Pubdate: Wed, 07 Mar 2001
Source: Christian Science Monitor (US)
Copyright: 2001 The Christian Science Publishing Society
Contact:  One Norway Street, Boston, MA 02115
Fax: (617) 450-2031
Website: http://www.csmonitor.com/
Forum: http://www.csmonitor.com/atcsmonitor/vox/p-vox.html
Author: Brad Knickerbocker

TACTICS IN DRUG WAR TAKE HITS

Calls Mount In Washington To Rethink The Program Of Certifying Other
Countries.

WASHINGTON -- Is it time to shift from sticks to carrots in the "war on
drugs"?

One of the bluntest tools in the US arsenal has been the 15-year-old
program that "certifies" drug-producing and trafficking countries as
cooperating in antidrug efforts. Those that don't make the grade lose
foreign aid.

But even those countries that earn Uncle Sam's stamp of approval find
the whole process insulting. Mexican President Vicente Fox, whose new
administration has begun cracking down on drug production and official
corruption, calls it "an affront- a sham that should be denounced and
canceled."

Other critics say it's hypocritical for the US to take a
holier-than-thou attitude when nearly 15 million Americans use illegal
drugs, spending $63 billion a year to support their habit.

"The drug certification process ... allows the US government to place
the blame abroad without taking a serious look at the failure of efforts
to reduce the demand for illicit drugs in the United States," says Gina
Amatangelo of the Washington Office on Latin America, a private research
and advocacy group.

All in all, it's a complicated issue in which many nations and
institutions, as well as virtually all social groups, bear some degree
of responsibility - as the current film "Traffic" makes plain. Which is
why the focus on drug certification is likely to provoke a broader
debate over US drug policy - particularly in Latin America, that part of
the world that seems to interest President Bush the most.

Mr. Bush has indicated interest in changing the certification program.
There are at least four proposals in the Senate - backed by conservative
Republicans as well as liberal Democrats - that would suspend if not
eliminate it altogether. Even former drug czar Barry McCaffrey says it's
time to end the decertification process. There's growing interest in
moving from a unilateral certification system to a multilateral process
of regular reporting conducted by the 34-nation Organization of American
States (OAS).

The latest State Department report shows some signs of progress in
eradicating drug-growing and stemming trafficking. Yet the flow of
illegal drugs into the US continues, symbolized by the recently
discovered tunnel from Mexico to Arizona that was stuffed with $6
million in cocaine.

Just a few days ago, Coast Guard officials seized a boat (a rusty
fishing vessel called the "Forever My Friend") headed from Mexico to
California with nearly nine tons of cocaine hidden beneath a load of
fish - the fourth-largest seizure in US maritime history. In just six
days recently, the Coast Guard intercepted nearly 29,000 pounds of
cocaine - as much as it had captured in all of 1996.

In all, the State Department estimates, worldwide drug trafficking
generates $400 billion in revenues each year. In the years since the
drug certification program began in 1986, federal spending on drug
control has grown from $3 billion a year to nearly $19 billion.

While countries such as Peru and Bolivia have cut sharply into cocaine
production in recent years, critics say the effort has not come without
cost, particularly in the area of human rights.

For example, the Washington Office on Latin America reports that "the
anti-narcotics police forces that the U.S. has created in Bolivia
brazenly intimidate, abuse, and torture peasants - while carrying out
[coca] eradication campaigns."

The latest US drug certification report lists 24 "major illicit drug
producing and drug-transit countries." Of these, two - Afghanistan and
Burma (the largest producers of opium poppies) - were "decertified."
Cambodia and Haiti were also decertified, but they received waivers on
grounds that cutting off foreign aid would harm US interests.

The other 20 "major" drug-producing and -trafficking countries
(including Mexico and Colombia) were found to have "cooperated fully
with the United States or ... taken adequate steps on [their] own to
achieve full compliance" with the United Nations 1988 Drug Convention.

(The US is not without blame. The certification report lists it as a
"major" source of precursor chemicals used in narcotics production and
also as a "major" money-laundering country.)

Moving from a unilateral certification regime to one that does not
feature the US as international drug cop would be a controversial move.

"We believe that most governments will be more responsive to
constructive criticism offered by a community of nations after an
objective and collaborative process, than to requirements imposed by a
subjective, unilateral process accompanied by the threat of sanctions
for noncompliance," Rand Beers, assistant secretary of State for
international narcotics and law enforcement, told a Senate panel last
week.

But that makes some supporters of certification suspicious. Sen. Charles
Grassley (R) of Iowa has said that having the OAS oversee drug
compliance "looks like it could be a gimmick to water down
accountability."

Senator Grassley would focus the US program on those countries with the
worst drug records, doing away with an annual list that seems insulting
to allies in the drug war like Mexico.

"We can improve the process, keep accountability," he says, "but still
remove some of the elements that have given everyone so much heartburn."
- ---
MAP posted-by: Doc-Hawk