Pubdate: Sun, 03 Sep 2000
Source: Washington Post (DC)
Copyright: 2000 The Washington Post Company
Contact:  1150 15th Street Northwest, Washington, DC 20071
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Website: http://www.washingtonpost.com/
Page: A24
Author: Molly Moore

COCAINE SEIZURES BY U.S. DOUBLE IN PACIFIC OCEAN

Seizures of South American cocaine bound for the United States through the 
Pacific Ocean have more than doubled in the last year, and U.S. drug 
authorities say the Pacific's wide open seas have replaced the congested 
Caribbean as the drug cartels' most lucrative trafficking route.

The increased seizures are a result of a major redeployment of the U.S. 
Coast Guard's Pacific Coast forces away from their more traditional 
missions of fisheries enforcement and support of military exercises that 
counter drug trafficking, senior officials said.

"More than half of the cocaine that leaves South America is now coming up 
the Pacific side," said Rear Adm. Terry Cross, the Coast Guard's chief of 
operations. "The drug smugglers are using the Pacific like any business; 
they're picking the least risky and least costly [route] for them."

U.S. law enforcement authorities said the expanding use of the eastern 
Pacific as a major drug trafficking route is particularly troubling because 
the open ocean is so difficult to patrol and because most of the drug 
shipments are put ashore in Mexico, where law enforcement has traditionally 
been lax and drug cartels have exerted growing control over police and 
public officials in the past decade.

"In the short term, we anticipate continued heavy flow through the eastern 
Pacific," said Vice Adm. Ernest Riutta, the Coast Guard commander for the 
Pacific area. "There's a limit to how much I can throw out there, and [the 
traffickers] have unlimited resources."

Drug smugglers' techniques in the Pacific are also far more challenging to 
law enforcement. While much of the cocaine in the Caribbean is moved in 
open speedboats that are easily identifiable by their oversized engines and 
extra fuel containers, most cocaine traverses the Pacific in the hulls of 
fishing boats or aboard massive container ships that are virtually 
impossible to search, law enforcement authorities and analysts said.

"They bring the drugs in cargo ships, and it never hits the intelligence 
radar screen," said Stephen Flynn, a fellow at the Council on Foreign 
Relations who is researching a book on the impact of globalization on the 
smuggling of drugs, arms and illegal immigrants. "And law enforcement is 
always slow to react to trends."

U.S. authorities began detecting an increased use of the eastern Pacific as 
a drug trafficking route nearly five years ago but have dedicated 
relatively few resources to the area because of financial constraints and 
jurisdictional bickering among U.S. law enforcement agencies and between 
the United States and Latin American countries.

However, in the last year, U.S. agencies including the Coast Guard, Drug 
Enforcement Administration and Customs have begun sharing intelligence 
information and coordinating operations more efficiently, senior law 
enforcement authorities and Coast Guard officials said.

"Significant increases occurred in inter-operability and info-sharing with 
U.S. military and national intelligence agencies," said Cmdr. Jim 
McPherson, a Coast Guard spokesman.

In addition, while U.S. officials said they continue to have conflicts with 
Mexico's anti-drug agencies, the Mexican navy has become increasingly 
cooperative in coordinating drug operations with the Coast Guard in the 
Pacific.

The Coast Guard has dedicated increasing numbers of cutters to drug 
interdictions, and in the first 10 months of this fiscal year, it has 
already exceeded last year's record cocaine hauls with seizures totaling 
more than 58 tons and worth an estimated $3.9 billion, according to Coast 
Guard documents. During the entire previous fiscal year, the agency 
captured 55 tons in what had been its highest seizure rate in history.

Overall, cocaine seizures by the Coast Guard have more than tripled in the 
last five years. In the last year, the location of the seizures has shifted 
dramatically. "Eighty percent of the cocaine we've interdicted is in the 
eastern Pacific, compared to 38 percent last year," Cross said.

The record seizures are part of a larger pattern of dramatic increases in 
Colombian cocaine production and a spurt in illegal drug use among 18- to 
25-year-old in the past two years in the United States, according to U.S. 
law enforcement agencies. The combined trends have alarmed law enforcement 
authorities and policymakers, helping prompt President Clinton to approve a 
$1.3 billion aid package to assist the Colombian government in fighting 
drug production and trafficking.

Coast Guard officials said the significant increase in Pacific seizures is 
due to the agency's growing emphasis on patrols and operations in the 
region, as well as to greater use of Pacific trafficking routes by 
smugglers. In February alone, Coast Guard cutters confiscated 15.6 tons of 
cocaine on four vessels plying Pacific routes, according to Coast Guard 
documents. Those included the two largest seizures of the year--two 
Colombian fishing vessels hauling six tons of cocaine each.

In a typical seizure in July, the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Chase stopped a 
Colombian fishing vessel about 900 miles north of Colombia based on 
intelligence reports of suspected drug trafficking.

A member of the boarding team, Lt. j.g. Anna Slaven, 24, said in a 
telephone interview from the cutter that she became even more suspicious 
when she noticed that the fishing gear appeared not to have been used in 
weeks and the crew members were far too well-dressed to be fishermen. After 
hours of searching, the team discovered half a ton of cocaine bricks frozen 
amid crushed ice and rotting shark pieces in the holds of the 60-foot boat.
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