EU taking ‘lax approach to cocaine boom’

Date: 17/06/04

By David Cronin

COLOMBIA'S illicit drug trade ought to be a subject at next week's EU-US summit, the country's vice-president urged yesterday (16 June).

In an interview with European Voice, Francisco Santos contended that the cocaine trade is closely linked with terrorism.

He was speaking after the massacre of 34 coca farmers in the north-eastern region of Norte deSantander. Bogota has blamed the Marxist Revolutionary Forces of Colombia (FARC) for the atrocity.

“Every time a Europeaninhales a gram of coke, he is putting money in the hands of terrorists in Colombia. Sometimes the EU takes a lax approach towards the use of drugs. But there is a cocaine boom in Europe,” he said.

Santos took issue with criticisms which Chris Patten leveled at Colombia's 'war on drugs' in January. Following a visit to the Andean state, the external relations commissioner had queried the effectiveness of Bogota's mass fumigation of coca plantationsas an anti-drugs measure, arguing that instead poor coca growers needed to be given incentives to cultivate other crops.

While recognizing that Colombia - where an estimated 30,000 deaths occur per year due to political violence - has a serious problem with terrorism, Patten has stated that the repressive measures taken to address it could backfire.

Last week the Congress in Bogota approved the Anti-Terrorist Statute, which grants judicial powers to the security forces and allows them make arrests, raid homes and intercept phonecalls without any prior legal authorization. According to campaign group Action on Colombia, this places the civilian population “even more at risk of having their rights violated.”

Yet Santos defended the new law: “It is restricted in time, place and who can use it; only specialized units in the army can use it. It will apply in jungle areas, where you don't have judicial workers.”

In addition, he called on the EU to provide political and financial support to the planned disarming of 15,000 guerrillas from the National Liberation Army - which is due to get under way in early July.

However, he alleged that asimilar peace process withFARC had been ruled out by the guerrillas themselves.

“The FARC on Tuesday [15 June] shot 34 peasants in the head. The FARC is on the EU's terrorist list for a good reason. We think we have to isolate organizations that pursue terrorism. No other country is encountering so many terroristacts on a daily basis, apart from probably Iraq.”

Interview with Francisco Santos, Vice-President of Colombia in which he argues that the drug trade in his country should be on the agenda of the EU-US Summit on 26 June 2004.