Pubdate: Sun, 18 Apr 2010 Source: Trinidad Guardian, The (Trinidad) Copyright: 2010 The Trinidad Guardian Contact: http://www.guardian.co.tt/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2982 Author: Kito Johnson How America Is Trying to Reclaim Its Backyard... THE 'COKE' WARS US Defense Secretary Robert Gates visited Barbados late last week in what was the final leg of a Latin American and Caribbean tour -- that also included stops in Peru and Colombia. Gates' visit to Barbados, where he held talks with regional security chiefs, has been viewed by experts as an attempt to gauge progress in the Obama administration's Caribbean Basin Security Initiative, which was launched in late December 2009. It remains unknown at the time of writing whether a security delegation from Trinidad & Tobago attended the talks. When contacted on Wednesday afternoon, a spokesman at the Ministry of National Security could shed no further light on the matter. "I am not sure who, if anyone, will be attending. We are in the middle of an election campaign and they are busy with that at the moment." The Caribbean Basin Security Initiative (CBSI) is a multilateral agreement involving all 14 Caricom member states, as well as the Dominican Republic and the United States. While in theory the initiative allows for US assistance on a multitude of security issues, its primary remit is to assist regional efforts aimed at combating international drug trafficking and transnational organised crime. At its inception in December 2009, Julissa Reyonoso, Assistant Secretary of State told Congress that: "The initiative will help the Caribbean nations address a wide spectrum of issues affecting the safety of our citizens across a 15-nation region with which we share close historical and cultural ties." She further added however that: "Stemming the flow of narcotics remains forefront in our national interest." When testifying before members of the Senate subcommittee who would ultimately determine funding for the CBSI, Stephen C Johnson, a former Assistant Secretary for Defense, stated that: "$US 3.2 billion over 25 years (spent in the region) is insignificant to what the United States currently spends on security assistance in other parts of the world." Johnson's words obviously had the desired effect, in that the subsequent budget allocated to the CBSI was reported to be around $US 37 million; to be spread over a five-year period. While all the reports coming out of Barbados have so far been positive, a government-level meeting dealing with organised crime and corruption in the region was probably the last thing that the Jamaicans wanted right now. Diplomatic ties between the US and Jamaica are currently at a low ebb due to the latter's refusal to extradite a Jamaican man currently wanted on multiple felony charges by the American authorities. Christopher "Duddus" Coke is suspected of being involved in serious crime, including international arms and drug trafficking, but repeated US requests to extradite him have been continually rebuffed by the Jamaican authorities. The Americans believe that the lack of cooperation by the government in Kingston stems from Coke's alleged links to senior members of the ruling party. As a result, the US State Department's annual International Narcotics Control Strategy Report pulled no punches in launching a withering attack on high-level public corruption in Jamaica. The report highlighted that: "Pervasive public corruption continues to undermine efforts against drug-related and other crimes, and plays a major role in the safe passage of drugs and drug proceeds through Jamaica. For the first time, corruption ranked first to crime and violence as the area of greatest concern for Jamaicans. It remains the major barrier to improving counter-narcotics efforts. Indeed, Jamaica's delay in processing the US extradition request for a major suspected drug and firearms trafficker with reported ties to the ruling party highlights the potential depth of corruption in the government." The Jamaicans totally refute the allegations and state that they simply oppose Coke's extradition on a matter of principle; in that the wiretap evidence against him was illegally obtained. Nevertheless, many people believe that it is they who will blink first in this modern-day depiction of David versus Goliath. Indeed, Jamaican Prime Minister Bruce Golding has since tasked the Attorney General to re-examine the facts of the case pertaining to the American request. Some Jamaicans feel that in this current period of global austerity, their government stands little to gain by angering the Americans. One concerned citizen remarked that, "When they (the US) thought that Manley was flirting with Castro in the early 70s, the Yanks put such a finan! cial squeeze on us that I don't think our economy ever fully recovered. We can ill afford to cross them again." Analysts in the region have long since maintained that the end of the Cold War, along with the dramatic rise in Islamist terrorism in the Middle East and elsewhere, has led to America largely shifting its international focus away from its tropical neighbours, to other parts of the globe. Gates' Latin American jaunt, however, is but another in a string of high-profile visits to the region by an administration less than two years into its tenure. It follows hard on the heels of Hillary Clinton's recent trips to Latin America and Obama's attendance at Trinidad's Summit of the Americas in April last year. Notwithstanding the change of government and vastly increased numbers of casualties, when one compares the speed and alacrity with which the US reacted to the Haitian catastrophe, to its sluggish and lackadaisical response to its own New Orleans disaster, we get the sense that this is an America attempting to re-assert itself in a region that it probably feels! it has neglected for too long. High-profile recent wars such as Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as Vietnam and Korea before that, make it harder to sell the fact that the United States has intervened more times in the Caribbean Basin than in any other part of the world. Some in the region may also be of the mind that those interventions have not always been favourable to, or in the best interests of, the local peoples. So whether this rekindled Latin American/Caribbean 'love affair' is a genuine desire to improve the region's lot, or is simply a flexing of the American muscle in the face of an increasingly belligerent Venezuela, and a resurgent Russia -- both of whom are expanding their sphere of influence in the Caribbean domain -- remains to be seen. Kito Johnson Scotland Yard policeman - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom