Pubdate: Thu, 15 Jul 1999
Source: Reuters
Copyright: 1999 Reuters Limited.

US BOOSTS BORDER DRUG HAULS BY POOLING INFORMATION

EL PASO, Texas (Reuters) - Drug seizures along the U.S.-Mexican border
jumped in the past year as U.S. law enforcement agencies started pooling
information, a top Treasury Department official said Friday.

The amount of cocaine intercepted rose 49 percent to 25,589 pounds in the
year ending April 30 from the same period a year earlier, according to the
latest U.S. Customs data released by the Treasury.

Heroin interceptions were up 53 percent to 188.9 pounds and seizures of
marijuana were up 32 percent to 617,142 pounds.

James Johnson, Treasury undersecretary for enforcement, credited the rising
narcotics haul to a program, the Border Coordination Initiative, launched
last autumn to help law enforcement agencies share information.

"We are communicating more to improve our performance in dealing with the
scourge of narco trafficking," Johnson told a news conference in this border
city.

"The figures speak for themselves," he said.

Agencies taking part in the program include local police in border areas as
well as U.S. Customs, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the FBI
and the Drug Enforcement Administration.

"Traffickers are always changing the way they move drugs," Johnson said. "As
we change, they change. But what used to take us months to respond to are
now taking weeks. We're getting the information we need and we're getting
the hits we need."

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