Pubdate: Wed, 01 Dec 2004
Source: Kansas City Star (MO)
Copyright: 2004 The Kansas City Star
Contact:  http://www.kcstar.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/221
Author: Pablo Bachelet, Knight Ridder Newspapers

COCAINE, HEROIN PRICES AT 20-YEAR LOW

WASHINGTON - Prices for cocaine and heroin have reached 20-year lows,
according to a report released Tuesday.

The Washington Office on Latin America, which usually is critical of
U.S. policies in Latin America, said the low prices called into
question the effectiveness of the two-decade U.S. war on drugs. A
White House official said the numbers were old and didn't reflect
recent efforts in Colombia to curb drug cultivation.

The Washington Office on Latin America, citing the White House's
Office of National Drug Control Policy, said the street price of 2
grams of cocaine averaged $106 in the first half of 2003, down 14
percent from the previous year's average and the lowest price in 20
years.

An official with the Office of National Drug Control Policy confirmed
the figures, which haven't been publicly released.

The report comes as the Bush administration and Congress work with
Colombian authorities to craft a successor to Plan Colombia, which
will end late next year after pumping more than $3 billion into
Colombia to fight drugs since 2000.

The Washington Office on Latin America accused the White House drug
policy office of not releasing price and purity numbers since 2000
because the data were "inconvenient."

"It strays too far from the message of imminent drug war success,
particularly around Plan Colombia," said John Walsh, a senior
associate with the Latin America organization.

The organization said that not only had the price of cocaine on U.S.
streets dropped to a fifth of its 1981 level, but heroin was much
cheaper, too. A gram of heroin, which cost $329 in 1981, sold for $60
in the first half of 2003, it said.

The drug policy adviser said Bush administration officials thought
those numbers no longer reflected reality.

The official said the government of President Alvaro Uribe in
Colombia, which took office in 2002, had made big gains in cutting
back coca crops with fumigation campaigns and has put the drug
industry "under duress."
- ---
MAP posted-by: Derek