Pubdate: Fri, 08 Feb 2008
Source: Houston Chronicle (TX)
Copyright: 2008 Houston Chronicle Publishing Company Division, Hearst Newspaper
Contact:  http://www.chron.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/198
Authors: Dane Schiller and Dudley Althaus
Note: Schiller reported from Houston; Althaus reported from Mexico City.

CARTELS ARE A POLITICAL RISK, U.S. TOLD

Millions Could Go to Help Mexico Fight Drug Groups Making $24 Billion a Year

Lobbying for nearly $550 million in aid for Mexico and Central 
America, a senior U.S. official warned Congress on Thursday that 
billions of dollars in drug cartel profits have made the gangs 
powerful enough to challenge their governments.

Support must be given to President Felipe Calderon's administration 
as it battles a criminal underworld that smuggles 90 percent of the 
cocaine consumed in the United States, Anthony Placido, the 
intelligence chief of the Drug Enforcement Administration, told a 
congressional subcommittee considering the aid package.

"In an age when we are increasingly concerned about the spread of 
terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, it is 
imperative that we support and strengthen government institutions, 
particularly those of our immediate neighbors," Placido told a House 
Foreign Affairs subcommittee in Washington.

The Bush and Calderon administrations are pushing for the aid 
package, which they proposed last March under a joint initiative 
called Plan Merida. The package was later expanded to include Central 
America, through which large quantities of cocaine flow.

Equipment and Support

The three-year initiative would send $1.4 billion in U.S. police 
equipment, training and support to Mexican and Central American 
security forces. Congress is expected to vote on the plan sometime this year.

Sixteen of the 41 major drug trafficking organizations the DEA has 
identified in Latin America are based in Mexico.

Calderon has made fighting those gangs an anchor of his 
administration since taking office 14 months ago. He has sent 30,000 
troops and federal police against them.

"We are fighting crime and violence with all the force of the 
government," Calderon said Wednesday in a meeting with the United 
Nations' top human-rights official, who is on a fact-finding visit to 
the country. "We must remember that guaranteeing public security is 
an elemental function of government."

Human-rights advocates, including the government's own top rights 
official, have criticized the use of the military in police work, 
urging that the troops return to the barracks. But Calderon and other 
officials argue that the troops' involvement in the drug war is 
essential because Mexico's state, local and federal police are not up 
to the task.

"It is in our own best interest in the United States that we have a 
strong, safe and secure Mexico - whatever violence and cartels they 
have there can spill over into the United States," Rep. Henry 
Cuellar, D-Laredo, who supports the funding, said after the committee hearing.

U.S. the Main Customer

While huge compared to past U.S. security aid to Mexico, the Plan 
Merida funds would pale in comparison to the $24 billion in annual 
drug cartel earnings from American sales, according to an estimate by 
the National Drug Intelligence Center.

"We understand that U.S. drug consumption provides much of the demand 
that makes trafficking in illegal drugs such a potentially profitable 
crime," Scott Burns, deputy director of the Office of National Drug 
Control Policy, said at the congressional hearing.

A large portion of the narcotics' profits are smuggled back into 
Mexico as cash, the intelligence center reports, finding their way 
into the Mexican economy and providing bribes for police and other officials.

The drug profits also buy top-of-the-line weapons for the drug gangs, 
who are often better armed than government forces.

Many of those weapons are smuggled in from Texas and other U.S. states.

Police in Mexico City recently seized a large cache of weapons, 
including grenade launchers and automatic rifles, from groups 
believed to be underworld hit teams targeting top drug enforcement 
officials here.

"No one can deny the severity of this problem," said Rep. Eliot 
Engel, D-N.Y., the subcommittee chairman. "As a country that consumes 
most of the drugs coming from Mexico and sends most of the guns to 
Mexico, the United States has a moral responsibility to help."
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake