LIMA, Peru - The highest prices in almost 20 years for coca leaf, cocaine's raw material, are pushing farmers in Peru to plant more drug crops, a top anti-drug official said.

Nils Ericsson, head of Peru's anti-drug agency, told Reuters a kilo of coca leaf was now selling for between $3 and $4, the highest price since 1985.

Coupled with a violent rebel conflict and government crackdown putting the squeeze on drug producers in the world's top cocaine-producing nation, neighbor Colombia, Peru has caught the eye of Colombian drug producers.

[continues 348 words]

LIMA, Peru - A State Department cable from the U.S. Embassy once described former Peruvian security chief Vladimiro Montesinos as a "valued ally in the drug war, but no choir boy." Peruvian investigators now believe Montesinos was a traitor in that war.

As Montesinos languishes in jail, at least nine accused or convicted drug traffickers in Colombia, Panama and Peru have come forward to allege that he collected money for assisting selected criminal drug enterprises, according to reports compiled by prosecutors and congressional investigators who are trying to uncover the extent of his criminal involvement.

[continues 1763 words]

LIMA, Peru (AP) - Peru has agreed to ease up on anti-drug operations in response to protests by coca farmers, the second move in a month that jeopardize U.S.-backed efforts to fight the cocaine trade.

The government agreed Monday to gradually reduce the cultivation of coca - the raw material in cocaine - and help find markets for alternative crops grown in Peru's second-largest coca producing valley, the Ene-Apurimac river basin.

The agreement follows one in late June in which the government suspended a coca eradication program in the Huallaga River valley in the eastern Amazon jungle region.

[continues 382 words]

LIMA, Peru - Peru's top anti-drug official said the government hopes to soon resume a recently suspended program to wipe out illegal coca cultivation.

"It won't be very long. From our point of view the sooner the better," Nils Ericsson told reporters Friday. "In no way have we canceled the program."

Facing protests by thousands of coca farmers, Peru's anti-drug agency agreed June 28 to suspend efforts to eradicate coca - the raw material of cocaine - in the Huallaga River valley in the eastern Amazon region.

[continues 268 words]

U.S. Goal in Andes Dealt a Setback

LIMA - The Peruvian government has abruptly halted forced eradication of coca plants and suspended crop substitution programs in coca-growing valleys, dealing a major blow to U.S. efforts to halt cocaine production in the Andes. As a result, the U.S. operation to control illegal drug crops in Peru -- heretofore considered an unqualified success -- is nearly paralyzed as farmers and government officials question its effectiveness and demand changes.

The sudden development cast doubts over the future of U.S. efforts to stop the cultivation of coca plants and cocaine production throughout the region.

[continues 863 words]

Peru, a nation hailed by the United States as an Andean success story in the war on drugs, has suspended its participation in U.S.-funded coca-eradication programs.

Also halted in the process was the related crop-substitution program, under which Peruvian farmers are paid to grow crops other than coca.

The programs were suspended after Peruvian officials met with farm representatives Friday and agreed to immediately end eradication of the coca plant -- from which cocaine is made -- in the Upper Huallaga Valley.

[continues 525 words]

LIMA, Peru -- Peru has cut programs to uproot coca fields and encourage farmers to grow alternative crops, key parts of the U.S.- backed war against cocaine.

To appease protesting coca farmers, Peru's anti-drug agency agreed over the weekend to suspend efforts to eradicate coca -- the raw material of cocaine - -- in the Huallaga River valley in the eastern Amazon jungle region.

The government also halted efforts by CARE, an Atlanta-based aid agency, to wean farmers in the Ene and Apurimac River valleys, also in the eastern Amazon, from cultivating the coca leaf.

[continues 469 words]

Operation in Latin America was halted last year after U.S. missionaries were mistaken for drug carriers and killed.

WASHINGTON - President George W. Bush is expected to approve the resumption of a program to force or shoot down airplanes suspected of ferrying drugs in Latin America, a year after the program was halted by the mistaken downing of a plane carrying American missionaries in Peru, U.S. officials say.

Once the president gives his final approval, the State Department would take over the program from the CIA, and U.S. officials said air- interdiction operations could begin in Colombia as early as this fall and would likely be expanded to Peru. The Pentagon would support the program as well, providing intelligence about suspected drug flights gathered from ground-based radar and other sources, officials said.

[continues 929 words]

LIMA, Peru -- Vladimiro Montesinos, once one of Peru's most feared men, was convicted Monday of usurping office - the first of more than 70 criminal charges ranging from arms smuggling to homicide that the ex-spymaster faces.

Montesinos, accused of orchestrating a vast network of corruption during former President Alberto Fujimori's rule, was sentenced to nine years in prison for seizing control of the National Intelligence Service while serving as an adviser to the agency.

The charge comes 19 months after a bribery scandal involving the former spy chief triggered the collapse of Fujimori's decade-long authoritarian rule.

[continues 403 words]

LIMA - Nearly one year to the day after his arrest following a continent-wide manhunt, former Peruvian strongman Vladimiro Montesinos was convicted of abuse of authority during his 10 years as security advisor to former President Alberto Fujimori.

A Peruvian court Monday sentenced Montesinos to nine years and four months in prison for illegally heading the National Intelligence Service under Fujimori, who governed Peru from 1990 to November 2000, when he resigned. Montesinos was also fined approximately $2.85 million.

