
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, June 1, 1993                   TAG: 9306010084
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: ROME                                LENGTH: Short

TAXPAYERS PAY AIDES' COST ON ASPIN TRIP

In Europe on official business, Defense Secretary Les Aspin spent several days vacationing at an expensive Venice hotel. He paid his own way but taxpayers picked up the tab for several aides and a doctor who accompanied him, officials confirmed Monday.

A longtime female friend who vacationed with Aspin at the Danieli hotel, a converted royal palace where room rates run upward of $400 a night, returned with him Monday aboard a government jet.

Officials said she would reimburse the government.

Aspin, appearing tan and rested, defended the five-night stay at the hotel. "I paid for the vacation myself," he said.

Pentagon spokesman Vernon Guidry said Aspin was accompanied on the vacation by a top military aide, a military physician, his communications team and a security detail. He said final cost figures were not immediately available.

Guidry declined to give the exact number of the entourage but a Pentagon source, speaking only on condition he not be named, said nine aides accompanied the secretary.

Guidry said Aspin hasn't taken much personal time since moving into the Pentagon's top job, even though he has been ordered by his physicians to get rest after recent heart troubles that led to his getting a pacemaker.

He said Aspin spent about two hours a day talking on the phone with officials in Washington.

As for the staff that accompanied Aspin, Guidry said it was unavoidable because defense secretaries require a special communications link to the president and a security detail at all times.

by CNB