Pubdate: Fri, 06 May 2005
Source: Vancouver Sun (CN BC)
0-4337-afae-4598f61bb76e
Copyright: 2005 The Vancouver Sun
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/vancouver/vancouversun/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/477
Author: Nick Squires, Daily Telegraph (UK)

COCAINE CORRUPTS 'PEARL OF THE PACIFIC'

SYDNEY -- For centuries the sea sustained the Marshall Islands, yielding
fish to eat and contact with explorers and traders in one of the loneliest
parts of the Pacific.

But the residents of the tiny tropical nation are now struggling to deal
with an entirely unexpected ocean bounty: a huge consignment of cocaine.

Last March dozens of packets of the drug washed up on the palm-fringed
beaches of Ebeye, one of more than 1,000 coral islands which make up the
Marshall Islands.

The neatly-wrapped bricks, which police believe were dumped overboard by
drug runners fleeing the US Coast Guard, weighed 60lb and were seized by the
authorities. More accustomed to coconuts than cocaine, the islands have no
history of drug abuse but the unusual jetsam was to change that.

It has now emerged that some of the cocaine was stolen from a police
station. With more packages probably found by beachcombing islanders, Ebeye
is now awash with the stuff. The cocaine, selling in small bags for only
five dollars, has found a ready market.

Although the Marshall Islands were described by Robert Louis Stevenson in
1889 as "the pearl of the Pacific,'' Ebeye is now little more than a slum.

Its 12,000 inhabitants live in crowded one-room shacks crammed together on
the 80-acre island. 
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