on the missionaries, he added.

The Cessna 185 was piloted by Kevin Donaldson, a member of a missionary group called the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism. He was flying Mr and Mrs Bowers, their six-year-old son, Cory, and Charity on a trip from the Brazilian border to the city of Iquitos, 620 miles north-east of Lima.

American officials in Washington and Lima said that after the American surveillance plane directed the A-37B jet to the missionaries' flight, the Peruvian pilot followed agreed procedures involving a series of warnings, which the light aircraft did not heed.

The Peruvian air force said the plane was shot down after a warning burst was fired. But Mr Bowers, from Muskegon, Michigan, told his family later that no warning was given and that the fighter made two separate passes at them.

His brother Phil said: "It happened very fast. The planes flew by first, did some swooping, and then came in from behind and started shooting. At some point, one of the bullets had gone through Roni's heart, right into the baby's head, from behind. They died instantly."

Mr and Mrs Bowers had been working in Peru since 1993 and lived on a house boat on the Amazon. Hank Scheltema, who works at the charity's headquarters in Pennsylvania, said Mr Bowers had told him that the fighter killed his wife and daughter on the first pass and then, coming back again, hit Mr Donaldson in the legs and caused the plane to catch fire.

The pilot was able to bring the Cessna 185, which was equipped with pontoons, down on the Amazon, but the aircraft turned on its back and began to sink. Mr Bowers was able to get his wife and children out of the plane as Mr Donaldson extricated himself. They kept afloat for 45 minutes until villagers reached them in dugout canoes. Phil Bowers said his brother had reported that at least one and possibly as many as three fighters had strafed them in the river.

President Bush said he was "saddened" by the deaths. "Our role, like in other missions, was to provide information as to tail numbers," he said. "Our role is to help identify planes that fail to file flight plans. We weep for the families whose lives have been affected." The Peruvian Prime Minister "expressed his sympathies" to Mr Bush, the White House said last night.

Javier Perez de Cuellar, at an official dinner at the Summit of the Americas, "approached the President and expressed his sympathies about the loss of life and said he would do all he could for the families", said a spokesman for Mr Bush.

The American government has been involved in flying back-up missions to help Peru and Colombia intercept drug runners since the early Nineties. The Peruvian air force is poorly equipped for such operations and the fighter pilot involved last Friday did not even have an air-to-air radar set in his plane.

The surveillance aircraft was piloted by an American civilian contractor under the command of the US embassy in Lima. It was not clear which agency in Washington was controlling the operation, causing suspicion to fall on the CIA.