Pubdate: Wed,  7 Nov 2001
Source: Blade, The (OH)
Copyright: 2001 The Blade
Contact:  http://www.toledoblade.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/48
Author: Ann McFeatters
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?203 (Terrorism)

DEA BOSS SAYS TERROR HURTS WAR ON DRUGS

WASHINGTON - The head of the Drug Enforcement Administration says 
that since Sept. 11's terrorist attacks, his agency has felt a major 
impact as the FBI's resources are "spread thin'' and diverted from 
investigating illegal drug cases to terrorism, even though the two 
increasingly are related.

Asa Hutchinson, who resigned as a congressman from Arkansas to take 
the DEA job Aug. 8, said yesterday, "Certainly, it's having an impact 
when FBI agents are pulled off drugs for terrorism [investigations] 
in Boca Raton [Fla.] and Boston," he said. "We have to make up the 
slack.''

He said "discussions are under way'' on whether this will lead to a 
"functional shift'' in allocation of resources at a time when the DEA 
has begun a new assault on medical marijuana.

There have been conflicting reports of the war on terrorism's impact 
on the drug war.

Mr. Hutchinson said terrorist cells in the United States have been 
forced underground, preventing them from selling as many drugs to 
fund terrorist organizations as they had been.

But last month the new head of the Customs Service, Robert Bonner, 
said terrorism has replaced drug smuggling as the top priority of his 
agency.

Hundreds of Customs officials have been redeployed from drug 
investigations to provide 24-hour inspections at the Canadian border, 
he said.

And as the war in Afghanistan continues, U.N. officials say Afghan 
farmers are beginning to defy the ruling Taliban's year-old ban on 
growing opium poppies, meaning there could be a global upsurge in 
supplies of opium and heroin.

While Afghanistan is a source of about one-fifth of the heroin trade 
in cities along the East Coast, Mr. Hutchinson said that 
Afghanistan's drug trade clearly is used to finance terrorist 
activities.

That is changing as U.S. anti-drug officials have focused more 
sharply on terrorism's drug connection since the strikes.

In congressional testimony last month, Mr. Hutchinson said flatly, 
"The sanctuary enjoyed by [Osama] bin Laden is based on the existence 
of the Taliban's support for the drug trade. Both drug traffickers 
and terrorists use many of the same methods to achieve their evil 
ends."
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