March 26, 2004
By Tim Gaynor

Photo: A group of British cavers pose outside of a cave in Cuetzalan, Mexico, after being rescued on March 25, 2004. A group of specialized divers rescued the trapped cavers as their misfortune turned into a diplomatic incident, with Mexican President Fox demanding to know what the British cavers, four of whom are British armed forces members, were doing. Photo by Pool/Reuters

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - A diplomatic rift between Britain and Mexico widened on Friday when President Vicente Fox refused to accept London's explanations for the presence of a British military group found stuck in a Mexican cave.

Fox said Britain had not clarified questions about the activities of six cave explorers, four of them members of the military, who were plucked from a cavern late on Thursday after a week trapped by an underground flood.

"We received a reply to our request from Britain, but it is frankly unsatisfactory, we need more clarification about what this was about," Fox told a news conference in Nicaragua, where he is on an official visit.

Mexico's attorney general's office said it was investigating media reports that the cavers were scouting for deposits of potentially radioactive materials.

"We do not have any indication up to this point that indicates illicit activity," Jose Luis Santiago Vasconcelos, deputy attorney general, told a news conference.

Mexico does not allow foreign military exercises on its soil.

The Mexican government is upset it was not told in advance of the presence of the expedition, most of whom were members of the Combined Services Caving Association, an enthusiasts' group made up of active and retired British soldiers and civilians in the Ministry of Defense.

Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Ernesto Derbez spoke in strong terms.

"We are not going to tolerate on this occasion that no one explains to us exactly what their citizens were doing here," he said in comments published in the Mexican press.


RELATIONS SENSITIVE

Mexico's relations with Britain were already sensitive because of allegations that Britain helped the United States spy on Mexico's U.N. mission in the run-up to the Iraq war.

After receiving medical checks at a military hospital, the cavers were brought in minibuses for questioning at a rundown immigration center in Mexico City on Friday, accompanied by trucks bearing rifle-toting members of a special police force.

British embassy sources told Reuters that all the expedition members were booked on a Friday night flight to London from Mexico City.

The trapped cavers were trapped by surging underground flood waters two days into a routine exploration trip in the Cuetzalan caves in Puebla province.

The British Embassy had originally described the cavers as being on a scientific mission and later clarified this to say they were mapping out the cave complex, one of the most extensive in the world.

Fox had asked on Wednesday for a "swift" explanation of what the foreign soldiers were doing in the caves.

Hoping to put an end to the incident, Britain said its minister for Latin America, Bill Rammell, met with Mexico's ambassador in London on Friday afternoon, and thanked him for help in getting the group out safely.

"We respect the Mexican authorities' need to clarify their immigration status," Rammell said, adding that he hoped the incident "could be resolved as quickly as possible." (Additional reporting by Ivan Castro in Managua)
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=4675816