AIDS Extravaganza in Vancouver

political leaders usually overreach themselves and start going into terminal decline. The projected rate of growth for 1996 is down to 2.3 per cent (the soothsayers foretell a resumption of 6 per cent growth for 1997-99), much below what is needed to get Peru back into its peak prosperity. The external debt situation still remains very threatening. And the narcotics issue will not go away while Washington is concerned Vladimiro Montesinos, a key security adviser to the president, has just been accused by a top narcotics trader on trial of taking bribes of 50,000 dollars per month to secure army protection to fly his cocaine cargo out of his airstrip. The charge has been denied, but less well known army chiefs in key localities are almost certain to be involved in the drugs business.