Bush Administration Launches Latin Outreach Program

WASHINGTON - The U.S. State Department on Monday launched a program to directly target and brief Hispanic immigrant communities on U.S. policy toward their home countries in an effort to get Latin Americans to view Washington more favorably, a U.S. official said.

Bush administration officials, including Secretary of State Colin Powell, spoke to representatives from about 70 Central American community organizations in a daylong seminar on issues ranging from gang activity to U.S. free-trade initiatives to the president's plan to legalize millions of immigrants through a temporary visa program.

''Part of this is a public diplomacy strategy to improve the image of the United States,'' said Roger Noriega, assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs and the main promoter of the outreach program. ``And how better to do that than [ask] family members to talk about this country with their communities back home and to be able to have a little more information about what our policy is in Latin America.''

The initiative comes as most polls show that most Latin Americans hold a negative view of the Bush administration's policies. A poll to be released this week at The Herald's Americas Conference by Latinobarometro, a Chilean firm, will show that the U.S. image has continued to fall among Mexicans, Brazilians and Argentines.

However, Central Americans largely hold a favorable view of the United States, the poll will show, and its leaders have tended to back the United States on Iraq and other issues. The Bush administration has signed a free-trade deal with the Dominican Republic and five Central American countries -- Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Costa Rica and Guatemala.

The new program will not include Mexico, which comprises the bulk of the Hispanic population in the United States. Mexico's needs are attended to by a bilateral Partnership for Prosperity program, Noriega said.