During the sentencing, the court said the 57-year-old Montesinos, who faces even more serious charges in dozens of cases, admitted that he had run the National Intelligence Service, even though he had never been officially named its leader.

[continues 697 words]

LIMA, Peru - Peruvian police said Monday they had broken up a major drug trafficking ring, seizing almost two tons of cocaine destined for the United States or Europe and arresting 27 people.

The gang was linked to Mexico's Tijuana cartel and had set up a fishing company in the Peruvian port of Chimbote as a front to smuggle the drugs to Mexico by sea and then on to Europe or the United States, Edy Tomasto, head of Peru's anti-drug police, told reporters.

[continues 191 words]

Peru expects the United States soon to announce it will resume a program to catch drug flights in the Latin American country that was halted after the shooting of an American missionary plane, officials said on Thursday, but Washington said no decision had been made.

"The information we have received from a good source is that a high- ranking US official is apparently set to make the announcement (to relaunch drug flights) on Monday," said Ricardo Vega Llona, who handed his job as Peru's first anti-drug "czar" to successor Nils Ericsson on Thursday.

[continues 304 words]

SANTA ROSA, Peru - Peru's counternarcotics efforts have eliminated 70 percent of the country's coca cultivation during the past seven years and have won praise from the Bush administration.

But far from the capital of Lima the reality is very different. Farmers in the mountainous high jungle are clearing land and planting coca fields faster than anyone can remember.

Demand and prices for coca leaves, which are used to manufacture cocaine, are on the rise and farmers here, as anywhere, know when to shift to better-paying crops. Adding to the rush to plant coca in Peru is growing U.S. counternarcotics aid to Colombia and a widening war there, which are reducing the supply of coca leaf in the country that produces the most.

[continues 705 words]

LIMA, Peru - The United States could flop in its fight to curb the drugs trade and the threat of terror if it does not soon open its market to select goods from the Andean region, which churns out almost all of the world's cocaine, Peru's top trade negotiator said on Wednesday.

"The biggest risk isn't that (Peru's) economy won't take off, but that drug trafficking and terrorism -- issues that the United States cares about -- get worse," Alfredo Ferrero, deputy minister for integration and international trade negotiations, told Reuters.

[continues 534 words]

The Text Of A News Conference Saturday With President Bush And Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo In Lima, Peru:

(Inaudible) ... of the United States of America, my good friend George Bush, Mr. secretary of State, members of the delegation of the United States accompanying President Bush, this (inaudible) representing a country with which we have had an historical relationship.

It is not a merely diplomatic visit, it is an official working visit. And we have touched on substantive issues which range from the open struggle against poverty, a war without border against terrorism and drug trafficking - I repeat, a war with no ambiguities whatsoever against terrorism and drug trafficking. We've touched on issues of trade, education, even the Peace Corps.

[continues 2919 words]

LIMA, Peru - Extending a hand to a shaken nation, President Bush declared Saturday that the United States would work with Peru to fight terrorism wherever it occurs, saying that the two nations share a common perspective on the problem: "We must stop it.''

"Security is impossible in a world with terrorists,'' Bush said in a joint news conference with Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo. "Our nations understand that political and economic progress depends on security.''

Toledo, for his part, said he and Bush share "the energy and the stubbornness'' to combat terrorism without wavering. He called it "a war with no ambiguities whatsoever against terrorism and drug trafficking.''

[continues 636 words]

The U.S. Government Has Undermined The War On Terrorism In Peru.

Saturday, President Bush will visit Peru, to bolster the war on drugs and the war on terrorism. Congress has tripled antidrug aid to Peru this year, providing $156 million. Yet Peru's past and present troubles demonstrate how the war on drugs has undermined the war on terrorism and will continue to do so. The drug war has created an environment ripe for narco-terrorism, enriched insurgent guerillas, and hindered rather than helped Andean government anti-insurgency efforts.

[continues 2371 words]

Excerpts of statements made by President Bush and Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo during a news conference held in Lima, Peru, on Saturday, as reported by The Associated Press.

QUESTION: President Bush, you are in a region now that's been devastated by terrorism and subversion and drug trafficking for over three decades. You are offering us the Peace Corps. I would ask you if you're willing, as president of the most powerful nation on earth, to lead a Marshall Plan for South America?

[continues 175 words]

LIMA, Peru - Extending a hand to a jittery nation, President Bush declared Saturday that the United States will work with Peru to fight terrorism.

He said the two nations share a common perspective on the problem: "We must stop it."

In a joint news conference with Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo, Bush said: "Security is impossible in a world with terrorists. Our nations understand that political and economic progress depends on security."

Toledo said he and Bush share "the energy and the stubbornness" to combat terrorism without wavering. He called it "a war with no ambiguities whatsoever against terrorism and drug trafficking."

[continues 1008 words]

LIMA, Peru -- Peru's economy is stumbling, and the president's popularity has plummeted. The war on drugs shows signs of stalling, and a long-dormant rebel group may be restive again, as evidenced by a bombing here on Wednesday.

But the government of President Alejandro Toledo is still viewed by the United States as democratic and reform-minded, a world away from the authoritarian government of Alberto Fujimori, who was toppled 17 months ago in a corruption scandal. Indeed, in many ways, Peru is better off than neighbors like Colombia, with its intensifying drug-fueled war, and Argentina, where default on a $141 billion debt brought down the government.

[continues 652 words]