Pubdate: Sat, 20 May 2000
Source: Moscow Times, The (Russia)
Copyright: 2000 The Moscow Times
Contact:  Ulitsa Pravdy, Dom 24, 125865 Moscow, Russia
Fax: (7-095) 937-3393
Website: http://www.moscowtimes.ru/
Author: Brent Scowcroft and Bob Graham
Note: Former National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft and Senator Bob 
Graham of Florida are co-chairs of a Council on Foreign Relations task 
force on Colombia. They submitted this comment to the Los Angeles Times.

INTERVENTION IN COLOMBIA

Skeptics looking for confirmation of a Colombia in crisis need look no 
further than the northern border towns of Vigia del Fuerte and Bojaya. In 
March, insurgent guerrillas attacked these fishing villages near Panama. 
Churches, homes and government buildings were destroyed. Thirty people were 
killed, seven taken prisoner, and four are missing.

Statistics complement this story of a country in precipitous decline. 
Between 1995 and 1999, annual cocaine production skyrocketed from 230 to 
520 metric tons, 80 percent of world supply. Since 1990, Colombia's growing 
guerrilla insurgency has murdered 35,000, including 5,000 police officers. 
Worse, drug traffickers and insurgents bent on overthrowing the oldest 
democracy in Latin America are working together, a merger that raises the 
specter of a nation run by violent narcotics predators.

Another ominous sign is Colombia's struggling economy. Colombia is 
suffering through its first sustained recession after nearly seven decades 
of uninterrupted economic growth. The combination of 21 percent 
unemployment, a robust black market economy and a lack of investor 
confidence is an explosive cocktail. Were these problems self-contained, it 
would be easy to dismiss them as another country's internal struggles. They 
are not. More than 90 percent of the cocaine and 70 percent of the heroin 
consumed in the United States originates in Colombia. U.S. interests in the 
Andean region extend beyond helping target the source of this drug flow. 
The struggle between insurgents and the Colombian government has bled into 
neighboring nations, a development that recalls the spread of civil 
disorder in Central America in the 1980s. And one of those nations - 
Venezuela - is our largest petroleum supplier.

Colombia's economic troubles promise to hit the United States. As South 
America's third-largest economy, Colombia has become our fifth-largest 
export market in Latin America. In 1998 alone, it imported approximately $4 
billion in U.S. goods and services. Colombia's oil reserves of 2.6 billion 
barrels - slightly less than Qatar, Indonesia and Algeria - could serve as 
a major energy source, but will remain untapped unless stability is restored.

In January, U.S. President Bill Clinton proposed $1.6 billion in U.S. 
assistance to complement Plan Colombia, the recovery proposal constructed 
largely through the efforts of Colombian President AndrIs Pastrana. The 
package provides aid to help destroy the country's coca-growing capacity 
and help in training, equipping and providing intelligence to Colombia's 
security forces. The House of Representatives approved the plan on March 30.

We support this plan, but it is not a panacea for Colombia's woes, nor can 
it represent the totality of U.S. involvement. Our greatest contributions 
must come in helping Colombia develop the strong institutions it needs for 
success, such as a professional military that protects human rights and a 
respected judicial system. We can bolster Colombia's economy by extending 
the Andean Trade Preferences Act, which for nearly 10 years has fostered 
economic cooperation with our Andean friends.

But our best intentions will be in vain if we delay. The United States has 
pledged half of the international assistance to help address Colombia's 
growing problems; a slow pace in providing that aid could have a chilling 
effect on other nations. Spain is hosting a June conference of nations to 
aid Colombia, a meeting that could fail if we have not shown our commitment 
to Colombian recovery.

Pastrana has made a good-faith effort to rebuild Colombia; Clinton has 
responded in kind. Now that the House has acted, it is up to the Senate. 
Given the rapidly deteriorating situation, assistance delayed will have the 
effect of assistance denied or rendered irrelevant. But if Congress acts 
quickly, we can contribute to restoring the societal and economic 
conditions on which a stable Colombia and Latin America depend.
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MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart