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COUNTERNARCOTICS STRATEGIES IN LATIN

AMERICA

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON 

INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

MARCH 30, 2006

Serial No. 109–181

Printed for the use of the Committee on International Relations

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.house.gov/international—relations 

(II)

COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 

HENRY J. HYDE, Illinois, Chairman 

JAMES A. LEACH, Iowa 

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey, 

Vice Chairman 

DAN BURTON, Indiana 

ELTON GALLEGLY, California 

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida 

DANA ROHRABACHER, California 

EDWARD R. ROYCE, California 

PETER T. KING, New York 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

THOMAS G. TANCREDO, Colorado 

RON PAUL, Texas 

DARRELL ISSA, California 

JEFF FLAKE, Arizona 

JO ANN DAVIS, Virginia 

MARK GREEN, Wisconsin 

JERRY WELLER, Illinois 

MIKE PENCE, Indiana 

THADDEUS G. MCCOTTER, Michigan 

KATHERINE HARRIS, Florida 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas 

J. GRESHAM BARRETT, South Carolina 

CONNIE MACK, Florida 

JEFF FORTENBERRY, Nebraska 

MICHAEL MCCAUL, Texas 

TED POE, Texas 

TOM LANTOS, California 

HOWARD L. BERMAN, California 

GARY L. ACKERMAN, New York 

ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American 

Samoa 

DONALD M. PAYNE, New Jersey 

SHERROD BROWN, Ohio 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

ROBERT WEXLER, Florida 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts 

GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York 

BARBARA LEE, California 

JOSEPH CROWLEY, New York 

EARL BLUMENAUER, Oregon 

SHELLEY BERKLEY, Nevada 

GRACE F. NAPOLITANO, California 

ADAM B. SCHIFF, California 

DIANE E. WATSON, California 

ADAM SMITH, Washington 

BETTY MCCOLLUM, Minnesota 

BEN CHANDLER, Kentucky 

DENNIS A. CARDOZA, California 

RUSS CARNAHAN, Missouri 

THOMAS E. MOONEY, SR., Staff Director/General Counsel 

ROBERT R. KING, Democratic Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE

DAN BURTON, Indiana, Chairman 

RON PAUL, Texas 

JERRY WELLER, Illinois, Vice Chairman 

KATHERINE HARRIS, Florida 

JAMES A. LEACH, Iowa 

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey 

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida 

CONNIE MACK, Florida 

MICHAEL MCCAUL, Texas 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

GRACE NAPOLITANO, California 

ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American 

Samoa 

DONALD M. PAYNE, New Jersey 

WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts 

GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York 

BARBARA LEE, California 

MARK WALKER, Subcommittee Staff Director 

JASON STEINBAUM, Democratic Professional Staff Member 

DAN S. GETZ, Professional Staff Member 

BRIAN WANKO, Staff Associate 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

Page

WITNESSES 

The Honorable Anne W. Patterson, Assistant Secretary, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, U.S. Department of State 17

Mr. Michael A. Braun, Chief of Operations, U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration ................................................................................................................... 27

The Honorable James F. Mack, Executive Secretary, Inter-American Drug 

Abuse Control Commission, Organization of American States ........................ 53

Ms. Joy Olson, Executive Director, Washington Office on Latin America .......... 59

LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING 

The Honorable Dan Burton, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of Indiana, and Chairman, Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere: 

Prepared statement .............................................................................................. 10

The Honorable Anne W. Patterson: Prepared statement ..................................... 20

Mr. Michael A. Braun: Prepared statement .......................................................... 29

The Honorable James F. Mack: Prepared statement ........................................... 56

Ms. Joy Olson: Prepared statement ....................................................................... 61

APPENDIX 

Material Submitted for the Hearing Record .......................................................... 75

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COUNTERNARCOTICS STRATEGIES IN LATIN 

AMERICA 

THURSDAY, MARCH 30, 2006

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE, 

COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, 

Washington, DC. 

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:38 a.m., in 

room 2172, Rayburn House Office Building, the Honorable Dan 

Burton (Chairman of the Subcommittee) presiding. 

Mr. BURTON. Good morning. A quorum being present, the Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere will come to order. I ask 

unanimous consent that all Members and witnesses written and 

opening statements be included in the record, and without objection, so ordered. 

I ask for unanimous consent that all articles, exhibits, and extraneous or tabular material referred to by Members or witnesses be 

included in the record, and without objection, so ordered. 

We have an unusual situation. Henry Hyde, the Chairman of the 

Full Committee, feels so strongly about the issues we are talking 

about, he gave me a statement that he would like for me to read 

into the record. 

So I hope that the panel will bear with me. You have to listen 

to Henry Hyde, the Chairman’s statement, and then you have to 

listen to mine. So I apologize for the duration of these statements, 

but they are very important. At least, we think so. 

This is from the Chairman of the Full Committee, Henry Hyde, 

on the subject of counternarcotics in Latin America. 

Chairman Hyde had hoped to be with us this morning, but unfortunately he could not be here, and here is what he writes:

‘‘Dear Chairman Burton, I want to thank you for holding today’s critical hearing on the struggle against narcoterrorism in 

our hemisphere. I had hoped that my schedule would have permitted me to attend in person so I could hear from the witnesses that you have invited to testify. 

‘‘As a strong supporter of United States counternarcotics efforts throughout the world, I am concerned that our efforts to 

fight the scourge of illegal narcotics seem to be adrift in our 

hemisphere. It is my hope that this hearing will serve to right 

this course, and reassure the American people and their allies 

in the Andes and in the United States that the United States 

Government is still standing with them, and will continue to 

support them in our mutually beneficial war on drugs. 

2

‘‘I request that you have this letter read into the record at 

the opening of your hearing. During consideration of the fiscal 

year 2006 emergency supplemental bill, you offered an amendment which would provide additional counterdrug aid to Colombia to support critical operational activities of the Colombian Navy. 

‘‘The amendment passed the House on an overwhelming 250 

to 172 vote, sending a clear signal to the Administration that 

Congress continues to demand strong engagement in the very 

unstable Andean Ridge, where deadly cocaine and heroin are 

produced and shipped to the United States. 

‘‘After 5 years of Plan Colombia, we are finally seeing success in our war on drugs. On American streets today the price 

of illegal narcotics is going up, while purity is falling. As a result, we are seeing fewer overdoses and drug related deaths in 

our communities. 

‘‘Unfortunately, these positive results have seemed to have 

lulled the Administration—and that is you guys—into a false 

sense of security, causing it to claim a premature victory in Colombia, and turn its attention to the Middle East and elsewhere. 

‘‘By doing this, it is likely to turn a winning hand into a losing one by tragically not fully supporting sustained vital assistance to our best ally in the Andean region, Colombia, and its 

leader, President Uribe. 

‘‘This would be unconscionable and we cannot let it happen. 

We will not let Latin America slip away from its long free and 

democratic moorings. The Colombians see light at the end of 

the tunnel under President Uribe, but still need our help to assist him in securing their nation once and for all. 

‘‘Unless we provide new and replacement counterdrug air assets and equipment, we will allow the terrorist group, FARC, 

to reenter the region as the newly demobilized paramilitaries 

have left, permitting them to consolidate their hold on the drug 

trade, and continue to destablize the nation. 

‘‘It is time for us to recommit ourselves to providing our closest ally in South America the right equipment and training to 

allow them a chance to prevail against the narcoterrorism that 

also threatens us. This is especially so, now that the United 

States has indicted at least 50 FARC leaders on drug trafficking charges. 

‘‘To that end, we need to replace 23 lost CNP aircraft, increase interdiction capabilities by the Colombian Navy on both 

coasts, and retarget and prioritize the use of the existing air 

assets in Colombia to pursue the FARC leadership and other 

High Value Targets, continue the fight against drugs and help 

President Uribe bring lasting peace and stability to Colombia. 

‘‘At a time when United States backed counternarcotics and 

counterterrorist efforts have helped bring about the demobilization of more than 26,000 right-wing paramilitaries of the terrorist and drug trafficking group UAUC, and when there are 

nearly 7,000 FARC defectors, now is not the time to cut aid to 

Colombia and lose the leverage we have gained in helping 

them fight our battle against drugs. 

3

‘‘All of these matters are in our national interests of saving 

lives here at home. I have asked for a reprioritization of the 

United States aid in Colombia in the past, and I do so again 

today. I hope that someone in the Administration is listening; 

our drug czar is clearly not. I ask that my letter to Secretary 

of State Condoleezza Rice of October 5, 2005, on the subject of 

air asset reprioritization, also be made part of the record. I 

look forward to continuing to work with you and hope that we 

can turn around the neglect in the Andean region before it is 

too late. 

‘‘We will regret not standing more closely with our allies in 

the Andes, especially concerning illicit drugs, where there are 

players who are not our friends, such as President Chavez of 

Venezuela, or Evo Morales in Bolivia, who has strong contrary 

views concerning United States policy on coca production. 

‘‘They and others seek to undo all our efforts of the last 20 

years against narcoterrorism, destablize the region, and in 

some cases, roll back democracy. We cannot let that happen. 

Sincerely, Henry Hyde.’’

I ask unanimous consent that Chairman Hyde’s letter to me and 

to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice be entered into the record, 

and without objection so ordered. 

[The information referred to follows:]

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Mr. BURTON. I am going to enter my statement in the record as 

well, because I do not want to be redundant. Chairman Hyde says 

a lot of things that I have said. I have been down there to Colombia. I have met with President Uribe. 

I have met with leaders of the other countries down there, and 

I think what the Chairman said is exactly right. We have problems 

in other parts of the world, and we have diverted assets to those 

other parts of the world to fight the war against terrorism. 

I think the war against terrorism is very, very important. However, in our own back yard, we have severe problems. President 

Chavez is getting over $100-million a day in oil revenues, $60-million of it from us. 

He has made outlandish statements. I saw one yesterday that I 

could not believe. Chevez was calling President Bush every name 

under the sun, and he has called the Secretary of State every name 

under the sun. 

Now we have Mr. Morales, whom I hope to meet and talk with, 

and hopefully he will have a different attitude from President Chavez. I have talked to his Vice President, but I want to see Mr. Morales. 

President Morales has indicated in some pretty strong language 

that we are not the best friends of that region. Currently, President 

Uribe is the guy that is standing alone in that particular area 

fighting the war against drugs. In addition, President Uribe is 

working very hard to help the United States, and help the kids of 

this country, and protect the streets of this country. 

We had a request, and the Speaker of the House was supportive 

of the request, for 23 aircraft. We got virtually no support from the 

Administration. Now, we were able to get three of the aircraft 

through the House by the majority that Chairman Hyde spoke 

about. 

I think that was a step in the right direction, and that will give 

us more eyes and ears to watch some of the transactions taking 

place and the traffic going through the Caribbean and subsequently 

through Mexico. 

Sixty-five percent of the drugs that get beyond Colombia get into 

the United States. Two-thirds. Yet, we aren’t getting the support 

that we would like from the Administration in order to deal with 

this. 

Now, I want to ask a couple of questions when we reach the 

question and answer period, but I have been told that we lost 23 

aircraft in the last few years. However, I have some records that 

indicate that we have lost a lot more than that, and the Administration is not even aware of it. 

Without the proper equipment, we simply cannot do the job and 

President Uribe cannot do the job. So, I hope that you will take 

back to Secretary of State Rice, for whom I have the highest regard, and to the drug czar, for whom I have regard, and to the rest 

of the Administration, let us not forget our front yard or back yard, 

whatever you want to say. 

Let us not forget them, because we had a war down there in the 

early 1980s, and I don’t want to prolong this, but I was down there. 

I was around Congress back in those days. You guys probably were 

not here, but I was here. 

10

I saw what happened as far as massive immigration; people losing their property and coming to the United States in droves. You 

may not know this, but we have a big immigration discussion going 

on right now in Congress, and if things get out of control in Latin 

America because of Chavez, Morales, Castro, or Daniel Ortega, we 

are going to have big problems. 

We could have wars down there that would be very bad, and 

maybe even rival the things that we have faced in the Middle East. 

The key to stopping that from happening, in my opinion, is to give 

our friends the assets necessary to deal with the problem now. Do 

not wait around. 

Three aircraft are not going to cut it. It just is not going to solve 

the problem. We need a lot more than that, and in addition to that, 

we need other things, like continued trade agreements that will 

help create jobs and stabilize the region. 

You guys are here today to talk to us about the drug problem. 

I hope that you will carry this message back from Chairman Hyde, 

Chairman of the Full Committee, and me as Chairman of the Western Hemisphere Subcommittee, and my other colleagues, because I 

think that it is extremely important that we pay attention to this 

area. 

I would like to ask for unanimous consent to take my written 

statement and submit it for the record, and without objection, so 

ordered. 

Mr. Engel, welcome as my new Ranking Democrat Member. Mr. 

Engel replaces Mr. Menendez, who went to the lower body. I have 

to explain that to you some other time. Mr. Engel. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Burton follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE DAN BURTON, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF INDIANA, AND CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE

WESTERN HEMISPHERE

With vigilance we are making progress in our counter-narcotics programs in Latin 

America. But there are challenges to keep up the pace and reinforce existing programs. We have lost critical hardware used in the eradication and interdiction of 

narcotics in the Andean region. We have diverted some equipment to other theaters 

of operation. There are gaps in our surveillance of key areas of the illicit drug transit zone in Central America and the Caribbean due to declining availability of air 

and surface patrol craft. These problems need to be remedied. 

Last week the U.S. District Court in Washington indicted 50 FARC leaders on 

charges of sending more than $25 billion worth of cocaine around the world to finance terrorism. The indictment estimates that the FARC supplies more than half 

of the world’s cocaine and 60 percent of the drug that enters the United States. This 

indictment is the culmination of extensive counter-narcotics cooperation. We need 

to keep up the pressure on the drug traffickers through close law enforcement coordination. We will hear more about the indictment from our first panel. 

Two weeks ago the Burton Amendment to the Supplemental Appropriations Act 

for Defense, the Global War on Terror, and Hurricane Recovery, 2006 passed with 

bipartisan support in the House. Our Amendment offers $26.3 million in assistance 

to Colombia for the purchase of three new DC–3 fixed-wing aircraft to serve as Marine Patrol Aircraft (MPA) for Colombian Navy drug interdiction efforts. The aircraft will help the Colombian Navy locate and stop illegal narcotics shipments both 

onshore and immediately off the Colombian shoreline, thus making overall interdiction efforts more effective. 

It has been reported that if drug traffickers make it to the coasts of Colombia, 

they have a 65 percent chance of getting their shipments into the United States. 

In our on-going efforts to protect our homeland, it is essential that we cut off this 

toxic pipeline before these drugs make it onto our streets and communities. If we 

can prevent these drugs from leaving Colombia, we help cut back on regional vioVerDate Mar 21 2002 14:30 Aug 01, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00014 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\WORK\WH\033006\26780.000 HINTREL1 PsN: SHIRL
11

lence, limit the bloodshed on the U.S.-Mexican border and protect our children from 

harm. 

The strategic objective of this hearing is to provide Subcommittee members with 

insights to the Annual International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, an assessment of funding levels and performance indicators for strategies including eradication, interdiction, surveillance and other aspects of the drug war. 

We are pleased to have Assistant Secretary Patterson with us to testify on our 

counter-narcotics strategy in Latin America. Your testimony today will help provide 

the Subcommittee with an update on trends in major illicit drug producing, drug 

transit, source, precursor chemical and money laundering countries. 

I am interested to hear your views on how we can improve cooperative partnerships in Latin America in combating narcotics production and trafficking to the 

United States. 

The International Narcotics Strategy Report, is published annually by the State 

Department’s Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs. The 

report provides a useful snapshot of the progress and challenges we face in the Drug 

War. 

The progress in Colombia is significant. In 2005, kidnappings were down 51 percent and homicides by 13 percent. Last year with U.S. and international support, 

Colombia destroyed 170,000 hectares of illegal coca through aerial and manual 

eradication programs. I received an update earlier this month from the State Department that Colombia’s military and police forces captured a record 223 metric 

tons of cocaine and cocaine base. The amount of cocaine that was kept off the streets 

of the United States totaled 378 metric tons with an estimated street value of $38 

billion. In 2005, an all-time high of 134 people were extradited from Colombia to 

face charges in the U.S. Mexico extradited a record 41 criminals and expelled other 

fugitives last year. 

Aggressive aerial spraying is forcing drug traffickers to move shop, and they are 

on the run replanting in other parts of Colombia and crossing borders into Ecuador 

and Peru. This balloon effect must be tamped down. 

Peru and Bolivia remain the second and third largest producers of coca. Bolivia 

is the world’s third-biggest producer of cocaine, after Colombia and Peru. We have 

witnessed mixed signals from the new President. One day he says he wants to work 

together to fight drugs, the next day he appears in front of a banner reading ‘‘Long 

live coca. Death to the Yankees.’’ Clearly our relationship with the new government 

in Bolivia is changing and will depend upon the policies they adopt on a wide range 

of issues, including counter-narcotics. 

Another key relationship in the region is under strain. Venezuela was de-certified 

last year after failing to adhere to obligations under international counter-narcotics 

agreements. The Venezuelan Government effectively suspended cooperation to reduce illicit cultivation, interdiction, law enforcement cooperation, extraditing drug 

traffickers, and taking legal steps and law enforcement measures to prevent and 

punish public corruption that facilitates drug trafficking or impedes prosecution of 

drug-related crimes. We have received reports from investigations of smuggling activity that led to the arrests of Venezuelan authorities, and this is especially troubling. 

In order to balance our security and commercial interests in the Andean region, 

many of us believe it is essential to consider the important role that licit industries 

in these countries have played in supporting U.S. policy goals. The promotion of sustainable licit substitute crops can be an engine of economic growth for rural development and to communities ravaged by violence. There is a link between lawlessness, 

drugs and poverty in Latin America. The Administration has shown a serious commitment to tackle these problems. Our security policies and our commercial policies 

require constant inter-agency coordination. If we are trying to promote alternative 

crop development for coca growers, by all means we should be offering viable commercial incentives as well. 

I also support multilateral initiatives like the OAS’s Inter-American Commission 

Against Drug Abuse (CICAD) which is conducting multilateral evaluations and offering recommendations to the 34 OAS member countries, including the U.S., on 

how to strengthen and better coordinate counter-narcotics programs. We need a 

comprehensive regional strategy to go after the links between drug trafficking, 

money laundering, terrorist financing and illicit arms trafficking. 

Drug traffickers are constantly on the lookout for weaknesses in the firewalls that 

we build in cooperation with countries in the region. The international community 

must not disengage or ease back in the drug war. Multi-ton seizures of cocaine were 

once rare in Europe, but they are increasing in number and yield. European criminal organizations and terrorist groups are trafficking in drugs from the Andes to 

12

Spain and the rest of Europe. Later this year we will be looking closely at European 

contributions to the Latin America Drug War. 

I look forward to continued vigilance in the months and years ahead, to better 

coordination, and to working together to reinforce the progress we have made. I now 

recognize the distinguished ranking member from New York, Eliot Engel, for any 

statement he may wish to make.

Mr. ENGEL. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, colleagues, and friends. Before I turn to the topic of counternarcotics, 

I want to first of all note that today marks my second Western 

Hemisphere Subcommittee hearing, though my first one with you, 

Mr. Chairman, and I am glad that you are resting that voice and 

feeling a little bit better, although I hear that you have a little 

ways to go. 

As I shared the last time, I am honored to join you as the new 

Ranking Member, and I especially look forward to working with 

you on our Subcommittee. I have heard wonderful things about 

how you run the Subcommittee, and have already appreciated our 

collaborative efforts relating to the region. 

I also look forward to working on a bipartisan basis with all of 

my Subcommittee colleagues to raise the Western Hemisphere’s 

profile, and help ensure that its numerous pressing issues receive 

appropriate attention. 

I note that Congresswoman Ros-Lehtinen is here, and with 

whom I have collaborated on many different things on this Committee. Also Congressman Delahunt, who probably is one of the 

most knowledgeable people in this Congress about the Western 

Hemisphere. I look forward to working with all of you on this Subcommittee. 

Moving on to the issue before us, Mr. Chairman, I think it is 

most appropriate that you have called this Subcommittee hearing 

on counternarcotics strategies in Latin America. 

This is a vitally important topic that affects us all. The trafficking of illegal drugs and its accompanying criminal activity are 

obviously serious threats that simultaneously target both our external and internal interests. 

Throughout the United States, we can see narcotrafficking’s corrosive society impact in the eyes of our drug-addicted children, in 

the streets of crime in neighborhoods, in the families destroyed by 

drugs, in the schools, and in the work force. 

I see such harm in my district as you see it in yours, and as we 

all see it in our districts. The list goes on. Last week’s Department 

of Justice indictment of 40 leaders of the FARC on charges of importing more than $25-billion worth of cocaine into the United 

States and other countries is both a law enforcement achievement 

and a wake-up call to the dangers that we face from the region. 

If drugs can have such a devastating and wide ranging effect on 

the United States, imagine the impact on fragile democracies with 

struggling economies. Illegal drug trafficking generates billions of 

dollars that finance black market arms traffickers, fueling violence, 

and socially destablizing criminal activity throughout most of the 

Western Hemisphere. 

The United States faces not only a threat from the illicit drugs 

on our streets, but also from the increasing instability brought on 

my insurgent guerrilla organizations that are fueled by the drug 

trade. 

13

I cannot think of one issue that is more important to the stability 

of our region than this. It ties in with all the things that we are 

concerned about, terrorism and what not. 

It is in our interest to be surrounded by stable democracies, with 

strong economies, not governments penetrated by the corrupting 

influence of drug money. The United States continues its twopronged approach to this issue, first tapping the United States domestic problem of illicit drug consumption; and second, fashioning 

an effective United States plan to address the flow from source 

countries. 

In this latter regard, few can deny that there is a narcotics crisis 

in the hemisphere, but since we have been at this for some time, 

we must ask what progress have we made, and at what costs, and 

where do we go from here. 

This hearing is an opportunity for us to address questions of 

eradication, alternative development, counter drug bastions, 

human rights, the environment, and governance in a region undergoing much political and social transition. 

Some of the issues affected by the drug crisis include democratic 

institution building, judiciary sector reform, and social welfare. 

These fundamentally, interconnected issues are at the heart of the 

matter, and we ignore them at our own peril. 

America has good friends in many countries to our south, and we 

should continue to work with them to find strategies to reduce the 

source of the illegal drug trade. Let me close, Mr. Chairman, by 

stating that I am dubious that our efforts on the supply side of the 

narcotics trade alone can eliminate the cash incentive from the 

drug trade over the long term. 

According to the DEA, the United States has 25 million drug 

users within its borders. We just do more to drive down demand 

at home through drug prevention, treatment, and education. If we 

reduce demand, narcotics growers, traffickers, and dealers, will increasingly be driven out of the business by economics alone. 

On the supply side, I note that many of my colleagues, myself included, are concerned about our efforts to work seriously at sustainable development issues within the hemisphere. 

Over 40 percent of the people in the Western Hemisphere live 

below the poverty level. However, I am dismayed to note that the 

President’s fiscal year 2007 budget request slashes core developmental assistance, namely child survival and health funds, as well 

as development assistance by 22 percent from fiscal year 2005. 

Twenty-two percent is a large amount, and it is simply unconscionable, inexcusable, and undermines our efforts to roll back the 

drug trade. I know that Mr. Burton expressed some of his dismay 

at the fact of the budget and the Administration for not putting 

forth the money to do the things that we know need to be done. 

If you want to diminish coca growing, and if you want to reduce 

illegal immigration, if you want to lessen the spread of diseases, if 

you want to preserve bio-diversity, we must do something more 

than simply trade with our neighbors to the south. 

Sustainable development is also very important, and I hope that 

we will focus on cooperative efforts to encourage coca farmers to 

take up other crops as we also seek to ensure that interdiction, 

eradication, and other ways of curtailing the supply are pursued. 

14

I thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I look forward to working with 

you on this important matter, and during the testimony today, and 

as I mentioned before, I look forward to working with you very 

closely on a number of matters. 

We have been good friends in my 18 years in Congress, and I 

look forward to continuing and enhancing that relationship. Thank 

you. 

Mr. BURTON. Thank you, Mr. Engel. It has been 18 years? 

Mr. ENGEL. It is hard to believe isn’t it? 

Mr. BURTON. We look so young. 

Mr. ENGEL. We are young. 

Mr. BURTON. Let us see. Oh, our good friend, Ileana RosLehtinen. 

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this 

important and timely hearing on the United States counternarcotics strategies in Latin America, and for your ongoing leadership on this issue. 

This issue as we have heard is particularly important to our 

Chairman, Mr. Hyde, and we value his contribution on this issue. 

Given the strategic location of my congressional district of South 

Florida, seen by many as the gateway to the Americas, this issue 

is of great personal and local concern to my constituents. 

According to the State Department’s 2006 international narcotics 

control strategy, 14 of the 20 major drug producing, or drug transit 

countries, are located in Latin America or in the Caribbean. 

In our own hemisphere, United States counternarcotics programs 

represent a vital front on the war on terrorism. In countries such 

as Colombia, the source of 90 percent of all cocaine entering into 

the United States, there is a clear connection between the drug 

trade and the financing of foreign terrorists organizations, such as 

the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC. 

United States-backed counternarcotics efforts are necessary to 

cut off this critical source of funding for violent narcotrafficking 

and terrorist organizations. Along with the support of terrorism, illegal narcotics undermine the stability and the rule of law throughout the region. 

The drug trade spreads corruption and money laundering. It 

erodes the institutional capacity of Latin America’s relatively new 

and fragile democracies. The United States counternarcotics programs in the region are therefore crucial in helping our partners 

and our friends eradicate the cultivation of illegal narcotics, build 

law enforcement infrastructure, prosecute traffickers, and seize 

their assets. I thank the Chairman for his ongoing leadership on 

this issue, and I look forward to the testimony of the witnesses 

today. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. BURTON. Thank you, Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Mr. Delahunt, the 

silver fox from Massachusetts. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. I will be very brief, Mr. Chairman. Thank you. 

I want to associate myself with the remarks of Mr. Engel. It clearly 

reflects, I think, a sensible approach, a balanced approach, and one 

that I am confident that we all embrace. 

I also agree with you, Mr. Burton. As you know, I supported your 

amendment to increase funding for specifically maritime interdicVerDate Mar 21 2002 14:30 Aug 01, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00018 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 F:\WORK\WH\033006\26780.000 HINTREL1 PsN: SHIRL
15

tion. I think the issue that we have got to address, however, is that 

we have been supporting Plan Colombia. 

You know that I have supported that early on, and was involved 

in the negotiations over Plan Colombia, but at some point in time 

this has to be assumed by the Colombian Government. 

I say this in a very positive way: Under the leadership of President Uribe, their economy is doing pretty well. More of the burden 

should be assumed by the Colombian Government if we are looking 

for that particular balance. 

So, I agree with you in terms of assets if we are to continue to 

sustain this effort, and the results apparently are trending well, 

but that is Colombia. We do have issues surrounding the so-called 

‘‘balloon effect’’ in other Andean nations, but again, the American 

taxpayers have stood up here, and they have stood tall to support 

Colombia. 

Again, their economy has improved considerably in the past 5 

years. I guess I would pose a question to Secretary Patterson, in 

terms of how the Government of Colombia rates in terms of enforcement of its tax laws. 

Tax compliance is a problem that I have, in terms of Latin American nations, where they don’t, as a group, seem to do as well as 

the United States in terms of insisting full compliance in securing 

the tax revenue that is necessary. With that, I yield back. 

Mr. BURTON. Thank you very much, Mr. Delahunt. I appreciate 

that. Mr. Mack, before I introduce you, I want to thank you very 

much. I had a very bad illness, a cold, which had me in bed for 

about 10 days, which is unusual, and you took over and conducted 

the energy hearing for me, and I want to thank you publicly. I hear 

you did a great job. 

Mr. MACK OF FLORIDA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. BURTON. With that, Mr. Mack, you are recognized. 

Mr. MACK OF FLORIDA. Thank you, and I will be brief as well. 

Thank you for holding this hearing today, and I want to thank the 

panel in advance for being here to talk about this important issue. 

The United States, through Plan Colombia, and foreign aid, has 

made a lot of progress. Yet, there is still a lot of work to be done. 

The work is not only in Colombia, it is in all of Latin America, and 

it is no secret that I have been a critic of President Hugo Chavez, 

and believe that he is a destablizing factor in our hemisphere and 

in the world. 

He is someone that cuts across what people in America are looking for, which is freedom. He is someone, whether it is through the 

increased trafficking of narcotics, purchasing of military weapons, 

or just completely taking the hopes and dreams—my belief of the 

hopes, and dreams, and aspirations of the people of that country 

away from the ideals of freedom and democracy, and toward a dictatorship. 

I am very concerned about Hugo Chavez, and what his influence 

in the region will ultimately mean to us here in the United States. 

So with that, Mr. Chairman, I thank you for holding this hearing. 

I look forward to hearing from the panel, and I also look forward 

to working with you in making sure that we can handle the issues 

that we have in our back yard so that Americans can feel more secure in their homes. Thank you. 

16

Mr. BURTON. Thank you, Mr. Mack. Mr. Payne. 

Mr. PAYNE. Thank you very much, and I will be very brief, too. 

I am glad that you are well and back in the saddle again. However, 

there were others who wish you were still out. That is private, too. 

Mr. BURTON. Mr. Payne, is this because of the garage in your 

district that we saw? 

Mr. PAYNE. No, as we have discussed before. But let me just say 

that it is a very timely hearing. I associate myself with the remarks by the Ranking Member, Mr. Engel, and certainly have seen 

the fact that there has been record amounts of spraying, and seizures, and so forth. 

However, it seems that there is only minimal evidence that we 

have a reduction in the availability. I know that it is a tough battle, but we need to evaluate the effectiveness of the program. 

I also would just like to mention briefly that as we all know, a 

tremendous amount of financial support goes to the military, and 

there is some question about the behavior of the military in other 

areas. 

We have seen IMET funds, and for example, in Ethiopia, the 

Chairman of that Subcommittee is talking about withholding funds 

for IMET in Ethiopia, where Ethiopia has the largest number of 

peacekeepers in the world because there is some question about 

some human rights abuses, which should not occur anywhere. 

We need to have parity in some of our policies as it relates to 

our support for the military, but we must hold them accountable. 

Finally, the spraying, and certainly this round up spray, this chemical is having a negative impact on the environment, on people, and 

on livestock, and we need to be careful that we are not throwing 

out the baby with the bath water, attempting to eliminate the coca 

growth, but we are also impacting on the health. 

Many people in the area are Afro-Cubans, and so the Colombians 

are Afro-Colombians, and the fact that the people who are treated 

the worst with the government, with the military, and then when 

this program of spraying also impacts on these Afro-Colombians, it 

is something that I think that we need to really evaluate. So once 

again, Mr. Chairman, I certainly commend you for calling this very 

important hearing. 

Mr. BURTON. Thank you, Mr. Payne. My good friend, Mr. 

Faleomavaega. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I, too, would 

like to associate myself with the comments made by my good 

friend, the gentleman from New Jersey, and your leadership in not 

only calling this hearing this morning, but the fact that you certainly have a firm commitment in looking through what should be 

our policies toward this important region of the world. 

I make no apologies for making this statement, Mr. Chairman. 

It seems that Latin America has always been our neglected neighbor if you will, and the problem is not whether it is a Republican 

or Democratic Administration. This has been the course that we 

have had for all these years. 

Latin America always seems to be the sick child that never 

seems to really—we have really never seriously made an honest effort in being not only as a good neighbor, but we seem to spend 

more time and more worries about the drug trafficking issues that 

17

come out of this region of the world than trying to develop serious 

economic trade relationships. 

The fact that there is some 400 to 500 million people living in 

that region of the world, and we never seem to consistently pursue 

a more positive policy in how we could really help our neighbors 

in the south. 

So this very issue itself, counternarcotics, and now that we have 

a new trend, if you will, of the kind of leaders that are being duly 

elected by some of these countries in Latin America, as I have always earnestly tried to bring to the forefront, at least a little sense 

of visibility about the fact that the indigenous populations of these 

countries have always been—it is almost like reading a road map 

of what we have to deal with native American communities in our 

country. 

I think we really seriously need to look at our counternarcotics 

policies that we have enunciated for all these years, and if there 

really have been positive results. I seriously would like to work 

closely with you, Mr. Chairman. 

Also, I offer my personal welcome to our newly-elected Ranking 

Member of our Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, and 

with that, Mr. Chairman, I look forward to hearing from our witnesses this morning. Thank you. 

Mr. BURTON. Thank you. Today on our first panel, we have two 

very distinguished people. Ann W. Patterson was sworn in as the 

Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, INL, on November 28, 2005. 

Recently, she served as deputy permanent representative, and 

then as acting permanent representative at the United States Mission to the United Nations from 2004 to 2005. 

Ms. Patterson has had a distinguished career in the foreign service, including posts as Ambassador to Colombia from 2000 to 2003, 

and Ambassador to El Salvador from 1997 to 2000. It is good to 

have you with us, Ms. Patterson. 

Special Agent Michael Braun is DEA Chief of Operations, and is 

responsible for leading the worldwide drug enforcement operations 

of the agency across the United States and in 58 countries. 

He is one of the principal directors of national drug intelligence 

management and national drug strategy on our Nation’s war on 

terrorism. We are pleased to have you with us again, Mr. Braun. 

Would you both rise so I can swear you in, please. 

[Witnesses sworn.] 

Mr. BURTON. We would like to get to as many questions as possible, and so if you can make your comments brief, we would appreciate it. We will try to be as tolerant as we can. Secretary Patterson, you are recognized. 

TESTIMONY OF THE HONORABLE ANNE W. PATTERSON, ASSISTANT SECRETARY, BUREAU OF INTERNATIONAL NARCOTICS AND LAW ENFORCEMENT AFFAIRS, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Thank you very much, Chairman Burton, Congressman Engel, and other distinguished Members of this 

Subcommittee. Thank you for the invitation to appear before you 

today. 

18

This is a timely opportunity to review the progress being made 

in the Americas to combat illicit drug production and trafficking. 

My written testimony includes a regional overview, but I would 

like to focus on some of the successes that we have achieved and 

challenges that we face today. 

Returning to these issues after some years away, I was struck by 

the maturing of inter-American cooperation in the western hemisphere, not just against drug trafficking, but also against 

transnational crime. 

Nowhere has progress been more pronounced than in Colombia. 

Under the leadership of Presidents Pastrana and Uribe, Plan Colombia has been a dramatic success. In 2005, Colombia destroyed 

170,000 hectares of illegal coca, and helped to cease 223 tons of cocaine. 

ONDCP recently announced that these efforts may have led to 

an increase in United States street prices and a reduction in purity. Plan Colombia has also achieved results that we did not fully 

anticipate. Today, all 1,098 of Colombia’s municipalities have a police presence. Kidnappings are down by half, and homicides are 

down by 13 percent. 

In 2005, Colombia extradited a record 134 fugitives to the United 

States, including FARC leaders and high level drug traffickers. 

Still, major challenges remain. 

Narcotraffickers aggressively replanted nearly as much coca as 

was destroyed in last year’s record setting aerial eradication campaign. We are evaluating now how to counter this replanting, including stepped up aerial spraying. In Colombia, much of the coca 

is grown in remote, inaccessible areas, where the FARC and other 

illegal armed groups are mostly free to operate. 

Success in eradication and interdiction depend on air mobility. 

INL is supporting Colombia with over 140 aircraft, plus assistance 

in training. INL’s critical flight safety programs seek to upgrade 

and maintain many of these aging assets to enhance pilot and crew 

safety, extend the aircraft’s operational life, and to reduce long 

term maintenance costs by making them commercially supportable. 

While our long term goal is to nationalize the helicopter program, 

we must do so at a pace that Colombia is able to sustain in order 

to protect the huge investments that we have made to ensure flight 

safety and to keep the programs focused on eradication and interdiction missions. 

I recently visited Joint Interagency Task Force South, JITFS, 

and discussed maritime interdiction with Rear Admiral Jeff Hathaway. The decline in availability of maritime patrol aircraft reduced 

our ability to detect, monitor, and target go-fast boats leaving Colombia. 

Nonetheless, JIAFT-South coordinated a record seizure of 254 

tons of cocaine in 2005 due in large part to markedly improved 

operational intelligence from such sources as Operation Panama 

Express. 

We and our allies are looking for ways to overcome this problem. 

For example, we are working on an initiative to use average denial 

aircraft for air and maritime detection, and monitoring along Colombia’s Pacific and Caribbean coasts. We will be consulting with 

your Committee soon on this concept. 

19

Peru and Bolivia remain the second and third largest producers 

of coca. 

Mr. BURTON. Excuse me just one moment. 

[Pause.] 

Mr. BURTON. I couldn’t listen to two women at one time. Excuse 

me. Pardon me, Secretary, that was not meant to be disingenuous. 

I apologize. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Let me just back up and say that we 

are going to be consulting with your Committee soon on a concept 

to use average denial aircraft currently in Colombia for maritime 

patrol. 

Peru and Bolivia remain the second and third largest producers 

of coca, and we saw increases in cultivation there in 2005. In Peru, 

the policies of the government, to be elected on April 9, will obviously have a significant bearing on the counternarcotics effort. 

Our relationship with the Morales Administration in Bolivia will 

depend upon the policies it adopts on a wide range of issues, with 

counternarcotics a key component. Mexico is one of our most critical partners. 

Some 90 percent of United States bound cocaine shipments transit the Central America-Mexico corridor, and Mexico remains a 

major drug producing country and base of operations for trafficking 

groups. 

We are also concerned about the production and trafficking of 

methamphetamine and its precursor chemicals. I traveled to Mexico City earlier this month to learn more about what Mexican and 

United States personnel are doing to confront the methamphetamine problem. 

I was pleased to see that the concrete progress that Mexico has 

made in a short time to curb precursor imports. At last week’s binational commission, Mexican and United States officials agreed 

that methamphetamine is a top law enforcement priority. 

Central America is a region of particular concern. The expansion 

of gangs has been devastating there, and has emerged as one of the 

serious problems in many communities across the United States. 

I.N.L. is working closely with other agencies and with partner 

nations to promote a balanced, multidisciplinary approach to the 

problem. We intend to include anti-gang and cultural lawfulness 

training in our international law enforcement academy in El Salvador as part of our regional anti-gang strategy. 

On drug interdiction, the Central American governments are 

committed partners, but they lack capacity and resources. Improving interdiction capacity in the region will be difficult due to the 

high cost of helicopter assets, and the increasingly competitive 

budgetary environment that we face. 

I look forward to working with other United States agencies and 

Congress to address this issue. In conclusion, progress is being 

made in the western hemisphere, but there is a long way to go. The 

important partnerships that we have forged have kept hundreds of 

tons of cocaine and heroin off our streets. 

United States law enforcement now has more professional and 

better equipped partners in many countries. I am optimistic that 

with the continued strong support of Congress that we will be able 

20

to build on these successes and overcome the challenges that lie before us. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Patterson follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE ANNE W. PATTERSON, ASSISTANT SEC- RETARY, BUREAU OF INTERNATIONAL NARCOTICS AND LAW ENFORCEMENT AFFAIRS, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Engel, and distinguished Members of the Subcommittee. The Department of State welcomes this hearing as a timely opportunity 

to review the significant progress being made in the Americas to combat illicit drug 

production and trafficking, as well as to discuss the challenges and opportunities before us. 

INCSR

On March 1, the Department of State released the 23rd annual International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (INCSR), a global report on international efforts to 

curb cultivation, production, trafficking and abuse of illicit drugs. While it is drafted 

and coordinated by the Department of State, it is reviewed by the entire USG law 

enforcement community—including the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security 

and Treasury, as well a DEA, the Coast Guard and ONDCP. The companion Money 

Laundering Report is, in fact, drafted by an interagency group of experts. The assessments and recommendations reflect interagency consensus. 

While there are many acute concerns and daunting challenges in the Western 

Hemisphere, it is helpful to begin by stepping back and comparing where we are 

now compared with a decade ago. Returning to the counternarcotics world after 

some years away, I am struck by the overall progress that has been made in this 

hemisphere—not just by individual countries, but by countries working together. Report after report in the INCSR provides evidence of maturing policies, modernizing 

institutions, and stronger cross-border, sub-regional and international cooperation. 

Countries are seizing more drugs, extraditing more fugitives, participating in more 

cross-border operations, and rooting out and punishing corruption. Many are making broad-sweeping changes to their legal systems to better confront modern forms 

of organized crime—and seeking to harmonize their legislation with neighboring 

states to prevent criminals from simply shifting from tougher to weaker jurisdictions. 

When the first INCSR was published, Latin American narcotics-producing countries were just reporting the first signs of drug abuse in their own countries, while 

the United States was in a full-blown crack epidemic. Today, U.S. cocaine consumption has leveled off and casual use is down substantially while drug abuse is growing in throughout the hemisphere. The inter-American dialogue on drugs has 

changed accordingly, with less finger pointing and a greater sense of shared responsibility and cooperation. 

This didn’t happen overnight—nor by happenstance. It was the result of long-term 

U.S. foreign policy and foreign assistance efforts to promote democracy and to 

strengthen democratic institutions—including the justice sector and law enforcement. It was the result of sustained encouragement and support by the U.S. Government—including the leverage exerted by the U.S. narcotics certification process—as well as multilateral engagement through the Organization of American 

States and the Summit of the Americas. It was also the result of the explosion of 

the myth in other countries that drug abuse was an American problem, not theirs. 

The international community also recognizes the links of the drug trade to money 

laundering, terrorist financing and organized crime and has been working together 

to confront the many challenges. The United States plays an important leadership 

role, but is no longer alone in pressing for effective action. Mexico and Colombia are 

staunch allies—multilaterally as well as bilaterally. Costa Rica emerged as a leader 

in promoting the development of a Caribbean regional maritime agreement. El Salvador stepped forward to host the new International Law Enforcement Academy for 

the Americas. Nicaragua has advanced the cause of combating weapons trafficking. 

All around the Americas, countries are taking a fresh look at what it costs to cling 

to old sovereignty sensibilities when there are real and menacing threats to be 

faced, and many are opting for creative ways to work with their neighbors. The Central Americans are working together to strengthen regional security. El Salvador 

and Guatemala mount joint patrols along their border—as the U.S. now does with 

Canada. The countries of the Eastern Caribbean were pioneers in this kind of collaboration through the Regional Security System (RSS). The U.S., Mexico and Canada have launched the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP), which seeks, 

21

among other goals, to develop a North American security perimeter. The Organization of American States’ drug commission (CICAD) is mobilizing regional and subregional cooperation across the full range of anti-drug efforts, from demand reduction to chemical control. 

All understand that only through common cause will we be able to contain and 

diminish the threats of drugs and organized crime, which are impediments to political and economic freedom and prosperity. 

The Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) has 

been at the forefront of these diplomatic efforts and reform efforts—with the invaluable partnership of DEA and other agencies and the sustained generous support of 

the U.S. Congress. INL has brought problems to light through the INCSR report, 

used diplomatic engagement to build the will of partner nations to make needed reforms, and then provided them with the technical and material assistance they need 

to be more effective. 

Let me highlight just a few of the important developments included in this year’s 

INCSR:

• The seven ACI countries made good progress in interdicting drugs and eradicating opium poppy cultivation.

• Andean countries, Central American states and Mexico reported seizing 365 

metric tons of cocaine worth tens of billions of dollars on the street.

• Mexican authorities, employing INL-provided screening equipment at several 

airports, uncovered over $40 million in currency hidden in cargo bound for 

Colombia.

• In the Western Hemisphere, U.S. and international support assisted Colombia in aerially eradicating 139,000 hectares and manually eradicating another 

31,000 hectares of illegal coca.

• Peru manually eradicated twelve thousand hectares of coca and seized eleven 

tons of drugs.

• Mexico eradicated over 20,000 hectares of opium poppy and over 30,000 hectares of marijuana, and seized 30 tons of cocaine, over 1,700 tons of marijuana and nearly a ton of methamphetamine.

• In 2005, Colombia extradited 134 people to face charges in the U.S.—an alltime high. Mexico extradited a record 41 fugitives and expelled or deported 

146 additional fugitives.

• U.S. and Canadian law enforcement have worked closely to attack and dismantle cross-border trafficking organizations, including a large criminal ring 

engaged in trafficking and producing ecstasy.

• Mexico moved to restrict the importation of methamphetamine precursors, notably pseudoephedrine, and tightened internal controls to prevent their diversion to illicit drug manufacturing. 

Budget Issues 

In our Fiscal Year 2007 budget proposal, pressing demands elsewhere in the 

world—notably Afghanistan—have forced us to make difficult choices. There are 

cuts in bilateral anti-drug aid to many Latin American countries, although we realize there are real needs, particularly in the Transit Zone programs in Central America and the Caribbean. 

COLOMBIA

Nowhere has progress been more pronounced than in Colombia. 

In 2000, U.S. and Colombian officials developed a joint, highly-focused and aggressive strategy to target illicit drug production and trafficking. During that first year, 

while we were building up the infrastructure for ‘‘Plan Colombia,’’ coca cultivation 

reached an all-time high, and only 47,000 hectares of coca were eradicated. In 2005, 

the U.S.-supported Anti-Narcotics Police Directorate (DIRAN) sprayed a record 

138,775 hectares of coca during the year and 1,624 hectares of poppy. The Government of Colombia reported that manual eradication accounted for the destruction 

of an additional 31,285 hectares of coca and 497 hectares of poppy. This stopped a 

potential of billions of dollars of cocaine from reaching U.S. streets. In addition, Colombian forces helped interdict 223 metric tons of cocaine and cocaine base. Recent 

preliminary analysis indicates that these efforts may have led to an increase in the 

U.S. street price of cocaine and heroin and a reduction in purity for both. 

Under the leadership of Presidents Pastrana and Uribe, ‘‘Plan Colombia’’ has been 

a success—more than I expected when I was sent there as Ambassador in 2000. It 

has benefited Colombia in ways we did not anticipate, such as in establishing secuVerDate Mar 21 2002 14:30 Aug 01, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00025 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\WORK\WH\033006\26780.000 HINTREL1 PsN: SHIRL
22

rity in the countryside and contributing to a renewed self-confidence in the country 

that is evident in many areas. Public safety has improved. Today, for the first time 

in the country’s history, all 1098 of Colombia’s municipalities have a permanent government presence. Colombia’s ongoing transition from an inquisitorial to an 

accusatorial criminal justice system with oral trials is well underway and in those 

districts where the transition has already occurred, the new system has proved to 

be enormously more efficient and effective and has gained the confidence of the public at large. Kidnappings are down 51 percent and homicides 13 percent, and the 

World Bank considers Colombia an attractive investment climate with legitimate 

economic development that is replacing illicit drug production. Who would have 

thought that possible even a few years ago? 

Another measure of progress is the extradition to the U.S. of organized crime 

leaders. Extradition is one of the legal tools most feared by drug traffickers. Major 

drug traffickers extradited to the U.S. last year included FARC leaders and Cali 

Cartel leader Miguel Rodriguez Orejuela. In 2005, a record 134 people were extradited from Colombia to the U.S. 

Still, the United States and Colombia understand that major challenges remain. 

Narcotraffickers have undertaken to more aggressively replant coca that was destroyed in last year’s record-setting aerial eradication campaign. 

The U.S. and Colombia are evaluating tactics to counter this rapid replanting, including stepping up the aerial spray program. We are also helping to build Colombian capacity to take over the program in the future. 

Narcotraffickers continue to shift routes and methods to avoid detection and interception, and—while our detection and monitoring capacity has improved—there are 

simply not enough USG or host nation assets available to respond to all of the actionable targets. 

Success in both interdiction and eradication rely on air mobility—the support of 

safe and dependable helicopters. Colombia is approximately the size of California 

and Texas combined, with an almost Texas-sized area lacking passable roads for 

much of the year. This remote area is where much of the coca is grown, and where 

the FARC and other illegal armed groups are most free to operate. Helicopter support is thus essential to enable the Government of Colombia—and especially the Colombian Army and National Police—to effectively confront drug cultivation and 

counter illegal armed groups. 

Helicopters, however, are very expensive assets to operate and maintain and require investments in lengthy aviator and maintenance personnel training. Although 

the Colombia Army has its own UH–60 Black Hawk fleet, INL is supporting it with 

over 70 USG-owned and supported helicopters. We are also providing technical assistance and training in conjunction with the Defense Department. Each year there 

is a marked improvement in the quality and number of Colombian helicopter pilots, 

mechanics, and support personnel. While the U.S. is working to ‘‘Colombianize’’ the 

helicopter program, we must do it at a pace that the Colombian government is able 

to assimilate, protect the large investments we have made, ensure flight safety, and 

keep the program’s focus on the highest priority missions—interdiction and eradication. 

Upgrading aircraft under INL’s Critical Flight Safety Program (CFSP) is another 

essential element for continued effective aviation support of Colombian counternarcotics activities. Many of the aircraft within the INL Air Wing fleet are excess 

defense articles that are no included in the Department of Defense’s support system. 

A great number are over 40 years old, with airframes reaching the limits of their 

useful lifetimes and have not received major depot level maintenance. In many 

cases, aircraft have been grounded due to evidence of severe structural weakness. 

INL has planned and requested funds for the CFSP to repair, upgrade, sustain and 

replace aircraft needed for eradication, interdiction and counterterrorism programs. 

Over 60% of the FY 2006 funding will go to support our fleet in Colombia, with the 

remainder benefiting other Latin American programs. CFSP funding is essential for 

eliminating the safety and mission availability risks for these critical aviation assets. 

The State Department coordinates the Colombian Airbridge Denial (ABD) Program. Since it was reinitiated in 2003, Colombia has established air sovereignty 

throughout the majority of its territory. This has led since 2004 to a 56 percent decrease in suspect trafficker flights, a 75 percent increase in law enforcement ground 

endgames, and a reduction in the total drug flow by air to the United States to 

seven percent or less. The program has forced traffickers to change their smuggling 

tactics by flying shorter distances. The number of air events and air intercepts have 

decreased significantly, and we are now largely in a deterrence mode. 

More than 93 percent of cocaine destined for the United States is smuggled by 

maritime transport. Our interagency interdiction community has been striving to 

23

get additional Maritime Patrol Aircraft (MPA) assets for the last two years. Joint 

Interagency Task Force-South (JIATF-South) coordinated the seizure of a record 254 

MT of cocaine in 2005 despite the shortage in assets—both MPA and surface vessels. Even with excellent operational intelligence from such sources as Operation 

Panama Express, the lack of MPAs limits our ability to detect, monitor and target 

go-fast boats leaving Colombia. 

Mitigating strategies include continued outreach to our allies, who continue to 

show strong support for the counter-drug mission. This year the Government of the 

Netherlands will be contracting with a private firm for two maritime surveillance 

aircraft to operate out of Curacao. These will fall under JIATF-South tactical control 

and provide much needed MPA support in the Caribbean. Likewise, DOD and Coast 

Guard are working to add additional aircraft to the effort. We understand that the 

FY 2006 Coast Guard budget includes additional funding for C–130 flight hours, 

which will also help close the MPA gap. Colombia and Central American countries 

have few, if any, MPAs or interdiction vessels. It would take a long time and significant new resources for these countries to develop this type of maritime interdiction 

capability. 

We are also working on an initiative to use Airbridge Denial aircraft for both air 

and maritime detection and monitoring in the littoral waters off the Colombia’s Pacific and Caribbean coasts. Ambassador Wood and I are exploring ways to get even 

a better return on our successful ABD program investment while increasing the effectiveness of our bilateral interdiction program. We hope to implement this initiative immediately since the assets are already in place. 

In addition, we have now arrived at a point in this process where we are turning 

greater attention to the democracy programs, the so-called ‘‘soft side’’ of our support. 

We need to be able to meet that commitment in order to ensure that Colombia will 

indeed be the free-standing, able partner that we envision for the future. 

OTHER ANDEAN COUNTRIES

Peru and Bolivia remain the second and third largest producers of coca. In 2005, 

both governments faced growing resistance from drug-cultivating farmers, which 

slowed eradication efforts and contributed to an increase in estimated coca 

cultivations. 

In Peru, the most recent USG survey detected increased coca cultivation, some of 

it in areas not surveyed before. Farmers were encouraged by high prices for coca 

leaf and temporary constraints on eradication. The government has now dedicated 

more resources than ever to eradication and goals were surpassed, but it will take 

time to wipe out the increase. The policies of the new government to be elected this 

April will obviously have significant bearing on the future of Peru’s counternarcotics 

effort. 

The new recently-elected Morales Administration in Bolivia has displayed a lackluster commitment to coca reduction. Our relationship with the new government 

will depend upon the policies it adopts on a wide range of issues, with counternarcotics a key component of our bilateral relationship. The U.S. will continue to 

try to maintain good relations with the Bolivian government and help it to sustain 

the enormous progress made there in the past ten years. 

We want to work closely with President Morales. Our Ambassador and Mr. Shannon, the Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere, have met with him a number 

of times. Secretary Rice met with him at the recent inauguration of President 

Bachelet in Chile. I will be traveling to Bolivia next month as well to urge Bolivian 

cooperation against drug trafficking. We hope to continue the productive partnership we have enjoyed with Bolivia. 

While not major drug-producing countries, Ecuador and Venezuela play critical 

roles in drug trafficking because of their long, largely unguarded borders with Colombia. In Ecuador, cocaine seizures reached a record 45 metric tons 2005. But the 

government has allocated insufficient resources for its security forces to consistently 

and effectively thwart cross-border incursions by Colombian narco-terrorists, and refuses to condemn such groups, espousing neutrality in the Colombian conflict. Ecuador’s security forces have conducted effective operations in the field given constraints on resources and capabilities. However, we are deeply concerned with the 

dramatic increase in the use of Ecuadorian-flagged vessels by drug trafficking organizations over the past 18 months. We are certain that this troubling phenomenon 

arises from the success of the maritime law enforcement agreement between Colombia and the United States. Because of the hundreds of seizures and U.S. prosecutions facilitated by this agreement, drug trafficking organizations are using Ecuador 

as a ‘‘safe haven’’ from U.S. prosecutions. 

24

There appears to be a trafficking shift from air to overland transport of drugs into 

Venezuela, but we are still very concerned about flights into the country from Peru, 

Bolivia and Brazil, as well as flights to Hispaniola. The Venezuelan government’s 

willingness to cooperate with its neighbors and with the U.S. is obviously critical 

to the regional strategy. However, as the INCSR report illustrates, Venezuela’s 

counternarcotics performance over the past year has been, at best, mixed. The President decertified the Government of Venezuela in September 2005 because of what 

the USG viewed as its failure to cooperate on a range of counternarcotics issues and 

also because of threats against Drug Enforcement Administration personnel. With 

the recent surge in production in the region, Venezuela constitutes a hole in our 

counternarcotics strategy in Latin America. Given Venezuela’s excellent record for 

cooperation in the past, we hope to see a return of that cooperative spirit in the 

coming year. 

Southern Cone and Tri-Border: The Southern Cone remains vulnerable to exploitation as a transit zone for narcotics trafficking and other transnational crime. The 

Tri-Border Area, shared by Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay, in particular, has long 

served as a venue for illicit activity including drugs and arms smuggling and money 

laundering. These countries are used as transit routes for over a hundred metric 

tons of cocaine. INL is actively engaged in enhancing the capabilities of the law enforcement agencies in Argentina, Paraguay and Brazil to enable them to act more 

effectively against narcotics trafficking, other transborder crime and international 

terrorism. In Paraguay, we are creating a Trade Transparency Unit, modeled after 

the successful unit in Colombia. It will enhance greatly the capability of our countries to prevent and combat money laundering, terrorist financing, stem official corruption, and support economic development through enhanced revenue collection. 

MEXICO

Combating drug trafficking from and through Mexico is an enormous challenge. 

In many ways, it is the principal counternarcotics challenge. Mexico is the principal 

transshipment route to the United States for South American drugs, a major source 

of heroin and the key supplier of methamphetamine. It is the principal placement 

point in the international financial system for proceeds of crime from the United 

States, and thus critical in terms of combating money laundering. Mexican-based 

trafficking groups are now the major foreign criminal threat we face here in the 

U.S. Beyond drugs, broader security interests and the recent surge in armed violence along the US-Mexico border are of gravest concern. 

Against this sobering backdrop, there are ample reasons to be optimistic about 

what can be done. Ten years ago, there were many divisive issues between us and 

Mexico, not least of which were the apparent impunity enjoyed by the Mexican drug 

cartels and the Government of Mexico’s refusal to extradite drug fugitives. Yet, in 

2005, Mexican forces took forceful action against a number of the drug cartels—

most of the leadership of the Arellano-Felix Organization, for example, is now behind bars. The Mexican government extradited 41 fugitives to the United States in 

2005, including a number of Mexican nationals, and the Mexican Supreme Court reopened the way to extradition of fugitives facing the possibility of life imprisonment—which for several years was one of the principal legal barriers to the extradition of drug traffickers. We still await the extradition of a major drug trafficker, 

and we would like to see closer cooperation in some important areas such as maritime interdiction, but we recognize that the Fox Administration has done a great 

deal to make that more possible in the future. Mexico has come a long way in recent 

years on many critical issues. 

During my trip to Mexico City earlier this month, I met with senior Mexican officials on a whole range of issues—but focused on the emerging threats, such as 

methamphetamine production and trafficking. I was pleased to see how much the 

Government of Mexico has done in a relatively short time to curb the importation 

of precursor chemicals. Mexican authorities have dramatically reduced the legal imports of pseudoephedrine and ephedrine during the past two years—by over 40 percent—after determining that imports exceeded needs for medicines containing such 

ingredients. The National Commission Against Sanitary Risks (COFEPRIS) cancelled many import permits and revoked import licenses, including the licenses of 

the seven largest distributors. It now requires importers to transport such substances in escorted armed vehicles. As a result of these changes, however, we anticipate that traffickers will attempt to circumvent the controls. Methamphetamine 

trafficking and production figured prominently in last week’s Binational Commission meeting here in Washington, with both governments pledging to intensify action against this threat. 

25

Institutional development and reform in Mexican federal law enforcement have 

been far reaching, resulting in a higher level of professionalism and willingness to 

cooperate with the U.S. and other foreign partners. Because of the Fox Administration’s own orientation toward reform and institutional modernization, INL’s Mexico 

program is one of our most innovative. Traditional INL programs, like eradication, 

have been nationalized in Mexico for some years now, allowing INL resources to 

focus on capacity building activities, such as modernizing Mexico’s federal police 

force, the Federal Investigations Agency (FBI equivalent). Our programs are very 

much tailored to facilitating effective partnerships between U.S. and Mexican counterpart agencies. We have also devoted considerable energy and resources in 

strengthening border security capacity in northern Mexico, complementing parallel 

work by the Department of Homeland Security on the U.S. side of the border, in 

support of the Border Partnership Accord. 

There is a tremendous amount of work still to be done in Mexico. Reforms and 

professionalization efforts at the federal level have not been replicated in all key 

federal agencies or at the state and local level. A key objective must be to support 

law enforcement reform and modernization at the state and local levels, including 

effective anti-corruption reforms. INL’s FY 2007 budget request includes programs 

focusing on state and local levels as well as continuing support for the Culture of 

Lawfulness program, which promotes rule of law at the school, community and government levels. 

Mexican law enforcement and military actions have disrupted criminal organizations, as we have seen in the past two years against the Arellano Felix Organization 

based in Tijuana, but efforts must be sustained over time to dismantle them. New 

restrictions on the importation of key chemicals will help to make it harder for 

methamphetamine traffickers to obtain these precursors, but parallel measures 

must be taken to prevent diversion from legitimate sources or to preempt a shift 

to clandestine smuggling. 

Another major challenge that defies easy solutions is border violence. This was 

a recurring theme in many of the Working Groups at last week’s U.S./Mexico Binational Commission. Secretary Rice personally raised U.S. concerns about border violence at that meeting; this message was reinforced by Attorney General Gonzales 

and Homeland Security Secretary Chertoff. Both sides pledged to make this a top 

priority. INL, along with other USG agencies, will redouble programmatic and operational efforts to assist Mexico to improve public safety. 

The Department of State is confident that—regardless of the outcome—the next 

Administration in Mexico will realize that it is clearly in Mexico’s interests to cooperate with the U.S. on security and combating crime. 

CENTRAL AMERICA

Central America is particularly vulnerable to drug transshipment and international organized crime. Approximately 90 percent of U.S.-bound South American 

cocaine and a large quantity of heroin transit the region as a whole, primarily over 

maritime trafficking routes. Their criminal justice systems are antiquated, inefficient and inadequately resourced. Corruption is a pervasive problem. The rise of 

highly-organized and violent criminal youth gangs is devastating Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala—and governments have been struggling to find the best way 

to devote their limited resources to the problem. Sadly, U.S. attention in the region 

has ebbed and flowed, preventing us from being as effective a force for change and 

reform as we might have been. 

The gang problem reaches beyond Central America and affects us directly in the 

United States as these groups expand their international networks. Enforcementoriented ‘‘hard line’’ (‘‘mano dura’’) approaches implemented in some governments 

have demonstrated that law enforcement alone is not enough. A balanced, multi-sector approach that addresses crime prevention, rehabilitation and social reintegration 

is clearly called for. 

As we have looked at how to improve—or in some cases restore—interdiction capacity in the region, it is clear that the needs are so great that the rather modest 

funding currently available will have very little impact. 

In Guatemala, for example, I sent a team down to look at what it would take to 

restore a modest five-helicopter mobility package. The estimated cost to do this was 

six times higher than INL’s intended FY 2006 budget for Guatemala. With maritime 

smuggling the dominant trafficking method, we would also like to expand maritime 

interdiction capacity, but this cannot be done—or done right—in the present budget 

climate. I will continue to explore this idea, but will have to find less expensive alternatives. 

26

Overland trafficking along the Pan-American Highway is also a threat. INL has 

assisted each country in strengthening its border inspection stations, particularly at 

key chokepoints and worked with DEA to establish Mobile Inspection and Enforcement Teams. Through the Cooperating Nation Information Exchange System, U.S. 

Southern Command provides data on suspect air and maritime movements to partner nation authorities to support their tracking and interdiction efforts. 

Central American governments also wrestle with trafficking in firearms, alien 

smuggling, and money laundering. Many also face serious domestic criminal problems, including criminal youth gangs, while struggling with underlying poverty, devastating natural disasters, and pervasive corruption. We see genuine commitment 

at the presidential level in most of the countries in the region and will work to reinforce that commitment. INL programs seek to modernize criminal justice sector institutions, especially federal police and prosecutors and to enhance interdiction capacity. While only a small percentage of illicit drugs moves by air, we have provided 

some limited support to governments, such as Guatemala, to restore some of their 

diminishing air mobility. 

INL funding for transit zone support is limited by budget constraints and competing priorities, such as Andean production. However, I am committed to finding 

ways to assist our excellent partner nations in the region. For example, by establishing the new International Law Enforcement Academy (ILEA) in El Salvador, the 

countries of Central America will benefit not only from training, but also from enhanced regional cooperation and information exchange. 

THE CARIBBEAN

Countries in the Caribbean region are largely poor, developing nations with weak 

justice sector institutions which are ill equipped to combat sophisticated drug or 

crime cartels. Corruption is another common challenge. Our programs focus on capacity building, maritime and air interdiction, port security and money laundering. 

To address border security issues, we are funding a regional database that will 

gather data on movement of people throughout the region. Known as the Regional 

Information and Intelligence Sharing System (RIIS), the database will link the 24 

countries and territories that are members of the Association of Caribbean Chiefs 

of Police. The database will also permit the vetting of arrivals and departures of 

passengers on cruise ships and airlines and will be linked to INTERPOL and other 

international watch lists. We expect the RIIS to become operational in the coming 

months. 

MULTINATIONAL EFFORTS

In the Western Hemisphere, the Inter-American Drug Abuse Control Commission—known by its Spanish acronym ‘‘CICAD’’—within the Organization of American States has promoted a common framework for anti-drug policies, laws, and cooperation. Through the Summit of the Americas process, CICAD was given a mandate to develop a hemispheric anti-drug strategy as well as a peer review system 

for assessing the efforts of each member of this anti-drug alliance. The resulting 

‘‘Multilateral Evaluation Mechanism’’ (known as the ‘‘MEM’’) provides each of the 

34 governments with an evaluation of its counter-drug efforts and recommendations 

for improving them. The CICAD Executive Secretariat, using funding from INL and 

other donors, provides training and other technical assistance to governments to 

promote compliance with the MEM recommendations. This system, while not yet as 

hard-hitting as the United States and other countries would like, still provides an 

objective, technical review that clearly results in governments making needed 

changes. It requires governments to take a more systematic and clinical look at 

themselves, particularly their own drug consumption and production trends. It is a 

valuable complement to the unilateral U.S. certification process. 

EMERGING THREATS

As we look to the future, INL will work to confront emerging problems or threats 

rapidly. Among the most pressing threats are synthetic drugs and youth gangs. 

Synthetic drugs—Today, we are particularly concerned about synthetic drugs, 

such as methamphetamine and ecstasy, which present major medical, social and law 

enforcement challenges for the United States and the rest of the world. We are 

working at home and internationally, especially on border controls with Canada and 

Mexico, to ensure that laws and law enforcement can deal with illegal production, 

trafficking and diversion of precursor chemicals used to make these drugs. We must 

be vigilant in controlling precursor chemicals, especially ephedrine and 

pseudoephedrine, that are readily available and easily used to produce synthetic 

27

drugs in small toxic labs. We are working closely with Canada, Mexico and producer/exporter countries to control the movement of these precursor chemicals. 

Criminal youth gangs—Criminal youth gang activity has a devastating affect on 

both public safety and lives of young people drawn into gangs. According to the Department of Justice’s 2006 national drug assessment, many street gangs have 

evolved into well-organized, profit-driven criminal enterprises that participate in the 

smuggling and sale of drugs. The largest of these, including Mara Salvatrucha and 

18th Street gang, are now recognized as full-blown international criminal organizations. 

The Department of State is working closely with other countries, especially in 

Central America, to confront the social and security problems posed by youth gangs. 

It is a very complicated policy issue and cannot be solved strictly through law enforcement action. INL will encourage partner nations to take a comprehensive, integrated approach that includes crime prevention, social reintegration, and juvenile 

justice reform. While many of INL’s gang-related project activities are subsumed in 

broader training or enforcement programs, I intend to give this area special attention in the coming year. 

We recognize that such a complex issue requires the involvement of many sectors 

of society, not just governments. We are partnering, for example, with non-governmental and international organizations, such as the Washington Office on Latin 

America and the Organization of American States. They have organized seminars 

and workshops to bring governments, private groups and other stakeholders together to develop better approaches to the problem. 

IMPACT OF U.S. EFFORTS ON THE UNITED STATES

ONDCP figures show that the use of illegal drugs by teenagers in the United 

States has dropped by nearly 20 percent since 2001. From 2003 to 2004, the purity 

of heroin in the U.S. decreased by 22 percent while the price rose by 30 percent. 

Since February of 2005, a similar, albeit preliminary, pattern has been seen with 

cocaine, although these drugs are still readily available. However, we believe overall 

demand has begun to stabilize. 

I firmly believe that if the United States was not supporting counternarcotics programs in the Americas the situation here at home would be dramatically worse. 

Without a concerted effort to eliminate the drugs at their source, we would have 

rising addition rates because more drugs would be available at lower prices. The impact on the United States of the progress being made around the Hemisphere is, 

admittedly, less dramatic than what we are seeing in Colombia or even Mexico, but 

it is there. Unquestionably, the eradication and interdiction efforts of our partner 

nations have, with U.S. support, kept hundreds of tons of cocaine, heroin and marijuana out of our country. 

In conclusion, we have a huge amount of work to do. It is both a ‘‘war’’ to be 

fought and won, and an ongoing effort to protect our country from foreign criminal 

threats. In my view, that is best done through strong partnerships, bilateral and 

multilateral. And, nowhere in the world do we have greater solidarity and shared 

sense of purpose and responsibility than right here in our own Hemisphere. 

Thank you. And I would be happy to answer your questions.

Mr. BURTON. Thank you, Madam Secretary. We have one or two 

votes, and I would like to inform my colleagues that if we only have 

one vote, I have asked Mr. Weller to run over, vote, and come back 

so that we could continue on. 

If you want to run and vote, and try to come back, that is fine. 

We will try to keep the hearing going so that we don’t have all this 

testimony waiting. Mr. Braun, do you want to go forward? 

TESTIMONY OF MR. MICHAEL A. BRAUN, CHIEF OF 

OPERATIONS, U.S. DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION 

Mr. BRAUN. Thank you. Chairman Burton, Ranking Member 

Engel, distinguished Members of the Subcommittee, on behalf of 

the Drug Enforcement Administration’s administrator, Karen P. 

Tandy, I thank you for the opportunity to testify on the drug trafficking situation in Latin America, and DEA’s bilateral operations. 

As you know, Latin America is the source of all cocaine, most of 

the heroin, and significant amounts of marijuana consumed in the 

28

United States. Bolivia, Colombia, and Peru remain the primary 

centers of production, with Colombia producing around 90 percent 

of the cocaine reaching the United States. 

Non-existent 10 years ago, heroin produced in Colombia now supplies over 50 percent of the heroin market in the United States. Recent political developments in Venezuela and Bolivia create special 

challenges for the DEA. 

In the past year, DEA Caracas has been in a precarious situation. Some reports in Venezuela portray DEA negatively, and entrusted counterparts were replaced with employees considered loyal 

to President Hugo Chavez. 

Despite these handicaps, DEA manages to work within Venezuelan established parameters, and maintains a presence in the 

country. DEA has been working with the United States Department of State to create an agreement with the Government of Venezuela which will return DEA agents to their normal status. 

The election of Evo Morales as Bolivia’s President also poses new 

challenges. DEA continues to operate bilaterally with its Bolivian 

counterparts. However, the relationship with the Morales Administration is in its infancy and it is too early to predict what impact 

the change will have on DEA’s operations. 

Notwithstanding the political developments in Latin America, 

and the corrupting influence of drug trafficking organizations on 

Central American governments, DEA, along with other United 

States agencies and our host nation counterparts, are mounting an 

attack on all levels of the drug trade, denying safehaven, transportation routes, precursor chemicals, and drug proceeds to leaders of 

these organizations. 

While DEA has evidence that some terrorist groups are involved 

in the drug trade, the trade continues to be dominated at all levels 

by traditional drug trafficking organizations. 

The clearest connections between drug trafficking and terrorist 

organizations exists in Colombia. We continue to make great 

strides against FARC, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, as exemplified by the recent Federal indictment naming 50 of 

the top level FARC leaders as defendants. 

This action is the first indictment of an entire leadership of a foreign terrorist organization involved in narcotics distribution to the 

United States. On a separate integrated front, DEA, JIAFT-South, 

other Federal law enforcement agencies, working in concert with 

counterparts throughout Central America, Mexico, and South 

America, have implemented a drug flow prevention strategy. 

Operations are conducted in Mexico, and Central, and Latin 

America transit zones, and consist of innovative, interconnected, 

multiagency operations designed to disrupt the flow of drugs, 

money, and chemicals. 

Two other noteworthy programs are Operations Firewall and Operation Panama Express. These projects combine investigative and 

intelligence resources to interdict the flow of cocaine from the 

northern coast of Colombia, and have resulted in combined total 

seizures of 410.9 metric tons of cocaine as of December 31, 2005. 

Successful interdiction operations are contingent upon cooperative agreements. No maritime agreements presently exist between 

the United States and the Governments of Ecuador, Venezuela, 

29

Mexico, or Peru. Without such agreements, the United States cannot board any flagged vessels by these nations in their territorial 

waters. 

And for boardings on international waters, these nations also can 

demand and do demand often that the crew, drugs, vessels, and 

evidence be returned for adjudication to their respective countries. 

Rest assured that the Colombian syndicates exploit this vulnerability. 

We know that controlled chemicals are camouflaged and clandestinely imported into Colombia, and despite positive law enforcement initiatives in cooperation with Colombian counterparts, traffickers are able to obtain vast quantities of essential chemicals. 

The policing of diverted raw products and precursor chemicals is 

challenging because of differing chemical laws in each country. To 

counter money laundering in Latin America, the DEA has established its bulk currency initiative, which provides financial interdiction and investigation training, and promotes information sharing. 

The DEA provides assistance to its counterparts through interagency coordination and agreements to combat money laundering 

and terrorist financing. Of note, Arab drug trafficking organizations based in the tri-border area are using the region for cocaine 

smuggling operations to Brazil, Europe, and the Middle East. 

There are reports of cocaine proceeds entering the coffers of Islamic radical groups, such as Hezbollah and Hamas. The profit 

margin for a kilogram of cocaine in European and Middle Eastern 

markets can be as high as $144,000 per kilogram, giving an initial 

investment of less than $6,000 in Latin America. 

At the core of the DEA’s efforts to identify, target, disrupt, and 

dismantle these groups will be our financial investigations. The 

longstanding bilateral law enforcement relationships in Latin 

America have proven to be key to the DEA’s success. 

Formalized agreements necessary for working relationships and 

non-politicalization of one of the world’s most noble endeavors, the 

elimination of the illicit drug trade, will bring the United States 

and the nations of Latin America closer to this objective. 

Chairman Burton, Ranking Member Engel, Members of the Subcommittee, I thank you again for the opportunity to testify and will 

be happy to address any questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Braun follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF MR. MICHAEL A. BRAUN, CHIEF OF OPERATIONS, U.S. 

DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION

INTRODUCTION

Chairman Burton, Ranking Member Engel, and distinguished members of the 

subcommittee, on behalf of the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) Administrator, Karen P. Tandy, I want to thank you for your continued support of the men 

and women of DEA, as well as for the opportunity to testify today on the drug trafficking situation in Latin America and DEA’s bilateral operations and approach to 

disrupt and dismantle organizations responsible for the drug trade. 

LATIN AMERICAN DRUG PRODUCTION THREAT ASSESSMENT

Seven of the 20 countries designated by the President as major drug transit or 

major illicit drug-producing nations are located in Latin America—Bolivia, Brazil, 

Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Peru, and Venezuela. The strategic deployment of apVerDate Mar 21 2002 14:30 Aug 01, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00033 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\WORK\WH\033006\26780.000 HINTREL1 PsN: SHIRL
30

proximately 38 percent of DEA’s foreign workforce to Latin America is testament 

to the important role the region plays in feeding America’s appetite for drugs. 

Latin America is the source of all cocaine, most of the heroin, and significant 

amounts of marijuana consumed in the United States. Bolivia, Colombia, and Peru 

remain the primary centers of cocaine production, although DEA remains concerned 

about the production potential of other countries in the region. Cocaine continues 

to be produced in Bolivia, Colombia, and Peru in vast quantities to supply the 

United States’ and world’s demand. Non-existent 10 years ago, heroin produced in 

Colombia now supplies over 50 percent of the United States’ heroin market. 

Bolivia 

Bolivia’s coca cultivation expanded from 24,600 hectares in 2004 to 26,500 hectares in 2005—an increase of 8 percent. That total hectarage equates to 70 metric 

tons of pure cocaine base that could be manufactured. Although a modest increase 

is noted, it represents the fourth year in a row of increased cultivation. More coca 

means that more cocaine can be produced. DEA’s interdiction efforts directly complement USG support for Bolivian coca eradication operations in the Chapare region. Bolivia’s primary counternarcotics challenge, however, remains the Yungas region. It is by far the largest coca growing area in Bolivia, with severe topography, 

and a long history of traditional coca cultivation and resistance to eradication. Alternative development activities in the area will be critical to strengthening local support for reduction of illegal coca; but even when combined with effective interdiction, 

cannot counter the long-term trend line in Yungas without the eradication component. 

For several years we have observed Mexican drug traffickers purchasing Peruvian 

cocaine suggesting that Mexican drug syndicates are attempting to supplement their 

Colombian cocaine sources by expanding their contacts with the Peruvian traffickers. Likewise, some Mexican traffickers also have increased their presence in Bolivia and are exploring their options in the Bolivian cocaine market. Bolivia’s persistent political unrest, systemic political corruption, nonexistent border controls, 

and lack of aerial radar coverage are all contributing strategic factors that magnify 

the drug threat from Bolivia. 

Colombia 

Colombia currently produces around 90 percent of the cocaine HCl reaching the 

United States, with an average purity of 84 percent at the wholesale level. While 

United States Government (USG) cocaine production estimates for 2005 in Colombia 

will not be available until early April, Colombia potentially produced 430 metric 

tons of pure cocaine in 2004—7 percent decline from the 460 metric tons of pure 

cocaine potentially produced in Colombia during 2003. Colombia’s 2004 potential cocaine production represents approximately 67 percent of the world’s potential cocaine production, which is a dramatic trend, considering Colombia only produced 

about 25 percent of the world’s cocaine base as recently as 1995. Accordingly, Colombian traffickers have become less dependent on Peruvian or Bolivian cocaine 

base sources of supply. Through intelligence sharing, DEA supports the eradication 

efforts coordinated by the State Department throughout Latin America, and in particular Colombia, which are critical components to stamping out drug production in 

this region. 

Not unexpectedly, Colombian drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) remain the 

dominant players in the international cocaine trade as they are increasingly more 

self-sufficient in cocaine base production, have a firm grip on Central American and 

Caribbean smuggling routes, and dominate the wholesale cocaine markets in the 

eastern United States and in Europe. Colombian opium poppy cultivation and heroin production have also increased significantly in recent years, and nearly all Colombian heroin is believed to be destined for the United States’ drug market. Colombia is also a stable source of marijuana—with approximately 5,000 hectares cultivated annually. In recent years, Colombia has also become a major supplier of 

marijuana to the European market. 

Peru 

Peru was once the largest worldwide cultivator of illicit coca and producer of cocaine base. As a result of effective and sustained interdiction and eradication efforts, 

Peru is now a distant second to Colombia. For 2005, Peru’s potential pure cocaine 

base production was estimated to be 165 metric tons—a 14 percent increase from 

2004 production levels. Additionally, USG surveys indicate an increase of approximately 38 percent in cultivated hectares from 27,500 in 2004 to 38,000 in 2005. This 

increase includes approximately 4,000 hectares not assessed in 2004. 

31

POLITICAL DEVELOPMENTS IN LATIN AMERICA

Recent political developments in Venezuela and Bolivia have created special challenges for DEA operations in Latin America. Venezuela serves as a major transit 

country for Colombian cocaine. While some cocaine is transported into the country 

via a variety of air, river, and land-based smuggling routes, the predominant shipping method relies upon vehicles to transport cocaine along traditional land routes. 

Primarily destined for markets in the United States and Europe, the cocaine leaves 

the country either by commercial sea freight, non-commercial ships (including ‘‘gofast boats’’), or airplanes. 

In the past year, DEA in Caracas has been in a precarious situation. Some press 

reports in Venezuela portrayed DEA negatively, and trusted Venezuelan counterparts, who had good working relationships with DEA, were replaced with employees 

considered more loyal to President Hugo Chavez and who have a negative history 

with DEA. For example, President Chavez appointed General Morgado as the head 

of the Anti-Narcotics unit of the National Guard. Shortly thereafter, General 

Morgado disbanded the DEA Vetted Units manned by personnel from the Venezuelan National Guard and Cuerpo de Investigaciones, Criminalistas Penales y 

Cientificas (CICPC). 

Despite these handicaps, DEA has managed to work within the parameters established by the Government of Venezuela and maintains a presence in the country. 

DEA has contributed intelligence information related to narcotics trafficking to numerous other DEA offices and in light of the restrictive environment, has still managed to retain a significant influence in investigating narcotics trafficking in this region. 

DEA, through the U.S. State Department, is currently reviewing a previously established working agreement with the Government of Venezuela, in which progress 

has been made. DEA has been working with the U.S. Department of State to create 

a document that is acceptable to both governments. It is hoped that a mutual agreement will be reached in the near term, which will return DEA agents to their normal status in Venezuela. 

The December 18, 2005, election of Evo Morales of the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS) Party as Bolivia’s president also poses new challenges for DEA activities. 

President Morales rose to power as the leader of the coca growers union, and has 

established a high-profile opposition to the U.S funded eradication of coca crops. The 

Morales Administration is currently faced with balancing the need to address 

cocalero coca farmers’ constituency demands to grow and/or de-penalize coca and 

also meet its counter narcotics obligations to the international community, specifically coca eradication. 

But despite some trepidation about what the change in Administration might 

mean to DEA operations, today the DEA continues to operate bilaterally with its 

Bolivian law enforcement counterparts. The relationship with the Morales Administration is in its infancy, and it is too early to predict what impact the change in 

Administration will have on DEA’s operations in Bolivia. 

BILATERAL LAW ENFORCEMENT—ATTACKING THE DRUG TRADE

Generically, DTOs are similar in structure and have similar operational needs to 

legitimate businesses, with both models sharing the goal of deriving profit. Law enforcement disruption at any level within these organizations and denial of support 

services, such as raw materials and communications, negatively impact their profit 

margin. DEA is uniquely positioned to attack these vulnerabilities in Latin America. 

Disruption and Dismantlement 

The leaders of the most significant international DTOs threatening the United 

States have been identified on the Consolidated Priority Organization Target 

(CPOT) list. Today, 38 of the 44 organizations on the CPOT list are based in Latin 

America. DEA works closely with host nation counterparts to aggressively pursue, 

locate, apprehend, and extradite the senior leadership of CPOTs to the United 

States. 

While terrorist groups are involved in the drug trade, the trade continues to be 

dominated downstream from the cocaine production level by traditional DTOs. The 

DEA does not specifically target terrorist groups, except those that are involved as 

major drug trafficking or money laundering organizations. Today, Colombia’s main 

guerrilla and paramilitary groups benefit and derive significant organizational proceeds from the drug trade, as well as other illegal activities such as kidnapping, extortion, and robbery. The clearest connections between drug trafficking and terrorist 

organizations exist in Colombia. The United States Department of State has officially designated the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Revolutionary 

32

Armed Forces of Colombia or FARC), the Eje ́rcito de Liberacio ́n Nacional (National 

Liberation Army or ELN), and the Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia (United SelfDefense Groups of Colombia or AUC) as Foreign Terrorist Organizations, all of 

which are based in Colombia. 

DEA continues to make great strides against the FARC, as exemplified by the 

Federal indictment which was handed down on March 1, 2006, in the United States 

District Court for the District of Columbia, naming 50 leaders of the FARC as defendants. Three of those charged are presently in custody in Colombia, and the 

United States will seek extradition of these individuals. In addition, the United 

States Department of State has also offered rewards ranging from $5 million each 

for the top seven leaders to $2.5 million each for 17 of the second-tier leaders, for 

information leading to their capture. It is well-documented by DEA that individual 

FARC fronts are involved in multi-levels of the drug trade, ranging from coca cultivation and cocaine production, to taxation and providing security at processing laboratories and clandestine airstrips, to international cocaine distribution and transportation. This indictment of the FARC is the first of its kind, where the entire leadership of a Foreign Terrorist Organization was shown to be involved in narcotics 

distribution to the United States. I believe this further demonstrates DEA’s resolve 

to combat narcotics distribution at the source and to contribute significantly to our 

nation’s war on terrorism. 

Interdiction—Transit Zone 

One of DEA’s strategies is to incapacitate major international DTOs by disrupting 

and dismantling supporting organizations which provide transportation services. 

DEA has initiated several extremely successful multi-agency operations to attack 

the vulnerabilities of the transportation services of these organizations. These programs also disrupt the supply of drugs to the United States and result in multiton seizures through targeted operations.

• DEA and JIATF-South initiated the Drug Flow Prevention Strategy in 2005. 

Operations in support of this strategy are conducted in Mexico and Central 

and Latin American transit zones and consist of innovative, interconnected, 

multi-agency host country operations designed to disrupt the flow of drugs, 

money, and chemicals between the source zones and the United States. This 

strategy also is supported by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Internal 

Revenue Service, several members of the Intelligence Community, agencies of 

the Department of Homeland Security, and the Department of Defense.

• Operation FIREWALL and Operation PANAMA EXPRESS combine investigative and intelligence resources to interdict the flow of cocaine from the northern coast of Colombia to the United States:

— Operation FIREWALL was initiated by the DEA Cartagena Resident Office in conjunction with the Cartagena Tactical Analysis Team and 

JIATF-South. It is estimated that the major syndicates use several hundred go-fast boats, each capable of transporting between 1.5 and 2 metric tons of cocaine. This program works in tandem with Operation PANAMA EXPRESS and other maritime programs that target CPOTs, as 

well as Colombian transportation syndicates operating in the Caribbean 

corridors. Since the July 2003 commencement of Operation FIREWALL, 

the program has resulted in the seizure in excess of 29.2 metric tons of 

cocaine. Additionally, Operation FIREWALL provided assistance in Operation PANAMA EXPRESS seizures of 33.2 metric tons, and other foreign countries in the seizure of 25.7 metric tons of cocaine.

— Operation PANAMA EXPRESS, an Organized Crime Drug Enforcement 

Task Force (OCDETF) initiative known as PANEX, consists of agents 

and analysts from DEA, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Immigration 

and Customs Enforcement, the United States Coast Guard, and the U.S. 

Attorney’s Office in the Middle District of Florida. This operation has 

targeted the highest level traffickers responsible for the financing, production, transportation, and distribution of cocaine throughout North 

America and Europe. Since the February 2000 implementation of Operation PANEX, 356 metric tons of cocaine has been seized, 109.2 metric 

tons of cocaine have been scuttled, and 1,107 individuals have been arrested. As of December 31, 2005, these two highly successful interdiction 

programs have resulted in combined total seizures of 410.9 metric tons 

of cocaine.

As with counternarcotics operations within the host nations, interdiction operations in the transit zone are contingent upon cooperative agreements. At present, 

33

no maritime agreement exists between the United States and the Governments of 

Ecuador, Mexico, or Peru. Because we have no agreements with these countries, the 

United States can only board vessels flagged by these nations on the high seas on 

a case-by-case basis,. Also, because we have no agreements with these countries, it 

is virtually impossible for the United States to obtain jurisdiction over the vessel 

and its contents, which is subject to the jurisdiction of the host nation. Rest assured 

that the Colombian syndicates exploit this vulnerability. 

Over the years, Colombian traffickers have exploited the Caribbean corridor, as 

the region provides them with increased flexibility and anonymity because of its 

vast geographic territory, numerous law enforcement jurisdictions, and fragmented 

investigative resources. With few exceptions (notably Costa Rica and Panama), the 

countries in Central America are ill-equipped to handle the threat of drug trafficking. Many Central American countries are experiencing weak economies, and 

scarce resources are oftentimes allocated for other pressing problems. Police and 

other agencies are often under-funded and receive inadequate training. Consequently, some officials are susceptible to the enormous bribes that drug traffickers 

can offer. The corrupting influence of illicit drug trafficking organizations on the 

governmental institutions of Central America significantly increases the difficulties 

of mounting successful drug interdiction efforts. 

Precursor Chemical Control 

The denial of raw products and chemicals has proven to be a significant disruptive 

force against DTOs. We know that controlled chemicals are camouflaged and clandestinely imported into Colombia, and many chemicals are also diverted by a small 

number of employees at large chemical companies in Colombia. 

Unfortunately, despite positive law enforcement initiatives and growing cooperation between the United States and Colombian Governments, traffickers are still 

able to obtain vast quantities of essential chemicals. The policing of the illegal diversion of raw products and precursor chemicals within Central and South America is 

challenging because of the different chemical laws in each country. What may be 

legal in one country may be illegal in another. This vulnerability is being exploited 

by the traffickers. 

However, through Operations Seis Fronteras and ALL–INCLUSIVE, initiatives 

that promote cooperation among South and Central American nations to interdict 

the movement of essential precursor chemicals to drug production areas, the participating countries have achieved successful collateral and multilateral-sharing of 

chemical information. There has been noted multi-lateral success which would not 

have been achieved without these operations and the multi-lateral agreements. 

Financial Investigations 

DEA’s overall strategic approach is based on the recognition that the major drug 

traffickers, operating both internationally and domestically, have insulated themselves from the drug distribution networks but remain closely linked to the proceeds 

of their trade. DEA is mounting several innovative approaches aimed at targeting 

the flow of money from the streets of America to the leadership of major DTOs. In 

FY 2005, DEA’s asset and currency seizures, excluding the value of drug seizures, 

were $1.4 billion. In addition, we also made more high-value seizures (those over 

$1 million) in FY 2005 than in FY 2004. DEA also denied drug traffickers $1.9 billion in revenue in FY 2005, which includes $1.4 billion in seized assets and $477 

million in drug seizures. 

Americans spend nearly $65 billion every year on illicit drugs. In its 2005 World 

Drug Report, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime estimated illicit drug 

revenues generated in the United States, Canada, and Mexico during 2003 at $142 

billion. A significant portion of these drug revenues return to the source countries 

in Latin America primarily through two money laundering methods—the Black 

Market Peso Exchange (‘‘BMPE’’) and bulk currency smuggling. 

The BMPE is currently the largest known money laundering system in the Western Hemisphere. Using a ‘‘parallel exchange’’ system, drug traffickers are able to 

sell drug dollars to brokers in exchange for pesos. Brokers then sell the drug dollars 

to Colombian merchants who purchase goods in the United States and elsewhere. 

By purchasing drug dollars on the Black Market and not through Colombia’s regulated exchange system, the importers avoid Colombian taxes and tariffs, thereby 

gaining significant profit and a competitive advantage over those who import legally. 

Stronger banking laws have forced some DTOs to change their money laundering 

methods. The transportation and smuggling of drug dollars out of the United States 

in bulk form is now the primary initial method of money laundering, with the currency being entered into banking systems in countries with weaker banking regulaVerDate Mar 21 2002 14:30 Aug 01, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00037 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\WORK\WH\033006\26780.000 HINTREL1 PsN: SHIRL
34

tions. In particular, billions of USD are smuggled across our border with Mexico, 

the majority ultimately destined for Colombian drug trafficking syndicates. 

To combat this threat, DEA has established its Bulk Currency Initiative, with the 

goals of providing training for all law enforcement officers involved in bulk currency 

interdiction and investigations; increased coordination between DEA and its federal, 

state, and local counterparts; centralization of intelligence; and the analysis and 

linkage to ongoing investigations. 

DEA continues to provide assistance to its Latin American host nation counterparts through interagency coordination and bilateral agreements to combat money 

laundering and terrorist financing. We also continue to support foreign-based money 

laundering investigations conducted by specialized units of our Latin American law 

enforcement counterparts. Arab DTOs based in the Tri-border Area of Latin America (where the borders of Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay meet) have been using 

the region as the central point for cocaine smuggling operations to Brazil, Europe, 

and the Middle East. These organizations have ties to radical Islamic terrorist 

groups such as Hezbollah and it is feared that these groups are reaping large monetary benefits from trafficking activities. It is important to note that this is not an 

emerging threat per se, but one that has existed since the late 1980s or early 1990s. 

After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, governments the world over began 

to focus more attention on what was happening in the Tri-border Area in order to 

determine the severity of the drug trafficking emanating from the region and whether or not Islamic terrorist groups were benefiting financially. 

Investigations into these groups as part of DEA’s Drug Flow Prevention Strategy

reveal Arab DTOs are exporting cocaine from South America to Europe and the 

Middle East. There are numerous reports of cocaine proceeds entering the coffers 

of Islamic Radical Groups (IRG) such as Hezbollah and Hamas in Europe and the 

Middle East. With the immense profit margin of cocaine sold in the European and 

Middle East markets, an initial investment of less than $6,000 USD for one kilogram of cocaine in Latin America, can yield a minimum of $30,000 USD in Spain, 

up to $110,000 USD in Hungary and Israel, and up to $150,000 USD in Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, or Oman. The danger of Arab DTO’s and IRG’s profiting 

from the lucrative cocaine trade can lead to an unlimited source of cheap and easy 

revenue to carry out potential terrorist acts. 

DEA’s primary efforts against these groups will focus on the identification, targeting, disruption, and dismantlement of Arab DTO’s in the Tri-Border Area. We 

are also attempting to identify the cocaine sources of supply from the Andean Ridge, 

identify any arms-for-drugs nexus, and identify and track IRG networks in Latin 

America, Europe and the Middle East, which are reaping the financial benefits from 

the lucrative European and Middle East cocaine markets. Key to these efforts will 

be to attack the financial narcotic nexus. 

Progress will be made towards disrupting and dismantling the Arab DTOs only 

through a concerted effort that harnesses the assets of Federal law enforcement, 

host-national law enforcement, and the Intelligence Community in targeting both 

the drug and money laundering aspects of drug trafficking in the Tri-border Area. 

Strengthening host-nation judicial capabilities will also be essential in convicting 

and jailing those involved in Tri-Border drug trafficking activities. 

CONCLUSION

DEA’s investigative efforts in Latin America will continue to be directed against 

the major international trafficking organizations and their facilitators at every juncture in their operations—from the cultivation and production of drugs in foreign 

countries, their passage through the transit zone, and their eventual distribution on 

the streets of our nation’s communities. We will also direct our efforts against those 

affiliates who supply precursor and essential chemicals and provide financial services to these organizations. 

The longstanding bilateral law enforcement relationships in Latin America have 

proven to be key to DEA’s success. Bringing to the criminal and civil justice system 

of the United States, or any other competent jurisdiction, those organizations and 

principal members of organizations involved in the growing, manufacture, or distribution of controlled substances appearing in or destined for illicit traffic in the 

United States will remain the core of our focus. Formalized agreements necessary 

for bilateral working relationships and non-politicization of one of the world’s common endeavors—the elimination of the illicit drug trade—will bring the United 

States and the nations of Latin America closer to this objective.

Mr. BURTON. Since we have less than 5 minutes on the clock, we 

will recess and try to come back as quickly as possible. We do not 

35

want to hold you up any longer, and I have a number of questions 

that I would like to ask. 

We will stand in recess at the fall of the gavel, and if our Ranking Republican comes back and wants to start, that is okay. We 

stand in recess. 

[Recess.] 

Mr. BURTON. First of all, let me apologize to you for being gone 

so long. We had an unexpected vote that we did not want to have 

to make, but we did. So we are back. Let me start off by talking 

to you about the lack of equipment. 

I mentioned in my opening remarks that we asked for 23 additional aircraft, and we were able to get three through the House, 

which at least was a beginning. Also, as I understand it, there have 

been as many as 55 aircraft that have been lost in the last 10 

years. 

I have been told that your records only go back to 1999. However, if you go back another 4 or 5 years, according to the information that I have, there has been 55 aircraft that have been lost and 

not replaced. How can President Uribe do the job down there without the equipment that he needs? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Mr. Chairman, let me give you some 

figures on this, because I think overall the story is a little more encouraging than the one that you have painted. Our figures do go 

back to the year 2000, and we have lost 39 aircraft. 

We can give you quite a bit of detail on this, but just to put this 

in perspective, in 2000, we had 54 helos, and now we have 147. We 

had 10 spray aircraft, and now we have 21. We had 17 fixed-aircraft, and now we have 36. 

This is supported by INL in various categories; the police program, which is a different category than the air wing, as your staff 

knows. And also during this period, there has been a sharp increase in quality because we have expanded the inventory of 

Hueys. 

We bought seven aircraft, air tractors, which have better capacity 

on spraying. We have bought the Blackhawks. At the same time 

the Colombians have, through their national funds, purchased 

Blackhawks and a number of other aircraft, and have another 

Blackhawk sale pending. 

At INL, we are quite proud of our readiness rates, which run 

from 79 percent on the Army program, to about 69 percent on the 

police program. We are very mindful, and with all of this said, I 

think we have come a long way. 

You have a totally legitimate point insofar as they need more aircraft, and they need updating of the aircrafts they have. The problem with the aircraft packages is that they are simply wildly expensive. 

So what we are going to undertake, and you were kind enough 

to give us $30-million this year, and we have asked for another 

$60-million, our critical flight safety program, of which 60 or 70 

percent will focus on the aircraft available in Colombia, and upgrade the helicopters, and upgrade the spray packages. 

We have old aircraft, and they are not commercially supportable, 

and we are hopeful with this critical flight safety program that 

36

they will both improve performance and improve the safety over 

the next several years. 

Mr. BURTON. Well, it was just pointed out by my right hand here, 

or one of my right hands, which says that a lot of the taxpayer’s 

dollars are going to be spent on counterdrug efforts in other places 

in the Andean region, replacing Colombian anti-drug police helicopters to take down rebel leaders, who are upgrading Bolivian helicopters to Huey-2s. Is that correct? 

Which is better? Is it better for them to be used in Colombia, or 

to spend that money, and send those helicopters into Bolivia, especially with a new Administration, and we don’t even know if they 

will use the Huey-2s. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. We are very mindful of that. We don’t 

know yet, but we don’t feel that we can afford to ignore Bolivia because of the history of Bolivia, and because it is still a major source 

of coca cultivation. 

Mr. BURTON. Well, I understand that, but the new President has 

made some very strong statements against what we have been 

doing, and against the United States, and before we start throwing 

money down there and sending helicopters, I am sure that the Administration is going to take a hard look at what Mr. Morales is 

going to be saying and doing. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Well, we are very concerned about 

President Morales’ statements, Mr. Chairman, very concerned, and 

as you may know, some of the helicopters that were originally 

scheduled to be delivered for Bolivia are now in Afghanistan assisting in that really critical drug fight against opium. 

But it is critical flight safety even now, even with the Bolivian 

input, 60 to 70 percent of those dollars that we have requested of 

you would go to support Colombian aircraft. 

Colombia is still the center of our aviation activities. We are very 

mindful of the shortages and some of the shortfalls that you have 

outlined, and we are trying to redress them with a longer term 

plan over the next several years. 

Mr. BURTON. How many of those are for the Colombian police? 

Are they all for the army? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. No, they are not all for the army. The 

spray aircraft, of course, are always under the control of the Colombian police, and I would have to get you the figure on the helicopters. 

Mr. BURTON. Could you give us a complete report on that? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Absolutely, we would love to have your 

staff. I think they may have been down to the air wing, and we 

have some very comprehensive briefings on our plans. Absolutely. 

Mr. BURTON. Well, we would like to take a look at all of that if 

it is okay. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Absolutely. 

Mr. BURTON. I just have two more questions and then I will yield 

to my colleagues, because I don’t want to monopolize all of this. 

How can you go after the FARC leadership, which are now under 

United States indictment—I think there is 50 of them—when the 

lost helicopters such as the CNP UH–60 Blackhawks, and the 

Huey-2s, have not been replaced? 

37

Also, you made an argument on opposition to that, and your aerial asset allocations system is so overly bureaucratic that it requires 48 hours advanced notice and planning, and the FARC guys 

start moving within 6 or 7 hours. 

We have got to get that time frame down to 4 to 7 hours so we 

can catch these guys, and right now it is saying 48 hours advanced 

notice and planning for us to get on line and go after these guys. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Mr. Chairman, that would be for a routine mission, and there is a lot of information that we can supply 

to you on this issue. If it is an effort to catch a FARC leader, believe me that the United States Embassy in Bogota would throw 

every resource they had into the fight. 

Mr. BURTON. What is the time frame on that? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. When I was there, we could do it, and 

we did do it, in a matter of hours. What I think happens sometimes 

is that there are lower level commanders that would say, oh, the 

United States Embassy does not give me resources. 

However, our practice, and I think it is a solid one, is that these 

requests have to go up the chain-of-command, because only the Colombian chain-of-command can make these decisions. 

Believe me, there is no higher priority for the United States Embassy than apprehending these major FARC leaders as well. I 

think the figure from the Embassy, but I want to verify this for 

you, is that only four of these missions have been turned down in 

the last year. 

That was because of competing missions that were of a higher 

priority, or an overriding safety concern. The vast majority of these 

missions are approved, and believe me if they are urgent, they are 

approved quickly. 

Mr. BURTON. Okay. Well, we would like to have as much information as possible on that as well. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Absolutely. We have very detailed figures on this, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. BURTON. I would like to have that if I could. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. We will make those available to you. 

Mr. BURTON. Thank you. One last question. Why are you ending 

funding for a major intelligence program in countries—and I am 

talking about Bogota—that recently helped bring down a major 

leader in the ACU, and just when you are saying you are going 

after these major kingpins? 

Are we serious about helping bring the FARC leaders to justice 

in the United States on these drug charges, and are we cutting 

back or ending funding for this major intelligence program in Bogota? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. INL will transfer funds to DEA for this. 

This is not sort of a typical INL program, because it basically is 

a law enforcement program. 

Mr. BURTON. Well, what I would like to do——

Ambassador PATTERSON. We will transfer the funding to the 

DEA. 

Mr. BURTON. Can you give me a time frame on that? You don’t 

have to do it right now, but if you could let us know when——

Ambassador PATTERSON. In the next couple of months. We have 

to do a reimbursable agreement, but we will transfer the funds. 

38

Mr. BURTON. Well, I would like to know when that takes place 

if you don’t mind, Madame Secretary. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Absolutely. 

Mr. BURTON. Okay. Thank you. I think that Mr. Delahunt is 

next. You were here first. Okay. Mr. Faleomaveaga. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Thank you, Secretary Patterson, and Mr. 

Braun, for your eloquent statements. I just wanted to go back to 

the more fundamentals, and try and learn arithmetic here. What 

is the total dollar value of the drug trade coming from Latin America? 

Mr. BRAUN. Congressman, I don’t have the exact numbers for the 

drug trade coming out of Latin America, but what I can tell you 

is that the best estimates are that Americans spend about $64-billion or $65-billion a year to feed their insatiable appetite for drugs, 

and obviously much of that money is from Latin America. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. That was going to be my next question, sir, 

and you beat me to the gun on that, Mr. Braun. I want to know 

particularly if we want to put in dollar value the drug trade coming 

from Latin America alone? 

Would you say that our appetite here alone in our own country 

is about $65-billion? 

Mr. BRAUN. Yes, $64-billion or $65-billion is the best estimate. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Well, that is pretty hefty. I thought it was 

a lot more than that. But the total, and this is worldwide, and coming from all different directions, the American appetite for drugs is 

$65-billion? 

Mr. BRAUN. That is correct. We can work to get you those other 

figures. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. I would appreciate if you would submit that 

for the record. I am just curious about that. My next question is 

how much does our country spend—the DEA, drug interdiction, everything that the Chairman has asked about, such as for the helicopters, and anything and everything that has to do with what we 

are spending in Latin America in eradicating drug trafficking and 

coming from Latin America to our country? 

I am just trying to get the general number for dollars that we 

are spending. How much are we spending for drug interdiction? 

Mr. BRAUN. I believe the amount is about $15-billion. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. So, $15-billion annually? 

Mr. BRAUN. That is what I believe. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Just from Latin America alone? 

Mr. BRAUN. No, no, I am sorry, not just Latin America. No. That 

is the overall expenditure. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Out of that $15-billion, how much of that do 

you think—and you can wing it, do you think we spend for Latin 

America alone? 

Mr. BRAUN. Just to clarify something, that is one-five, 15 billion, 

and not 50. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Yes, 15, I got that. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. I think from this, and I can’t speak to, 

for instance, DEA’s operational budget, or what the military would 

spend, but INL has requested something in the range of $550-million this year. And Plan Colombia alone, Mr. Congressman, is between $4-billion and $41⁄2-billion. 

39

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Can you give me that again? Four billion 

dollars? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Since 2000, the initial stage of Plan Co- lombia in 2000 is between $4-billion and $41⁄2-billion. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. So we have spent about $4-billion or $5-billion in the last 5 years? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. In Colombia, yes. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. That is just in Colombia alone? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Yes, and say another $100-million in 

Peru and Bolivia. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Can you submit that for the record? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. That is easy, sir. We will submit that. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. I would really appreciate that. By the same 

token, how much do we give to Latin America as far as promoting 

economic development? Can you provide that? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Certainly we can provide it, and I think 

that the point that you are getting at is that traditional assistance 

has dropped, but I think it is going up again with the partnership 

with the Millennium Challenge Account and other accounts, but 

certainly our overall foreign assistance budget has been under considerable pressure. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. I am trying to get the big picture here, with 

Latin American down there, and Uncle Sam up here, and one of 

the leaders of Latin America was complaining about if there wasn’t 

so much demand from the United States that maybe this will discourage Latin American countries from supplying us with the 

drugs. 

I was just wondering how well are we doing in our own country 

in going after our own cartels, going after our own drug pushers, 

as part of the prevention effort if you will. 

I don’t think that this problem is going to change, at least in the 

years that I have served on this Subcommittee, and that drug trafficking has been in existence for the last 20 or 30 years, and it is 

still there, no matter how many preventive efforts that we have 

made. 

Now, just in the last 4 or 5 years, we have expended over $4-

billion or $5-billion. I want to know if our higher priority is drug 

trafficking control? Is that more important than trying to give economic development initiatives to these countries so that maybe 

they can make better use of the money rather than spending so 

much in this effort. 

I am just curious, Mr. Braun, how successful have we been if you 

say from a scale of zero to 10, that we have been very successful 

in going after our own drug cartels, and our own drug pushers and 

preventing this thing from coming to our country? 

Mr. BRAUN. Well, first of all, sir, you have got to understand that 

the way that the drug trafficking has evolved, not only in our country, but globally. The 42 most notorious drug traffickers and organizations that are impacting not only the United States, but other 

parts of the world, all operate and reside outside of our boundaries. 

That is one point that I would like to make. But of those 42, 38 

have actually and are currently under indictment in the United 

States. I believe since we started putting that list together, that 

most wanted list if you will, about 4 or 5 years ago, we have actuVerDate Mar 21 2002 14:30 Aug 01, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00043 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 F:\WORK\WH\033006\26780.000 HINTREL1 PsN: SHIRL
40

ally been able to arrest and have extradited to the United States 

a number of those, and what are referred to as——

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. I know that my time is up, Mr. Chairman, 

but I just wanted if you could provide that, Mr. Braun? Mr. Chairman, can I just have one more question? 

Mr. BURTON. For you, Mr. Faleomavaega. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. You are a gentleman and a scholar. Mr. Evo 

Morales was recently elected as the newly-elected President of Bolivia, and he now as one of his basic tendencies is to commercialize 

the production of the coca plant as an enterprise, not only for 

mediational, but pharmaceutical. 

I was wondering can we assist President Morales in this effort, 

that he wants to convert the use of the coca plant maybe for pharmaceutical and mediational purposes rather than calling it as a 

dangerous drug? Because the Indians there either chew it, or if 

they want to go up in the mountains, they chew the coca plant, because it gives them—we use the kava plant. 

It does not make you drunk, but it is a sedative, and I just wanted to know, do we really understand natives of this country, because over 65 percent of the population in Bolivia are indigenous 

indians, and they use the coca plant all the time for mediational 

purposes, and not necessarily for the way that we are using it. 

Also, I was wondering if you think that we can assist Mr. Morales in this effort? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Mr. Faleomavaega, I guess I would answer that I don’t think we should, because already the cultivation 

in Bolivia greatly exceeds the so-called traditional uses, which is 

chewing, and coca tea, and things like that. 

It is clearly the excess over these needs which is only a few thousand hectares, is clearly being exported at this moment to Brazil, 

and which is a growing dope market in Latin America. 

What we don’t want is Bolivian cultivation to soar again and to 

start to come into the United States market, and undermine everything that we have been trying to do in Colombia. 

There is a legal market for coca. Most of it is exported out of 

Peru, and it has a pharmaceutical base, and it happens to be tiny. 

That is not the answer in my view at least to Bolivia’s problems. 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will wait for 

the second round. I have got some more questions. Thank you. 

Mr. BURTON. Thank you. Mr. Weller. 

Mr. WELLER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I missed the opportunity to make an opening statement. I would just ask for unanimous consent to submit that for the record in the appropriate 

place. 

Mr. BURTON. Without objection. 

Mr. WELLER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And I want to welcome Secretary Patterson and Mr. Braun to 

our hearing this morning. Mr. Braun, since we are focusing on narcotics here, and your agency plays the lead role, what do you consider to be the biggest investigative challenge that you face right 

now in Latin America? 

Mr. BRAUN. The biggest investigative challenge that we face in 

Latin America? Let me try to put it in these terms, because there 

41

has been talk during the opening remarks, Congressman, of both 

terrorism and narcoterrorist organizations. 

If you look at today’s foreign terrorist organization, and you compare that to the modern day drug trafficking syndicate from Latin 

America, they are virtually identical. They operate exactly the 

same way. 

They both have very complex organizational structures that consist of highly compartmentalized cells when you are talking about 

drug trafficking organizations from Latin America, and Colombian, 

and Mexican drug trafficking organizations. 

Again, they are highly compartmentalized. They are broken 

down into distribution cells or trafficking cells, and transportation 

cells, and security cells, and communications cells. 

And if you take just two or three of those distribution cells down, 

or transportation cells, you have virtually no impact whatsoever. 

Because they are so highly compartmentalized, they don’t even 

know that the other cells exist and where they are operating. 

They are organized just like foreign terrorist organizations. They 

both rely on the latest in technology, which is very much a concern 

for the DEA. They rely on the cell phones, the satellite phones, 

many of which are encrypted now with off the shelf encryption devices. 

Even off-the-shelf technology makes it very difficult for those of 

us in law enforcement, and not only in law enforcement, but in the 

intelligence community. They also rely on not only the communications devices—cell phones, Sat phones, and text messaging, the 

Internet—they also rely on the latest in navigation equipment, 

GPS. They leverage and exploit all of these things that make life 

very, very difficult for us. Just like terrorist organizations, unless 

you are able to cut off the head, they are able to regenerate themselves very quickly. 

You can take the arms, and legs, and the digits off, but if you 

don’t take the head off, often times they are right back in business 

within days, within short periods of time. 

They have got hundreds of millions, and not tens, but hundreds 

of millions of dollars, if not billions of dollars, and they can corrupt, 

and use that money to corrupt with, as well as invest in those technologies, modern technologies, which is just a tremendous problem 

for us. We are falling behind the curb there. 

I think that the third most significant challenge for us, and the 

first two again being technology and the corrupting ability of these 

organizations, is their organizational structure. They have evolved 

into very, very complex organizations. 

Mr. WELLER. Mr. Braun, and Secretary Patterson, and Madam 

Secretary, I would ask that you comment on this as well, and first 

I want to again commend you and your department. 

We have worked together over the last several years getting the 

international law enforcement academy established in El Salvador, 

and the satellite campus that is underway in Peru as well. 

It is important for group coordination and communication with 

law enforcement agencies in the region, just as our law enforcement agencies between Virginia and Maryland call each other 

when there is criminal activity that crosses the State line. 

42

We want to encourage that, and professionalized law enforcement in the regions is a part of that. Tieing in with the question 

that I asked Mr. Braun about the increased sophistication as you 

had mentioned, we are hearing that from our friends. 

Recently, some of our senior staff from this Committee were in 

El Salvador meeting with those that are involved in law enforcement, as well as senior officials. They indicated that certain gangs, 

such as MS–13, the Eighteenth Street Gang, and those that are 

trafficking cocaine throughout El Salvador, as well as Central 

America, they indicate exactly what you are talking about, which 

is the sophistication of these gangs. 

Madam Secretary, I would ask you to comment on this first, but 

do you see these gangs as they grow in sophistication, and grow in 

the amount of resources that they have, do you see them emerging 

as a threat to our national security? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Mr. Weller, I think these gangs are a 

huge threat, and I was astonished frankly. I had been Ambassador 

to El Salvador from 1997 to 2000, and when I came back, there has 

certainly been a lot of work done to combat these gangs, but they 

have grown very substantially in both reach and numbers. 

Here today with us is my new deputy assistant secretary, 

Christy McCampbell, who has 30 years of law enforcement experience from California, and she is going to be working with the Department of Justice to try and develop—again, a lot of work has 

been done, a more comprehensive strategy on this. 

As you know, we are going to teach courses in the INL in combating gangs and more sophisticated efforts, like forensic accounting, and money laundering, and such. But the gang course is a very 

high priority. 

We have met with the Central Americans, and OASC is doing 

work on this, and some of your other witnesses, like Joy Olson, 

have done a lot of work. So we are going to be coming forward with 

a reprogramming notice soon to this Committee, and others, to try 

and put more money against this problem. It is a very serious 

issue. 

Mr. WELLER. Well, in particular, I hope you will focus on corruption as well. There is a lot of money flowing around that can be 

tempting, particularly for the public officials, to take advantage of 

that, and we would hate to see that continue to grow to be a problem. 

Can you comment on the connection between these gangs—MS–

13, and the Eighteenth Street Gang, and their ties with the Colombian, as well as the Mexican drug cartels? Also, what are we doing 

to disrupt those connections? 

What is the DEA doing as well? If you would both comment, I 

would appreciate that. 

Mr. BRAUN. Well, first of all, Congressman Weller, I would echo 

what Ambassador Patterson just said, that these gangs do pose a 

significant threat as far as the DEA is concerned. 

I can tell you that at this point, however, that we don’t believe 

that any of these gangs have developed. They are not as sophisticated in their drug trafficking activities as, say, the Colombians or 

the Mexicans, Mexican drug trafficking organizations. 

43

We also have intelligence by the way that many of the Colombian 

and Mexican syndicates don’t want anything to do with these folks, 

and for what reason, we are not sure right now. They are really 

not that interested in doing business with them. 

Suffice it to say that throughout Central America, and in parts 

of Mexico, and even in some parts of South America, these gangs 

are involved in drug trafficking activity. It has spilled over our borders as some of these gang members have migrated into the United 

States, whether it be legally or illegally, and established operations 

in our country. 

We certainly have seen that in Virginia, with an ongoing MS–13 

investigation that is being conducted by the interagency and Federal law enforcement community, along with local and State law 

enforcement. 

Mr. WELLER. Mr. Chairman, I realize that my time has expired, 

but I have a quick followup on this if I could. 

Mr. BURTON. Go ahead. 

Mr. WELLER. There was an official in the opposition in El Salvador that told our Committee staff that they actually have seen 

evidence that there is a linking up between the Colombians and 

the Mexicans. Is there any further comment that you can make in 

what you have shared? What do they know that we don’t? 

Mr. BRAUN. Well, we have an office in El Salvador and we work 

very, very closely with the national police there. In fact, we have 

got offices in every country in Central America, where this activity 

is most prevalent right now. 

I am not going to sit here and tell you, and DEA is not going to 

tell you, that there are not links between these organizations and 

some members or elements of Mexican and Colombian—or organizations of Colombian or Mexican descent. 

I can only tell you that at a very high level, a very high level, 

powerful Colombian and Mexican drug trafficking organizations are 

not dealing face to face with these folks at this time. Not to say 

that it is not going to happen in the future. 

I believe it was before this Committee a few months ago where 

I was testifying about the drug threat in the transit zone, and I 

used the Pablo Escobar example. I mean, Pablo started out as a 

street thug, and as the Ambassador knows from her days in Colombia, we know what he morphed into, and what he grew into over 

the years, a very powerful, and probably the most powerful drug 

trafficker in the western hemisphere. 

What concerns me is that many of these violent gangs throughout Central America that are not just involved in drug trafficking, 

but are involved in extortion of shop owners and people on the 

street, and they are involved in home invasions, and they are involved in kidnappings, and they are involved in a myriad of crime, 

I know what is going on within these groups. 

And you have got a lot of young, very violent criminals, and for 

the most part are very poorly educated, and they are vying for 

power right now, and they won’t hesitate to kill anyone within or 

outside the organization as they try to climb to the top of the ladder. 

Mr. WELLER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You have been very 

generous in giving me that extra opportunity. Thank you. 

44

Mr. BURTON. Mr. Delahunt. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. I would just like to ask a series of questions, Ambassador, or just a second, Madame Secretary. The three Americans that are being held hostage by the FARC, is there an update 

on that that you can give us? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. No, Congressman Delahunt, there really is not an update on that. We have said many times that we will 

use every means available to try and achieve their release, but we 

cannot make concessions to terrorists. 

There really isn’t an update, and the FARC, of course, has the 

responsibility for their safety and security. This is a horrible situation. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. I understand that, but I wish you would convey 

back to your supervisors that it is a concern of all of us that serve 

on this Subcommittee, and all in the House, and it is a priority, 

to be candid. 

I don’t deny the fact that more assets are needed, but as I indicated in my opening remarks, if you will, there comes a point in 

time when the issue is who pays. I think really we are at that point 

right now. I think we have to remember that Colombia is not a 

third-world country. 

It is a prospering economy, and their GDP is growing more 

quickly than ours, and that is good. I just hope that the benefits 

of that growth are being defused throughout the entire society. 

I would hope that message is being delivered to the Colombian 

Government by this Administration, because it truly is important. 

Part of my frustration is—and I think we have a responsibility to 

work with the Uribe Government—with the Colombian people because, in-part, we are significantly responsible for their problem 

and the violence that has been the byproduct of the drug traffic between our countries. 

But in this country—and, Mr. Braun, feel free to interrupt—the 

reality is today that in the northeast, for example, meth, is becoming the drug of choice as opposed to cocaine. 

Our efforts in Colombia are focused on interdicting cocaine. We 

don’t have as much of a direct selfish, if you will, interest in interdicting cocaine as we do with dealing with another series of drugs. 

That is why I put out there the question of how much longer is 

the American taxpayer going to have to participate in the same 

order of magnitude, particularly when we receive information that 

revenues generated through compliance, and full compliance with 

the tax laws in Colombia and elsewhere, leaves a lot to be desired. 

That is my frustration, and I think that we can all understand 

that there is a need, and I do respect what President Uribe and 

his successor, President Pastrana, has done. 

Yet, there comes a point, and I think we are getting there quickly, and that is just an observation. Mr. Braun, I would like to go 

to the issue of Venezuela. I know that there are discussions going 

on now between the respective governments about reconfiguring 

and reconstituting, if you will, the relationship between the DEA 

and the appropriate agencies in Venezuela. 

Up until the replacement of—and I forget the woman’s name, but 

the female drug czar, how would you describe the cooperation between Venezuela and this Administration? 

45

Mr. BRAUN. As I said in my opening statement, sir, we have got 

some real challenges in Venezuela. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. No, I am just asking a very discreet question. Up 

until the replacement of the female drug czar, how would you describe the cooperation between the Venezuelan Government and 

this Government? 

Mr. BRAUN. Before she was replaced? 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Before she was replaced. 

Mr. BRAUN. Before she was replaced, it was far better than it 

was now. We had better police and national guard counterdrug investigative units that we worked very, very closely with, and for 

the most part those relations have been severed, and not by us obviously. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Okay. But up until that replacement, it was generally a constructive, positive relationship? 

Mr. BRAUN. It was, yes. Yes, sir, it was. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Okay. Can you give us an update on the status 

of the negotiations? 

Mr. BRAUN. We are working very closely with the State Department, and the Ambassador, by the way, is doing a phenomenal job. 

He is fully engaged and working very, very hard on in implementing a document that would basically define the parameters by 

which we could work with the Venezuelan Government. 

We believe, and I believe a recent update to give you, I believe 

it potentially may be signed within the next couple of weeks from 

what we understand. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Is that correct, Madame Secretary? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Yes, we are working very hard on this. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. So there is the possibility within the next few 

weeks? So I would suggest that it is incumbent upon all of us to 

not allow the acrimonious relationship that currently exists on the 

political level to interfere with hopefully an accord that would restore DEA to having a positive relationship with the corresponding 

Venezuelan agencies. 

That would just be an observation, but you are free to comment 

on it, Mr. Braun. 

Mr. BRAUN. No, sir, I just appreciate your comments and your 

support. I mean that with all sincerity. We are trying to get back 

in the game in Venezuela, and if we are going to be successful, we 

have got to be able to do that. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Well, I can assure you that I will make every 

personal effort that I can to see that that accord is achieved, and 

if you feel that I can be of assistance, Madame Secretary, or Director Braun, please feel free to contact me. With that, I yield back. 

Mr. WELLER [presiding]. Thank you. Secretary Patterson, my 

friend from Massachusetts raises an interesting point, and the view 

that we should be asking the Colombian Government as a nation 

to be shoulder more of the financial burden of the war against 

drugs. 

Picking up more of the costs of Plan Colombia, that is a very interesting idea, and I am just wondering. You spent a lot of time 

in Colombia. That is where we first met. 

From your knowledge of the priorities of the Colombian people, 

and the priorities of the Colombian Government, who have been 

46

engaged in essentially a civil war for 30 or 40 years, do you think 

if we put more of the burden on them for the financial costs of the 

war against the counternarcotics efforts that they would make it 

their first priority, or would the first priority be using what limited 

resources they have for the efforts against the FARC and the other 

terrorist and guerrilla groups that are operating in their country? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Congressman Weller and Mr. Chairman, I think that the two are so intertwined that this is the highest priority. It is very difficult to distinguish between the two. 

I wanted to comment on what Mr. Delahunt had said. We have 

had many discussions with the Colombian Government. They 

know, and are totally prepared to pick up more of the costs of this 

activity. 

You mentioned the tax collection item. When President Uribe 

came into office several years ago, it was the lowest in Latin America, with the exception of Guatemala, and defense spending has 

gone up 30 percent, adjusted for inflation, and social spending has 

gone up. 

The presence of the military and the police have gone up by 60 

percent. So, I think it is fair to say that the Colombian Government 

is making a very significant investment in this. 

To give you an example of how this should work, we have been 

spending a lot of money on Average Denial, a very expensive program, largely successful, and next year, they will have the Tuconos 

coming on board. They purchased these jet aircraft. So we will expect them to bear more of the operations and the costs on this, and 

they are prepared to do so. 

Mr. WELLER. As I understand it from what you are saying, Madame Secretary, is that you believe the Colombian Government 

considers our counternarcotics effort, as well as the fight against 

the FARC and the other terrorist groups, one and the same? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. One and the same. They know that you 

can’t beat one without beating the other, and no one feels more 

strongly about this than President Uribe. 

Mr. WELLER. Before I recognize my friend, Mr. Engel, what year 

did the State Department determine that FARC was a terrorist organization? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. I don’t remember, but I am not sure. I 

think it was 1998, but I will get that for you. 

Mr. WELLER. All right. And the other two groups that are operating in Colombia? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. The ELN, I think, preceded 2000, and 

the AUC was like in 2001 or 2002. 

Mr. WELLER. Okay. If you can get us the exact dates, we would 

appreciate that. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. I will get for you the precise dates. 

Mr. WELLER. We would appreciate that. Thank you, Madam Secretary. Mr. Engel. 

Mr. ENGEL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Braun, in your testimony, I was particularly interested when you mentioned the connection between drug trafficking and fund raising activities for 

both Hezbollah and Hamas in the tri-border region. 

Could you expand on that? How are they raising their money, 

how much, for whom, and where? 

47

Mr. BRAUN. I have to be a bit careful here because we have ongoing investigations and intelligence collection projects. 

Mr. ENGEL. If it is something that you cannot tell me, I would 

welcome a classified briefing on it. 

Mr. BRAUN. We would be more than happy to provide that to 

you, Congressman. I can tell you, and to put it in perspective, when 

an organization in the tri-border area can purchase a kilogram of 

cocaine for somewhere between $4–6,000, and then turn nearly 

$150,000 in profit per kilogram in places like Israel and Europe, 

the potential is there to make enormous profits and money. 

I am not going to sit here and tell you, sir, that all of that money 

is making its way into the war chests of terrorist organizations 

that are hell bent on destroying our way of life. 

I can tell you that some of that money is making it into their coffers, and then to put it into even further perspective, when you 

think that the Madrid train bombing only cost about 60 to 70,000 

dollars to pull off, and a loss of life and property in that event, and 

again just to put it into perspective for you, it is something that 

we are very concerned about, as well as I know that our colleagues 

at the State Department. But I would be happy to give you a briefing. 

Mr. ENGEL. Thank you. Secretary Patterson, you mentioned in 

your testimony that you had budgetary pressures from Afghanistan, and due to increased drug crop cultivation there the amount 

of money available for counternarcotics assistance obviously has 

been squeezed. 

How is this, in your opinion, affecting our efforts to fight drug 

trafficking throughout the western hemisphere? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Certainly, Mr. Engel, the two huge boys 

on the block, Iraq and Afghanistan, are absorbing huge amounts of 

government resources, and for my bureau as well, because we are 

deeply involved in some of those countries. 

Certainly we could do with more resources, but we are trying to 

work a little smarter. As I said, the critical flight safety program 

will be cheaper than buying new aircraft. 

We are trying to extend the life, and we are trying to use the Average Denial aircraft to do some maritime patrol, but money is 

going to be a problem, and I think it would be naive to say otherwise. 

An area that Congressman Delahunt has been very interested in, 

and I think we will have enough funds for, is the Haitian police, 

but we are not sure. So that is not a very good answer, but yes, 

of course, it is going to have an impact. 

Mr. ENGEL. Well, since you mentioned Haiti, let me raise it. 

Many of us met with President-Elect Preval yesterday or the day 

before, and he will be sworn in next month, and some of us hope 

to go to his swearing in. 

Drug traffickers in Haiti are fragmented into competing cells, 

and they are obviously a major destructive force in Haiti. They contract gangs and threaten entire communities. 

Also, in Haiti there is really no law enforcement. It has become 

a major transition, a regional transit point, in the international 

drug trade. How do we plan, or do we have any plans to assist the 

48

new Preval Government in dealing with this? I think right now 

with a fresh beginning. 

Now is the time for the international community to show that it 

really stands with Haiti. So are there any plans to assist the government to address all these problems, and what are our plans for 

working with the Haitian National Police to strengthen its counternarcotics capabilities? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Yes, sir, we do have plans, and like you, 

I was dismayed when I saw the number of tracks going into Haiti 

and the Dominican Republic. Although, there were some major 

drug traffickers who were put in jail in 2003 and 2004. We are going to spend $2-million this year to set up a 

counterdrug unit with the Haitian Police. I will be candid, we have 

poured huge amounts of money into that organization over the past 

10 or 15 years with no good effect. 

Even so, we are hopeful, like you are, with President Preval. We 

are very encouraged by the new head of the Haitian National Police, Mr. Andersol. We are also very encouraged that other Latin 

American countries have stepped up to the plate on this. 

The Argentines, the Brazilians, the Uruguayans, and the Canadians have a very significant presence there. So, yes, we do have 

plans to work on this. Again, we are just cautious in promising a 

quick success. 

Mr. ENGEL. I just wanted to ask you one final question, because 

in your testimony, you mentioned that The Netherlands will supply 

two aircraft for maritime surveillance. 

I am happy about that, but can you comment on the EU and if 

you think overall that they are putting forth an adequate effort, or 

could they do more to help us fight drug trafficking in the western 

hemisphere. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Well, I think for all of us who have 

worked on Latin America, the European contribution has been disappointing, but I also think it has gotten better. While the amounts 

given in Colombia aren’t substantial—well, $100-million over the 

past few years is substantial, but where they really have put their 

resources, and the Brits, and the Dutch in particular, have been in 

the Eastern Caribbean. 

The Brits are recently deploying some police, for instances, to 

Trinidad and Tobago. They sort of look at that as a jumping off 

point for them. This is a constant theme when we engaged the Europeans. 

Now we can certainly say that, since most of the Afghan heroin 

is headed for Europe, we are putting a huge investment in Afghanistan to stop that. They should be more focused on our hemisphere, 

but the Dutch and the U.K. do a pretty good job in the Eastern 

Caribbean. 

Mr. ENGEL. Well, thank you. I know I said my last question, but 

I will try to sneak one more in because I wanted to talk to you 

about Colombia. We have been talking a lot about Colombia here, 

and you had mentioned that we and the Colombians are stepping 

up the aerial spraying programs. I am wondering if you could give 

us some more specifics about that. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Mr. Engel, I think it is a disappointment to all of us that the fields have become more disbursed and 

49

harder to reach with our spray program, and so we have to keep 

the pressure on with the spray program. 

I fear, perhaps, that we have underestimated the Colombian 

crop. There may be more out there than we anticipated, but we are 

going to have to move aggressively and efficiently to get at some 

of these distant fields as best we can, because to eliminate it at the 

source is still by far the most cost effective way of attacking the 

narcotics program. 

Mr. ENGEL. Thank you, and thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. WELLER. Thank you. Madame Secretary, Mr. Engel raised 

what I think is a really important issue. Many of us have expressed concern about what we perceived to be a somewhat disappointing involvement by our European allies in the counternarcotics efforts, particularly in the Andean region. 

It is my understanding, and I have seen numbers as high as 40 

percent of the cocaine produced in Colombia and the Andean region 

reaches Europe. What percent of the counternarcotics effort that is 

currently underway in Colombia and the Andean region is paid for 

and financed by our European friends? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. I will get you a more precise figure, but 

the bottom line is not much. 

Mr. WELLER. Zero? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. No, not zero. 

Mr. WELLER. 1 percent? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Maybe 10, just pulling a figure out of 

my head. 

Mr. WELLER. So they receive 40 percent of the cocaine, but they 

might be providing 10 percent of the effort for counternarcotics? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Maybe that is high. I mean, what they 

would say is—and they probably would not like it to be described 

as counternarcotics. What they would do is rural development, or 

health projects, or for internally displaced persons. So in terms of 

overall effort, they may give some money, but it is not directly related to counternarcotics? 

Mr. WELLER. So it is really unrelated to any of the counternarcotics efforts? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. No. 

Mr. WELLER. Okay. Just some cleanup questions here. Your office recently told Chairman Hyde on March 14 in a letter that you 

are replacing lost spray planes in Colombia by taking money from 

existing police operations and maintenance programs, and it was 

about a $7.4-million reprogram. Isn’t that just robbing Peter to pay 

Paul, and not fixing the long term problems and the issue of lost 

aircraft? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Well, again, Mr. Weller, a lot of this is 

simply driven by costs. We needed to maintain the spray program 

at full bore as it were, and so we put in this reprogramming request to buy more air tractors. I think $7-million to buy three of 

them. 

Yes, it will come out of other Colombian programs, and the reason the police program—and this is not a good answer, and I understand that. They are much further along in managing their own 

operations and maintenance, and their own training programs than 

the army is. 

50

We need in my view, and I think most people in the interagency 

would agree, that if we don’t maintain the spray program, we are 

going to have a resurgence. We need to beat it back while we have 

the chance to do so. 

Mr. WELLER. Madam Secretary, Article 98 has been an issue out 

there, and as you work in your efforts to improve the quality and 

the results from our counternarcotics program, I would note that 

12 out of 21 nations in Latin America have been suspended from 

United States military training and aid programs because of the 

International Criminal Court rule, the Article 98 issue, and that includes Brazil, Peru, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Bolivia, Uruguay, and 

most recently Mexico. 

We are seeing increasing flows of illegal drugs and human trafficking across Ecuador’s border from Colombia, and since Ecuador 

has not signed an Article 98 agreement with the United States, 

central equipment and training is not available to them. Is this 

compromising the quality of narcotics programs? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Mr. Chairman, this is a tough one. Let 

me first say that counternarcotics spending is exempted from both 

forms of sanctions that come into play when you don’t have an Article 98. 

I have been able to continue with my programs in Ecuador and 

Mexico, and other places, that are going to be hit with Article 98 

sanctions. I would only ask that you address—I mean, I am not 

trying to duck your question. Sure, it is going to have an impact. 

There are useful things being done in Ecuador, Mexico, and 

Brazil that are going to be affected by this. I was briefed last week 

in Mexico about some very promising justice programs that are 

going to be affected by this. 

So it is going to have an impact, but I can assure you that Assistant Secretary Shannon and other decision makers are very much 

involved in looking at this. 

Mr. WELLER. Of course, in many cases the military is involved 

in counternarcotics efforts with our allies, and the effort against 

narcotics. I would note in the Defense Department, and the new 

Adrenal Defense Review, called for an unlinking of military training programs from the ICC issue. What is the official position of 

the State Department on this question? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. I am not quite sure, Mr. Chairman. I 

know that there has been a lot of discussion of this, but I am not 

sure. Our official position is that if you don’t have an Article 98 

agreement, you are excluded from these programs as per the law. 

That is what the law provides. 

Mr. WELLER. The issue of Haiti came up earlier, an issue of great 

concern, and many of us did have the opportunity to meet with the 

newly-elected President of Haiti, and obviously he had great election results, and considering the number of candidates, were pretty 

impressive. 

We all wish him well, and want him to be supported, but Haiti 

has requested trade concessions from the United States as part of 

a package of assistance, essentially removing tariff barriers to 

products made in Haiti entering the United States. 

Clearly, 600,000 to a million Haitians who depend on the Dominican economy benefit from DR–CAFTA. but for the rest, the PresiVerDate Mar 21 2002 14:30 Aug 01, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00054 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 F:\WORK\WH\033006\26780.000 HINTREL1 PsN: SHIRL
51

dent has urged that we move a package, and there is legislation 

that is being considered in Ways and Means, as well as Senate Finance. 

What is your view from the State Department perspective about 

the importance of making some trade concessions which would be 

helpful for a track investment, particularly in the textile sector in 

Haiti? 

If you do support that, do you believe that should also be coupled 

with assisting some of the other nations, such as Sri Lanka, that 

have asked for similar help as a result of the Tsunami recovery? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Mr. Weller, I am not qualified to make 

an observation on that. I am way out of my lane here if I respond 

to that. So, just excuse me. 

Mr. WELLER. Okay. We would appreciate the opinion from the 

State Department. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. From the regional bureau. 

Mr. WELLER. If you are not the appropriate person, I would appreciate that. 

Ambassador PATTERSON. Thank you. 

Mr. WELLER. You have been very generous with your time. Do 

we have any second round of questions from anyone? Mr. 

Delahunt? 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate your 

attempt to answer on the Article 98. I think I just want to make 

it a matter of record that I, of course, support the ICC and the statute, and I think many of us predicted exactly what is unfolding, in 

terms of our relationships with foreign militaries. 

Just to add to that observation, Mr. Chairman, I think it is interesting given the concern that some Members on this Committee 

have expressed about China and its developing relationships in 

Latin America. I read recently where General Braddock, the head 

of SOUTHCOM, has indicated on the record in testimony in front 

of the Senate that the Chinese are now developing relationships 

with those 11 or 12 Latin American nations, military to military. 

I think we should take note of that, and I am sure that the reality has set in with our own Department of State that this policy 

had better change quickly, or we will find ourselves even more isolated, in terms of Latin America, than we currently are. 

I have always believed, and you talked about the production, and 

obviously that would be an ideal to be able to eliminate the production itself, the growing and the cultivation. 

But the reality is, Madam Secretary, it would appear—and I 

know there is a fudge factor, there has to be in terms of estimates—that replanting is either exceeding or keeping up, or slightly behind eradication. Is that a fair statement? 

Ambassador PATTERSON. I think so. What we have seen is that 

the replanting is certainly worse than we would have anticipated. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Okay. I mean, the point is that we are making 

the effort, and we are giving it a try, but this is very frustrating. 

And I think we have got to take some lessons from it. I would suggest, and this is not just Latin America, but in terms of our focus, 

that it ought to be shifting toward the money laundering internationally that is allowing the incredible profits that these drug 

traffickers are receiving. 

52

We just need to have an international convention that once and 

for all deals with secrecy, and these off-shore financial centers. 

They are wreaking havoc, and I would suggest, respectfully, and I 

am sure that something is happening within the Administration. I 

know that there are good efforts on the part of the DEA to deal 

with it. 

But we really ought to rethink our narcotics strategy. You know, 

the old cliche about follow the money, and in the end that is it, and 

you are clear to respond, Mr. Braun. I just saw Chairman Burton 

coming back, and so I would like to pose a question to you. 

We have not talked about Cuba, and I think we should. I know 

that we have ad hoc efforts, or at least we have had them in the 

past with Cuba, in terms of interdiction. They have been successful, and the feedback that I receive from DEA agents in the field 

is that the Cubans do a pretty good job in terms of cooperation 

when called upon, and are apparently corruption-free in terms of 

the issue. 

I would be interested in you commenting upon our intermittent 

efforts with the Cubans as far as coming up that corridor in the 

eastern Caribbean. Thank you. 

Mr. BRAUN. Well, let me just discuss very quickly the first item, 

money laundering, and as you said, ‘‘Follow the money.’’ When Administrator Karen Tandy took over almost 3 years ago, she came 

up with basically seven vision items. 

The first was to ‘‘follow the money.’’ The DEA for many years has 

done a great job of following the drugs, and taking those drugs off 

and making the seizures, and gathering evidence, et cetera. 

Where we were lacking was in our ability to follow the money 

back downstream or downrange. I can assure you that the Administrator has directed and mandated that every single investigation 

opened by DEA has a financial aspect of that investigation. 

Consequently, in just the course of about a year, or excuse me, 

just about over the course of 2 years, our seizures have gone from 

about under $500-million to $1.9-billion last year. So I will admit 

that it is a drop in the bucket, but we are making significant 

progress. 

Mr. DELAHUNT. Well, that is welcome news, and I would commend the DEA for that effort. Let us start closing down some of 

these off-shore financial centers. Obviously that is easier said than 

done, but please, and on Cuba. 

Mr. BRAUN. On Cuba, I believe you hit it right on the head. That 

when we need to cooperate with the Cubans, with the Cuban Government with respect to—typically it comes in the form of air drops 

off of Cuba. 

I can’t remember, sir, if we are dealing with their coast guard 

or their national guard, but they have been responsive in the past. 

With respect to corruption free, we could provide you with some information in a different forum perhaps. 

Mr. BURTON [presiding]. You and I will have to talk about some 

of that later, Mr. Delahunt. I want to thank you very much for 

being so patient with us today, especially with the votes and everything. 

If you could send us the information that we asked for, we would 

really appreciate it. We want to stay as up to date as possible on 

53

what is going on in Colombia and the entire Andean region. So we 

really appreciate it. Thank you very much, and we will now go to 

our next panel. 

The next panel consists of Ambassador James Mack. He assumed 

the position of executive secretary of the Inter-American Drug 

Abuse Control Commission of the Organization of American States 

(OAS) in September 2004. 

He began his work in multilateral coordination in 2002 as coordinator of the Inter-American Observatory on Drugs. Before joining 

the OAS, Ambassador Mack served as the principal deputy assistant secretary in the State Department’s Bureau of International 

Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs. He also led the inter-agency task force that coordinated United States anti-narcotics assistance to Plan Colombia and other countries in the Andean region. 

Joy Olson is the executive director of the Washington Office on 

Latin America. She is a recognized authority on human rights in 

Latin America, and has directed nongovernmental human rights 

organizations for more than decade. Would you both rise so that I 

can swear you in, please. 

[Witnesses sworn.] 

Mr. BURTON. I think we will start with you, Mr. Mack, since you 

are a former Ambassador, and we would like to hear your testimony, and then we will go to questions after we hear from Ms. 

Olson. 

TESTIMONY OF THE HONORABLE JAMES F. MACK, EXECUTIVE 

SECRETARY, INTER-AMERICAN DRUG ABUSE CONTROL COMMISSION, ORGANIZATION OF AMERICAN STATES 

Ambassador MACK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and distinguished 

Members of the Subcommittee. I am very pleased for this opportunity to appear before you on behalf of the Inter-American Drug 

Abuse Control Commission, which is a specialized agency of the Organization of American States. 

I will discuss my organization’s role in promoting international 

anti-drug cooperation in the western hemisphere. My organization 

is best known by its acronym, CICAD, and it consists of a staff of 

about 40 full-time professionals of 15 nationalities. 

We are based in Washington, but we run programs all over the 

region. We have a board of directors called the CICAD Commission, 

consisting of one representative per country of the 34 active member states of the Organization of American States. 

The universal participation of active OAS member states in 

CICAD today demonstrates their recognition that the drug problem 

is a hemispheric challenge. That dealing with it is the shared responsibility of all OAS member states, and they can accomplish a 

lot more by working together than by going their own separate 

ways. 

Very briefly, I want to cover some key CICAD programs, and 

then I will go to the main focus of my presentation. We work with 

member states to help prepare their national anti-drug plans. We 

help them establish drug abuse prevention programs in middle 

schools and high schools. 

54

We help them develop standards for drug treatment. We have 

helped many schools of public health, nursing, medicine, education, 

and introduced into their curriculum the issue of drugs. 

We help countries accurately assess drug consumption in their 

countries, and with strong support from the Government of Spain, 

we are helping countries decentralize many of their drug programs 

to their regions and municipalities, particularly in the area of prevention. 

We are partnering with private industry, USAID, and other national organizations to promote sustainable tree crop development 

for small farmers in the Andean countries as an alternative to production of illicit drugs. 

We promote cooperation to combat drug smuggling and provide 

training to customs officials in that area. We help member states 

set up systems to control the importation of chemicals that are 

used to manufacture illegal drugs. 

We help train port security personnel to detect drugs in ships 

and containers. We run a counterdrug intelligence school for police 

in Lima, Peru, for Andean drug enforcement officials. 

We train judges and prosecutors to try money laundering cases, 

and we have helped member states set up specialized financial investigative units in their banking systems to detect suspicious 

transactions. 

And recently, at the request of the Colombian Government, 

CICAD sponsored an international team of very well known scientists, who published in April 2005 the results of the first phase 

of their study of the impact of aerial spraying of coca in Colombia 

on human health and the environment. 

And coming up in May, in partnership with the United Nations 

Office of Drugs and Crime, we are going to publish the results of 

the first ever comparative study of drug use by high school students in all of South America. 

Today, I want to talk with you about a particular CICAD program, which is called the Multilateral Evaluation Mechanism 

(MEM), which I believe is taking a unique approach to improve the 

capacity and strengthen the will of Western Hemisphere nations to 

deal with drug problems. 

The MEM is the hemisphere’s standardized instrument to periodically measure progress by the member states in the hemisphere 

in all aspects of the drug problem. The reason that we have this 

instrument is quite simple. 

In the late 1990s, OAS member states came to realize that they 

could not know what future steps they needed to take in drug control unless they had a means of assessing the strengths and weaknesses of their current anti-drug programs. 

They needed an evaluation instrument that was multilateral and 

not unilateral; collegial and not adversarial; and in which all the 

member states felt they had a stake. 

The first national evaluations were carried out in all member 

states in 2001, the second round concluded in 2003, and the third 

in 2005. During the first year of the evaluation cycle, every member state is evaluated; and in the second year, every country’s 

progress in complying or in implementing the recommendations 

from the evaluation is assessed. 

55

The evaluations are drafted by a group of experts, one selected 

by each of our 34 member states. They come from a variety of backgrounds. They participate in evaluations of all member states, except their own. 

Each state completes a standardized questionnaire, based on a 

series of indicators and benchmarks agreed to by all the member 

states. These include such metrics as the existence of national drug 

control plans, drug consumption and seizure statistics, area of illegal crops under cultivation, et cetera. 

The MEM experts examine the data submitted by each country. 

They make judgments on the progress or shortcomings, and then 

they draft evaluation reports based on that information, and on 

subsequent dialogue with the country being evaluated. 

Governments are given the opportunity to review and comment 

on the drafts, but the drafts are ultimately approved by the commission, not the county being evaluated. You can find the reports 

on our Web site. Here is an example of a report, on Mexivo. I also 

have them on the United States, Bolivia, Peru. I have them on all 

the countries if you would like them, Mr. Chair. 

The process does not impose sanctions, but the evaluation reports do call upon member states to address the problems that are 

identified. And the process provides member states with a very exhaustive assessment of how they are progressing on all aspects of 

the drug problem. 

The information contained helps their policy makers then design 

the most effective policies and programs which respond to a particular country’s needs. We believe that the MEM process has stimulated improvements in drug control programs, as well as increased coordination and cooperation in the prevention of drugs in 

the hemisphere. 

Here are some specific results of MEM evaluations and recommendations. Almost all of the member states now have functioning national anti-drug plans. They now have a functioning 

equivalent of a national drug commission to coordinate their implementation. 

A specific example is Ecuador. With the help of my organization, 

Ecuador updated its anti-money laundering legislation, and now we 

are helping Ecuador establish a specialized financial intelligence 

unit to spot suspicious financial transactions. 

As a result of another MEM recommendation, CICAD is helping 

MEM member states adopt standards of care in drug treatment. 

We are also implementing standard methodologies for countries to 

assess their internal drug consumption, which allows for a comparison among the states. 

Mr. BURTON. Pardon me, Ambassador. If you could summarize, 

and I would not interrupt you, except that we are going to have 

a series of five votes in about 10 minutes, and I want to make sure 

that we get both of your testimonies. 

Ambassador MACK. Yes, sir, I will wrap it up. First of all, 90 percent compliance in our recommendations from the first round; and 

70 percent compliance in the second round; and I suspect as time 

goes on that figure will go up. 

So countries are complying with the recommendations and improving their capacity. It is a mechanism that countries have deVerDate Mar 21 2002 14:30 Aug 01, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00059 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 F:\WORK\WH\033006\26780.000 HINTREL1 PsN: SHIRL
56

signed themselves. They have bought into the process, and they 

feel that they have a stake in the success and I believe it should 

be a central pillar in strengthening capacities and commitments of 

the member states of the western hemisphere to deal with the drug 

challenge. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Mack follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE JAMES F. MACK, EXECUTIVE SECRETARY, 

INTER-AMERICAN DRUG ABUSE CONTROL COMMISSION, ORGANIZATION OF AMERICAN STATES

Thank you Mr. Chairman and Good morning. 

INTRODUCTION: 

I am very pleased to have the opportunity to appear before this sub-committee 

on behalf of the Inter-American Drug Abuse Control Commission, a specialized 

agency of the Organization of American States, to discuss my organization’s role in 

promoting international drug cooperation in the Western Hemisphere. The InterAmerican Drug Abuse Control Commission, best known by its acronym ‘‘CICAD’’, 

was established in 1986 in response to a mandate by the OAS General Assembly. 

CICAD consists a staff of 40 full time professionals from 15 countries based at OAS 

headquarters here in Washington, and a Commission (or board of directors) with 

representatives from all 34 OAS member states, which meets twice a year to set 

policy for the organization. 

The universal participation of active OAS member states in CICAD demonstrates 

their recognition that the problem of drugs is a hemispheric challenge; that dealing 

with it is the shared responsibility of all OAS member states; and that they can accomplish more by working together rather than by going their own separate ways. 

CICAD’s main objectives are:

• To serve as the Western Hemisphere’s policy forum on all aspects of the drug 

problem;

• To foster multilateral cooperation on drug issues in the Americas;

• To carry out action programs to strengthen the capacity of its member states 

to prevent and treat drug abuse, and to combat drug production, trafficking, 

and money laundering;

• To promote drug-related research, information exchange, and specialized 

training; and

• To develop and recommend to its member states model drug-related legislation, common standards for drug treatment and for the control of pharmaceuticals and of chemicals that can be used to produce illicit drugs, and standardized methodologies for measuring drug consumption. 

CICAD PROGRAMS: 

CICAD programs cover almost every aspect of the drug problem. Here are some 

examples: We help member states prepare their national anti-drug plans, establish 

drug abuse prevention programs in schools, and develop standards for drug treatment. With assistance from CICAD, many schools of nursing, public health, medicine and education throughout the Western Hemisphere are introducing drug 

themes into their core curricula and are carrying out drug-related research. CICAD 

programs help member states accurately survey drug consumption among their populations. With strong support from Spain, CICAD is helping the Andean countries 

decentralize many of their drug abuse programs (especially in the area of prevention) to the provincial and municipal level. In partnership with private industry, 

USAID and international organizations, CICAD is promoting sustainable cacao and 

tree crop development for small farmers as an alternative to illicit crops in Bolivia, 

Peru, Ecuador and Colombia. CICAD promotes maritime cooperation against drug 

smuggling, helps member states set up systems to control the importation of chemicals that can be used in the manufacture of illicit drugs, and trains port security 

personnel to detect drugs secreted in ships and containers. It runs a drug intelligence school in Lima, Peru for law enforcement officers from the Andean region. 

CICAD helps member states prepare legislation on drug-control. We train judges 

and prosecutors to try money laundering cases and help member states set up specialized financial intelligence units in their banking systems to detect suspicious 

transactions. At the request of the Colombian Government, a CICAD-sponsored 

57

international team of scientists published in April 2005 the results of the first phase 

of its research of the impact of aerial spraying of coca in Colombia on human health 

and the environment. In May, CICAD, in partnership with the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime, will publish the results of the first ever comparative study 

of drug use by high school students in 10 South American countries. 

CICAD receives direct financial assistance principally from the United States, 

Canada, Spain, France, Mexico, and the Inter-American Development Bank. Brazil 

and Chile, under agreements with CICAD, are carrying out substantial ‘‘horizontal’’ 

assistance programs in drug research and drug abuse prevention training for other 

Latin American countries. In addition, CICAD has established a fruitful partnership 

with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to carry out a number of programs in the Americas. 

MEM BASIC INFORMATION: 

But today, I want to talk to you about a particular CICAD program, the Multilateral Evaluation Mechanism (MEM), which I believe is taking a unique approach to 

improve the capacity and strengthen the will of Western Hemisphere nations to deal 

with the drug problem. The MEM is the western hemisphere’s standardized instrument to periodically measure progress, by member states individually, and by the 

hemisphere as a whole, in all aspects of the drug problem. 

The reason for such an instrument is quite simple. In the late 1990s, OAS Member states came to realize that they could not know what future steps they needed 

to take in drug control unless they had a way to assess their current situation. They 

wanted a means of measuring, in a comprehensive and systematic way, their individual and collective efforts in drug control, the strengths and weaknesses of their 

drug programs, and where they should direct their future efforts to address those 

detected weaknesses. They also wanted an evaluation instrument that was multilateral, not unilateral, collegial, not adversarial, in which all member states participate 

in the evaluation of all other member states in a constructive, supportive way. 

So the Western Hemisphere’s Heads of State and Government, meeting at the 

1998 Summit of the Americas in Santiago, Chile, issued a mandate to the OAS (specifically CICAD) to establish just such an instrument. After developing the measurement criteria or indicators, the first national evaluations were completed and made 

public in 2001, the second in 2003 and the third in 2005. 

During the first year of the two year evaluation cycle, every member state is evaluated. In the second, each country’s progress implementing the recommendations 

from the previous year’s evaluation is assessed. 

WHO DRAFTS THESE EVALUATIONS?

The MEM evaluations of individual countries and of the hemisphere as a whole 

are drafted by a Governmental Expert Group of Governmental Experts, one selected 

by each of CICAD’s 34 member states. The experts participate in the evaluations 

of all member states except their own. 

HOW DOES THE MEM EVALUATION PROCESS WORK?

Each member state first completes a standardized questionnaire based on a series 

of indicators or benchmarks agreed to by all member states. These include metrics 

such as the existence of national drug control plans, drug consumption and drug seizure statistics, ratification and accession to international treaties, areas of illicit 

crops under cultivation, persons charged and convicted of drug trafficking, legal and 

judicial regimes to deal with money laundering, arms control and diversion of chemical and pharmaceutical products for illicit use. 

The MEM experts examine the data submitted by each country, make judgments 

on national progress or shortcomings, and then draft the evaluation reports based 

on this information, and on subsequent dialogue with each country. All MEM reports include recommendations specific to each country. The evaluation mechanism 

is designed to maximize participation and transparency. Governments are given the 

opportunity to review and comment on preliminary evaluation drafts. Reports, including recommendations, are approved by the CICAD Commission, and then published. In fact you can find them on our OAS/CICAD website (show example). 

The process does not impose sanctions. But the evaluation reports do call upon 

member states to address problems that are identified. 

58

WHY HAS THE MEM BEEN USEFUL?

The MEM process has stimulated improvements in drug control programs, as well 

as increased coordination and cooperation in the drug field among the OAS member 

states. 

Here are some specific results of MEM evaluations and MEM recommendations. 

Most CICAD member states now have national anti-drug plans, and the equivalent 

of national drug commissions to coordinate their implementation. The Government 

of Ecuador, with the help of CICAD, updated its anti-money-laundering legislation, 

which was recently approved by the Ecuadorian Congress. Based on Ecuador’s new 

law, CICAD is now helping Ecuador establish a specialized financial intelligence 

Unit training to spot suspicious financial transactions. As a result of another MEM 

recommendation, CICAD is helping many member states adopt standards of care in 

their drug treatment programs. 

RECOMMENDATIONS AND ASSISTANCE FOR THEIR IMPLEMENTATION: 

I want to talk briefly about the recommendations made to member states, since 

they lie at the heart of the MEM process. As I noted earlier, the objectives of these 

recommendations are to identify the strengths, weaknesses, progress and setbacks 

in each OAS member state and to help fine tune their policies and programs to respond in a more effective manner to the drug problem. If countries require help to 

correct any gaps or deficiencies identified by the MEM through its recommendations, they are encouraged to seek assistance from other member states and from 

CICAD in areas which they consider a priority. 

Since the outset of the MEM, CICAD has invested nearly $ 2 million in projects 

throughout the Hemisphere in response to requests by member states as a result 

of the MEM process. These projects include the creation of drug information systems, the drafting of national anti-drug plans, the adoption of drug trafficking control measures and the collection of statistics on drug consumption through scientific 

surveys. 

Member state responses to MEM recommendations have been very positive. To 

date, over 90 % of recommendations from the First Evaluation Round (2001), and 

over 70% from the Second Round (2003) have been completed. 

In practical terms, this high level of compliance by CICAD member states demonstrates their clear commitment to the MEM, and to the principles of shared responsibility and multilateral cooperation. 

INTER-GOVERNMENTAL WORKING GROUP

An important feature of the MEM is its constant self-evaluation and adaptation 

to the ever-changing facets and challenges presented by the drug problem. 

At the outset of each new MEM evaluation round, representatives of all CICAD 

member states meet in an Inter-Governmental Working Group (IWG) to evaluate 

and update the indicators, the questions and the process itself. Such a meeting took 

place one month ago in Washington. Its findings and suggestions on how to improve 

the MEM will be presented in May to the full CICAD Commission for approval. 

One of the main proposed changes is to extend the duration of the full MEM evaluation (which includes the initial country evaluation reports and the follow up reports on the implementation of recommendations) from 2 to 3 years. This would give 

countries more time to implement recommendations and show general progress. One 

new indicator being proposed for the next evaluation round would measure illegal 

internet sales of pharmaceutical drugs. Another would measure member state capacity to curb maritime narcotrafficking. 

THE BENEFITS OF THE MEM PROCESS: 

The MEM provides CICAD member states with an exhaustive assessment of how 

they are progressing in all aspects of the drug problem, both individually as well 

as on a collective hemispheric level. The information contained in the reports helps 

policy makers to then design the most effective policies and programs which respond 

to the priority needs of their country. 

In this sense, the MEM process serves as a blueprint and stimulus for corrective 

action as well as a means for countries to request assistance from CICAD to make 

the needed changes. 

Despite great disparities in resources available to individual CICAD member 

states, almost 100% of them have seen fit to participate in the MEM evaluation 

process. This is a significant achievement. The key reason the MEM enjoys such 

universal support from member states is that it is a mechanism that they themVerDate Mar 21 2002 14:30 Aug 01, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00062 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\WORK\WH\033006\26780.000 HINTREL1 PsN: SHIRL
59

selves have designed, in which they themselves participate, and in whose success 

they themselves have a stake. 

I would like to close by underscoring that the CICAD’s Multilateral Evaluation 

Mechanism has proven itself to be one of the central pillars in strengthening capacities and commitment of the nations of the Americas to deal with the drug challenge, as well as encouraging more effective cooperation among them. 

Thank You.

Mr. BURTON. Thank you, Mr. Ambassador, and I apologize. I did 

not mean to interrupt you, except that I don’t want you to be cut 

off when we have a bunch of votes. Ms. Olson. 

TESTIMONY OF MS. JOY OLSON, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, 

WASHINGTON OFFICE ON LATIN AMERICA 

Ms. OLSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for this opportunity to 

speak before you today. I would particularly like to thank you because I know that much of what I am going to say, you probably 

won’t agree with. And I really respect the fact that you have nonetheless invited WOLA to testify today. 

We believe that the United States drug policy in Latin America 

has been ineffective at achieving its own goals, and has generated 

much collateral damage. There was a lot of discussion earlier this 

morning about success on public security in Colombia, but we think 

that success on public security and success on drug policy are actually two different things, and you need to think about them separately. 

A more effective and less harmful approach to a drug policy in 

the region is possible. My comments are going to be based on what 

we learned from a 3-year study, which produced this book, Drugs 

in Democracy in Latin America. 

And an additional report that I would request be submitted for 

the record, along with my written testimony, and that report is entitled, ‘‘Are We There Yet? Measuring Progress in the U.S. War on 

Drugs in Latin America.’’

Let us look at this year’s INCSR and let us start there. It tells 

us that records are being set. It says that cocaine seizures in the 

western hemisphere set new records for 2005, and Colombia had a 

record year for eradication, interdiction, and extradition. 

These are good things, but do records mean progress. I would say 

no. They tell us that we have been very busy and that we have 

worked hard. In 2004, we sprayed 130,000 hectares of coca in Colombia, but the total area under cultivation remained statistically 

unchanged. 

While new numbers for Colombia cultivation have not been released, it appears that cultivation in the Andes in 2005 will be at 

best 3 percent below what it was in 2000 when Plan Colombia 

started. 

And this may not even reflect a reduction in coca production because of the increasing yields that appear to be taking place 

throughout the region. Now let us look at the collateral damage 

that has been caused by counterdrug policies. 

The humanitarian side of our policy approach, alternative development, has lagged woefully behind the enforcement side. Aerial 

fumigation destroys food crops as well as coca, and coca is produced 

mostly by small farmers. Every time we spray and displace small 

farmers, without providing them with some sort of alternative, we 

60

leave families without food and drive them from subsistence to desperation. 

Their alternatives are moving to a new plot of land, joining an 

illegal armed group, or migrating. We have made poverty and 

forced migration a standard part of United States policy. 

Colombia now has the second largest internal displaced population in the entire world and an estimated 47,000 people were displaced in 2005 by fumigation. We also believe that the current policy is investing in the wrong institutions. 

Money laundering, corruption, and violence, go hand-in-hand 

with the drug trade. These problems are best addressed by criminal investigations and prosecutions, backed by serious political will. 

While the United States has invested in justice reform and specialized police units, our primary investment has been through regional militaries. The use of the military in Latin America can provide short term results, but lasting impacts require dismantling 

trafficking networks. 

Only police and judicial institutions can do this. So we would 

argue that we need to get back to looking at reform of police and 

judicial institutions. There is also a negative impact on civil liberties in the region. 

United States drug policy has promoted harsh anti-drug laws 

that have resulted in the creation of procedures that greatly limit 

due process. Ecuador and Bolivia adopted United States backed 

legislation in which the burden of proof for conviction of drug offenders was so low that local human rights lawyers complained 

that defendants were forced to prove their innocence. 

Harsh mandatory minimum sentencing laws have also spread 

throughout the region, giving the same sentences to drug mules 

and major traffickers. United States counterdrug agreements with 

countries have promoted a real body count mentality that does not 

produce useful results. 

For example, the United States counterdrug agreement with Ecuador last year required a 12 percent increase in arrests. Well, who 

are they going to arrest with that kind of a goal? Some guy carrying coca leaves on his back, or a major drug trafficker? Clearly, 

they are going to go after the lowest hanging fruit. 

In conclusion, United States drug policy in the region is plagued 

by short term thinking, leading to tactical victories that often make 

the problem worse and create collateral damage. 

Every time we are ‘‘successful’’ in eradicating or interdicting 

drugs, the problem moves elsewhere. Every time we declare victory, some part of Latin America loses. So what should we do to 

reduce the damage? 

First, we need to think longer term. We have to get out of the 

quick fix mentality. Congress needs to commit to a long term investment, with a policy approach designed for the next 20 years. 

We must stop thinking from one budget year to the next and stop 

the body count. 

Second, we need to rethink the indicators used, the indicators of 

success. We need to find different indicators that link international 

and domestic drug policy, and indicators that demonstrate how 

what we do internationally impacts drug use in the United States. 

61

Third, we need to reduce harm at all levels. While there is always going to be some harm produced by drug trafficking certainly, 

and by anti-drug strategies, we should base our policy choices on 

what is truly effective, and creates the least collateral damage. 

Fourth, we need to establish an evidence-based approach. There 

are studies on the international and domestic side that show what 

works. Cooperative eradication has a more lasting impact than 

forced eradication. Development needs to come before eradication 

for success. And drug treatment is the most effective policy of all. 

Fifth, we need to work better in consultation with governments 

in the region. Instead of holding a big stick over Latin Americans, 

and threatening to cut off their trade status if they don’t live up 

to agreements, drug agreements with the United States, we should 

develop a more cooperative approach. This would go a long way toward remedying hostile regional feelings toward the United States. 

And, sixth, I would argue that we should slaughter the sacred 

cow. In the past 3 years, I have had countless conversations with 

United States policy makers about drug policy. There is overwhelming sentiment that current policy does not work. 

But that it is a sacred cow and that it is political suicide to challenge the policy, or to think outside the box. I have also traveled 

extensively in the United States over the past year, giving public 

presentations on this issue, and not one person has stood up and 

said to me why are you questioning this policy because it is so successful. 

There is tremendous public sentiment that current policy is not 

working. There is political space for change. I think that it is time 

to get all of the policy makers who question the current approach 

together in one room and let them slaughter the sacred cow. 

We must explore policies in the United States and in Latin 

America that can be more effective in mitigating the extreme harm 

caused by drugs and the war against them. Thank you, sir. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Olson follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF MS. JOY OLSON, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, WASHINGTON

OFFICE ON LATIN AMERICA

ADDICTED TO FAILURE

The Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) is a non-governmental organization that promotes human rights, democracy and social justice in Latin America 

and in U.S. foreign policy toward the region. WOLA has been monitoring U.S. drug 

policy in Latin America since the early 1980s. Most recently, with the help of about 

20 researchers throughout the hemisphere, we spent three years investigating the 

impact of U.S. drug policy on human rights and democracy in Latin America. We 

appreciate the opportunity to testify before the Subcommittee. 

We believe that U.S. drug policy in Latin America has been ineffective at achieving its own goals and has generated much collateral damage. In the focus on supplyside solutions, we have lost sight of the fundamental need—to reduce drug consumption and the associated damage to society. We have perpetuated the illusion that 

supply-control efforts deliver the most ‘‘bang for the buck’’ as a way to shrink illicit 

drug consumption. We have developed a body count mentality for measuring success, making much ado about indicators that gauge how active we are, but say very 

little about what progress we’re making. Even worse, such indicators (hectares 

eradicated, drugs seized, arrests made, etc.) are touted as major victories when they 

may just as easily be interpreted as evidence of the drug trade’s expansion and 

adaptability. 

The metaphors for imminent success have changed over the years—light at the 

end of the tunnel, turning the corner, reaching the tipping point—but the problem 

seems, if anything, to have become worse. Just last week, in arguing for augmenting 

62

U.S. military aid to Colombia, a prominent member of Congress reminded his colleagues that ‘‘the streets of America are awash in drugs.’’ Unfortunately, this reminder was probably not necessary. The plain fact is that the main illicit drugs targeted by U.S. efforts in Latin America—cocaine and heroin—remain readily available at near-record low prices. The supply-control strategies into which we have 

poured so many billions of dollars have patently failed to shrink drug availability. 

The U.S. needs a new approach to drug policy because failure means continued 

unacceptably high rates of drug addiction in the U.S., and a corrosive mix of spreading corruption and violence in drug-producing and transit countries, as well as increased addiction. We believe that the so-called ‘‘war on drugs’’ is not winnable. But 

with a fundamentally different policy approach, aimed at reducing the entire range 

of harms caused by illicit drug consumption—not just reducing use prevalence 

rates—the U.S. can devise policies that reduce drug-related harms and avoid many 

of the harms caused by the war on drugs as we have waged it for the last quartercentury. Drug control resources are limited, and policy makers are responsible for 

investing in the most cost-effective approaches to reducing drug consumption and 

the drug markets that fuel corruption and violence. Despite years of trying, there 

is little evidence that the supply-side approaches in which the U.S. has invested so 

heavily can make a significant contribution. On the other hand, there is a substantial and growing body of evidence that strategies such as treatment are cost-effective in reducing both drug consumption and its related harms, including crime and 

the spread of diseases such as HIV/AIDS. It is long past time for policymakers to 

shed strategies that achieve very little and cause significant collateral damage, and 

refocus our limited drug control resources on strategies that work. 

INCSR and Standards of Measure 

I would like to comment on the International Narcotics Control Strategy Report 

(INCSR) in the context of what we learned in our three-year study, which produced 

the book, Drugs and Democracy in Latin America, and an additional report, that 

I request be submitted for the record, entitled Are We There Yet? Measuring 

Progress in the U.S. War on Drugs in Latin America. 

The first thing to ask about the INCSR is what measures are applied, and what 

do they tell us about drug control progress? Two of the principal measures used in 

the INCSR are hectares eradicated and drugs seized. For example, this year’s 

INCSR asserts that ‘‘Cocaine seizures in the Western hemisphere set new records 

in 2005,’’ and that ‘‘Colombia had a record year in 2005 for eradication, interdiction, 

and extradition.’’

Records are being set. We must be making progress, right? Instead, the story 

these figures tell is that we are trying hard and that we have been very busy. But, 

activity and success are two different things, and these figures cannot measure success. 

The theory behind supply-control activities such as drug crop eradication is that 

reduced drug availability will drive up U.S. street prices and thereby discourage 

consumption. Within this framework, the more pertinent measures of success have 

to do with availability, prices, and consumption. 

In January, the U.S. Justice Department reported that ‘‘Cocaine is widely available throughout most of the nation, and cocaine supplies are relatively stable at levels sufficient to meet current user demand.’’

Recent claims by the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) that cocaine’s retail price was on the rise from February through September 2005 have 

been used to suggest that the Plan Colombia and associated supply-control activities 

have at last created supply scarcities and are driving up prices. But these claims 

must be regarded with considerable skepticism. First, ONDCP has offered no explanation of the methods used to generate the new price estimates, even though the 

charts that have been publicized are obviously at odds with the price and purity 

time series produced by RAND for ONDCP and posted on ONDCP’s website in February 2005. For example, RAND’s estimates show cocaine’s retail price per pure 

gram to have been about $94 in the second quarter of 2003. ONDCP’s new chart, 

by contrast, begins in July 2003, showing cocaine’s retail price to be roughly $210. 

Obviously, cocaine’s retail price did not double from June to July 2003, meaning 

that the new ONDCP results are substantially different from RAND results. But 

whereas the RAND-produced price and purity estimates are accompanied by exhaustive descriptions of the methods and data sources used, the new ONDCP charts 

provide no description of how the estimates were arrived at. With such dramatic discrepancies between the sets of estimates, the new figures cannot be considered credible until ONDCP describes in full the methods used and opens their findings to expert scrutiny. 

63

Second, even if the new ONDCP figures are taken at face value, they beg the 

question as to why this particular price spike (if genuine) should be expected to endure. Indeed, the chart that was provided to the media by ONDCP last November 

shows the much-touted price increase as having come on the heels of a significant 

price decrease. As revealed in the RAND estimates, which go back to 1981 (see 

Chart 1), the long-term price trend has been fairly steadily downward, punctuated 

by occasional upward spikes. Even when the price spikes have been considerably 

larger than the Fall 2005 fluctuation claimed by ONDCP (as in 1990 and 1995), 

they have been ephemeral and followed by continuing prices declines. In short, history suggests that not too much should be made of the kind of fluctuation ONDCP 

has been claiming recently, especially since the RAND estimates showed prices to 

have been at their all-times lows at mid-year 2003.

The latest estimates on prevalence of cocaine use and dependence are not encouraging either. The Bush administration has claimed great success in reducing levels 

of illicit drug use among youth, but the best that can be said of cocaine use rates 

is that they have remained relatively stable, based on the Monitoring the Future 

school-based survey. Other government figures are even less encouraging. The federal government’s National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), a household 

survey, shows a 33 percent increase between 2000 and 2004 in the number of firsttime cocaine users under the age of 18. Also according to the NSDUH, the number 

of Americans considered to be abusing or dependent on cocaine rose from 1.488 million in 2002 to 1.571 million in 2004. 

Now, let’s look at the results of coca eradication in Colombia and the Andes in 

general. Despite record aerial spraying of over 130,000 hectares of coca crops in 

2004, the total area under coca cultivation remained ‘‘statistically unchanged’’ at 

114,000 hectares, according to figures released by ONDCP in March 2005. While the 

2005 estimate of Colombian coca cultivation has not yet been released, indications 

are that the estimate will be the same as or even higher than in 2004, despite another record year of aerial spraying, as well as a significant increase in manual 

eradication. If the 2005 estimate for Colombia is in line with the 2003 and 2004 figures, then the area under coca cultivation in the Andes for 2005, according to the 

governments’ own estimates, will be roughly 179,000 hectares, only 3 percent lower 

than the estimate for the year 2000, when Plan Colombia got underway (see Chart 

2). If, as has been speculated, coca growers are increasing their coca leaf yields per 

hectare, then small decreases in total land under cultivation may not actually translate into less coca and less cocaine production. Indeed, the record seizures being reported may suggest no shortage of cocaine being produced.


26780a.eps
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It should be noted that this discussion has assumed that the U.S. coca cultivation 

estimates are more or less accurate. But—as anonymous senior U.S. officials have 

acknowledged in the media—the coca estimates are in all likelihood serious understatements of the true extent of coca cultivation, especially as new plantings have 

become more dispersed and farmers take precautions to conceal their crops from 

aerial spray operations. The uncertainties involved in the estimation process argue 

against the presentation of a single-figure estimate, which hides these uncertainties. 

As a result, policymakers and the public are misled into believing that we know 

more than we really do. The cultivation numbers, wherever they seem to be headed, 

need to be taken with a grain of salt, with the understanding that, in reality, coca 

cultivation and cocaine production exceed the official estimates, perhaps by wide 

margins. 

In the past, the failure of eradication to achieve substantial and lasting reductions 

in coca cultivation and cocaine production has been met with an escalation and intensification of essentially the same strategy. Indeed, Administration officials have 

already suggested that in response to the failure of aerial spraying to deter new coca 

cultivation, the U.S. and Colombia must expand and intensify the aerial spray program. The argument for escalation is accompanied by the fallback position that if 

the U.S. had not been pursuing its supply-control approach, the problem would be 

that much worse. While not entirely implausible, this fallback position is undermined by its failure to account for two major questions. First, what are the opportunity costs of adhering to (and even escalating) a dubious approach when the same 

money could be spent far more effectively on other strategies? Second, is the collateral damage generated by current policies justified by such minimal (if any) positive 

results? The wisdom of staying the course, already on extremely shaky ground given 

the sheer ineffectiveness of current policies, becomes even more suspect when the 

opportunity costs and collateral damage are taken properly into account. 

Collateral Damage 

The sad reality is that forced eradication and other aspects of supply control have 

not only failed to reduce drug production, but these elements also have caused serious collateral damage in the region, and continue to undermine U.S. credibility. 

This was the focus of the Drugs and Democracy study and let me summarize them 

for you. 

1) Forced Eradication 

Aerial spraying has led to a dramatic expansion of the areas where coca is grown 

in Colombia. At the beginning of Plan Colombia, coca production was mostly confined to three departments in the southern part of the country. Coca can now be 

found in at least 23 of the country’s 32 departments and is now often grown in 


26780b.eps
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smaller parcels, under shade, where it is harder to detect. Crop protection measures 

and higher yields per hectare make the challenge even greater. Our policy has demonstrably not deterred new coca cultivation, but has led to its dispersal to new 

parts of the country. Indeed, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and 

Crime (UNODC), more than 60 percent of the coca fields detected in Colombia in 

2004 were new, a finding that ‘‘revealed the important mobility of coca cultivation 

in Colombia and the strong motivation of the farmers to continue planting coca.’’

Insufficiently considered are the people at the other end of the forced eradication 

strategy. From the start of Plan Colombia until today, the humanitarian side of our 

policy approach, alternative development and assistance to those displaced, has 

lagged woefully behind the enforcement/eradication side. In the department of 

Guaviare, for example, nearly 110,000 hectares of coca were subjected to aerial herbicide spraying from 1999 through 2004, according to UNODC, but over this entire 

six-year period only about $500,000 was devoted to alternative development in the 

department. 

The reality is that coca is produced by poor farmers. It is a small scale cash crop 

often produced along side of subsistence food crops. Glyphosate, the herbicide being 

sprayed, does not make a distinction between coca and beans. Every time we spray 

and displace small farmers without providing them with some sort of alternative, 

we leave families without food and drive them from subsistence to desperation. 

What do we expect from this policy? These people are not just going to lie down 

and die. They are going to struggle to survive, whether that means moving to a new 

plot of land, joining an illegal armed group, or migrating, so be it. We have made 

poverty and forced migration out of desperation a standard result of U.S. policy. 

Colombia has the second largest population of internally displaced persons in the 

world, after Sudan. This displacement is primarily caused by Colombia’s 40 yearold internal armed conflict, but U.S. drug policy is making the displacement problem worse. According to CODHES, the Consultoria para los Derechos Humanos y 

el Desplazamiento, a Colombian NGO working on issues of displacement, about 

47,000 people were displaced in 2005 due to fumigation. 

Aerial eradication is not simply an ineffective policy, it is a cruel one. 

2) Investing in the wrong institutions 

Many of the problems created by drugs in Latin America are related to money 

laundering and corruption. These problems are best addressed by criminal investigations and prosecutions, backed by serious political will. While the U.S. has invested in justice reform and specialized police units, its primary investment has 

been through the military. 

In 1989 the U.S. Congress made the U.S. military the ‘‘single lead agency’’ in the 

detection and monitoring of drugs coming into the United States. While the military 

initially resisted this role, they did what any good democratic military does when 

assigned a job by the civilians: they embraced the role. They also turned to their 

partners in the region, Latin American militaries, for help. 

Another incentive for military engagement was that local police were often judged 

to be too corrupt to be reliable. The U.S. has invested heavily in military involvement in counter drug solutions while treating police and judicial institutions in the 

region like the poor step-sisters—you have to keep them in the family, but you don’t 

want to invest any real money in them. 

During the 1980s much of the region withdrew its militaries from civilian roles, 

including internal policing. However, U.S. engagement with regional militaries has 

helped push many of those militaries back into policing roles, a trend we now see 

expanding beyond combating drugs to gangs and other transnational policing issues. 

In search of effective partners, we have gone to extremes at times, as with the 

creation of the Expeditionary Task Force, a paramilitary counter drug force that 

was under the direct control of the U.S. embassy in Bolivia. Only after its existence 

was documented in the U.S. media was the force subsequently disbanded. 

In general, use of the military does provide short-term results, but lasting impact 

requires dismantling trafficking networks. Only police and judicial institutions can 

do this. It boils down to short-term results vs. long-term solutions. By investing in 

military approaches we are not investing in long-term solutions. We must invest in 

strengthening police and judicial institutions. 

3) Civil Liberties 

U.S. drug policy has also promoted the adoption of harsh anti-drug laws that are 

at odds with basic international norms and standards of due process and undermine 

already tenuous civil liberties. These laws often result in the creation of either 

courts or procedures that greatly limit due process guarantees, such as the preVerDate Mar 21 2002 14:30 Aug 01, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00069 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\WORK\WH\033006\26780.000 HINTREL1 PsN: SHIRL
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sumption of innocence, the right to an adequate defense, and the requirement that 

the punishment be commensurate with the gravity of the crime. 

For example, both Ecuador and Bolivia adopted U.S.-backed legislation in which 

the burden of proof for conviction of drug offenders was so low that local human 

rights lawyers complained that their defendants were forced to prove their innocence. As in the United States, harsh mandatory minimum sentencing laws have 

also spread across the region. In Ecuador, the law mandates a 12-year minimum 

jail sentence and a 25-year maximum sentence for drug-related crimes. The law 

does not differentiate between those who are paid to carry drugs, small-time traffickers, or drug kingpins—all are subject to the mandatory minimum. The maximum sentence for murder, in contrast, is 16 years. Thus, a small-time trafficker 

could end up with a higher sentence than a murderer. 

Anti-drug legislation, including mandatory minimum sentencing laws, and the use 

of numerical quotas for arrests, has filled the prisons of countries across the region 

with low-level offenders—even innocent people—who have little access to adequate 

legal defense. In some countries, only a small percentage of those arrested are actually convicted, while in others conviction rates are astoundingly high. Pervasive corruption and weak judiciaries mean that major drug traffickers are rarely sanctioned. If they are, they often benefit from far more acceptable prison conditions, 

as they have the resources to purchase a range of amenities. 

4) Oversight 

U.S. drug control policy, and security policy more generally, with respect to Latin 

America, is moving out of the jurisdiction of the Department of State and this Committee and into the Department of Defense and the Armed Services Committees. 

Historically U.S. military training has been paid for and overseen by the Department of State. Increasingly, training is being paid for and executed directly through 

DOD. About 60% of all US military training for Latin America is paid for out of 

the Pentagon.

This is of concern to us for three reasons: 1) there is much less congressional oversight and many fewer reporting requirements on programs under the jurisdiction of 

Defense than State; for example, only sporadically in recent years have the Armed 

Services Committees required any public reporting at all on counter drug programs; 

2) training has historically been under State because of the foreign policy implications of foreign military training, and we believe that State should play a central 

role in decisions about training; and 3) the 40 years of legislative history on human 

rights law on foreign assistance (with the exception of a version of the Leahy Law) 

applies only to programs under the jurisdiction of the Foreign Assistance Act, so 


26780c.eps
67

training and security assistance programs funded through DOD are not subject to 

these restrictions. 

We believe that this committee has played a critical role in this process and that 

it is imperative for the committees of jurisdiction (House International Relations 

Committee and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee) to reassert their authority 

over these programs. 

Conclusion 

In conclusion, U.S. drug policy in the region is plagued by short-term thinking 

that leads to tactical victories that often make the problem worse and create collateral damage. Every time we are ‘‘successful’’ in eradicating drug production through 

forced eradication, we displace people who move elsewhere, often moving production 

and environmental damage with them. When we are ‘‘successful’’ through interdiction in limiting trafficking in one area, it moves somewhere else, bringing corruption 

and violence to a new country or region. Every time we declare victory, some area 

previously unaffected by the drug trade loses. 

So what should we do to control the damage caused by drugs and U.S. drug policy 

throughout the U.S. and Latin America? 

1) Think long-term. We have to get out of the quick-fix mentality. The Congress 

needs to decide that it wants to impact drug consumption in the U.S. and production 

and trafficking in Latin America by making a long-term investment with a policy 

approach designed for the next twenty years. By requiring State and DOD to show 

‘‘progress’’ in the war on drugs from this year to next, we have developed short-term 

bureaucratic thinking that has produced negative long-term results. Stop the body 

count. 

2) Reduce harm. Current U.S. drug policy exacerbates political and human rights 

problems in the region and contributes to anti-American sentiment. While there will 

always be some harm produced by anti-drug strategies, as there is harm produced 

by the drug trade, we should base our policy choices on what is truly effective and 

creates the least collateral damage. 

3) Invest in evidence-based approaches. There are studies on the international and 

the domestic side that show what works. They tell us that cooperative eradication 

is more lasting than forced eradication. If we took this seriously we would put development strategies ahead of the eradication process. The perennial goal of our enforcement-led supply-control approach has been to restrict availability and thereby 

reduce drug use. But the best available evidence on availability (including price and 

purity trends) has shown that this just has not worked. By contrast, an enormous 

body of evidence shows that without any doubt, treatment for drug abuse is both 

an effective and cost-effective way to reduce drug consumption and associated 

harms, without any of the collateral damage that has characterized our supply-control emphasis. 

4) Work in consultation with governments of the region. We certainly have not cornered the market on success in terms of drug policy. Why not be more flexible with 

countries in the region that are committed to fight drugs, but need the political 

space from the U.S. to try alternative policies? Instead of holding a big stick over 

Latin American nations, threatening their bilateral aid and trade status if they 

don’t implement the programs we prefer, we should develop a more cooperative approach. This would go a long-way toward remedying hostile regional feelings toward 

the U.S. 

5) Slaughter the sacred cow. In the past three years I have had countless conversations about U.S. drug policy in the region with U.S. policy makers from both 

side of the aisle. The overwhelming sentiment I have gotten is that there is a fundamental understanding that current policy does not work, but that it is a sacred cow 

and that it is political suicide to challenge the policy or think outside the box. 

I have also traveled extensively throughout the U.S. over the past year giving 

public presentations on the Drugs and Democracy study. Not one person stood up 

and said, why are you questioning this successful policy? There is tremendous public 

sentiment that current policy is not working. There is the domestic political space 

for change. 

I think that it is time to get all of the policymakers who think that the current 

policy is failing together in a room with no outside observers, to slaughter the sacred cow, and to start to explore policies in the U.S. and in Latin America that can 

be more effective in mitigating the extreme harm caused by drugs and the war 

against them.

Mr. BURTON. Well, that was very interesting. I will have a question or two for you, but before we go to questions for our panelists, 

I did have one additional question for the State Department. 

68

Are you the young man back there for the State Department? 

Would you jot this down and ask them to answer this for me. When 

did the Department of State determine that FARC was linked to 

the drugs and the drug cartels. 

I need to know the date and the time, because many of us have 

felt that they were linked together for a long time, and it hasn’t 

been admitted by the State Department. So I would like to have 

your dates and the times. 

I want to submit for the record, if I might, a report on progress 

in Colombia, which I will be talking to you about in just a moment. 

Without objection, we will have that included in the record. 

Let me start with you, Ms. Olson. You paint a pretty bleak picture. Do you think that we may have to go to some legalization of 

drugs, or something, down the road in order to deal with the problem? 

It seems what you are saying is that, if we push in on one part 

of the balloon, it sticks out someplace else. It we push in here, it 

pops out someplace else. In fact, what you are saying is that as far 

as drug reduction and drug production being stopped, or winning 

the war against drugs, we are going to have a real problem because 

they just move from one place to another if we start eradication. 

Ms. OLSON. We are not advocating legalization. What we do 

think is that we can come up with more effective approaches that 

reduce the harm caused by drugs. It is more of a harm reduction 

approach. 

The drug production produces harm, and environmental harm. 

The trafficking produces tremendous harm, and corruption and violence are with it at every step of the way. And certainly drug consumption in the communities here is incredibly damaging. 

At each stage in that process, if we could try and develop policies 

focused on being the most effective at reducing the harm caused by 

the illicit activity, by consumption, by production, by the environmental impact, we think that we could come up with a policy package that would be more effective than what we have right now. 

Mr. BURTON. Well, if you have a policy package that you want 

to advocate, I would sure want to look at it. I heard your six points 

that you made, and I think that they would be included in your 

proposal. 

Ms. OLSON. They are, and much more extensive recommendations are included in my testimony. 

Mr. BURTON. I understand, Ms. Olson, and that is very interesting what you said. So if you could send it to my office, and any 

other Member of the Committee that would like to have it, I would 

like to see what your proposals are. Could you make sure that we 

get those? I would just like to take a look at them. 

Ms. OLSON. Certainly. 

Mr. BURTON. Ambassador Mack, you said something about the 

students down in Central or South America, and whether or not 

they are responding to these programs that are minimizing or slowing down the consumption of drugs. Is it being effective? 

Ambassador MACK. Well, sir, different countries are at different 

stages in putting into practice prevention programs among students. 

Mr. BURTON. Well, give me a generalization if you will. 

69

Ambassador MACK. A generalization is that most countries do 

not have effective prevention programs for their students, although 

this is beginning to change and my organization is helping countries put together prevention programs. Chile has the most advanced school-based prevention program perhaps in the hemisphere. 

Mr. BURTON. Are they in general working? Are the programs 

that you are advocating just in their infancy, or what is the deal? 

Ambassador MACK. Well, Chile’s program, their consumption, 

which is higher than most of the other Latin American countries, 

is probably for the simple reason that it is a more prosperous country than the other countries in South America and Latin America. 

Their consumption is leveling off and so I would say that their 

prevention programs are having a positive impact. The other programs are so new that it is hard to say that they have had an impact to date. They are just getting started. 

Mr. BURTON. How is that comparing with what is going on here 

in America and our drug programs? 

Ambassador MACK. Sir, I am not competent to answer that question as I am no longer a United States Government official. 

Mr. BURTON. You are an American aren’t you? 

Ambassador MACK. I think clearly, sir, that the consumption has 

gone down in the United States over the last 20 years. We are 

much better organized to deal with the problem than a lot of our 

colleagues to the south of us, who are now beginning to face the 

problem of consumption for the first time. 

So they are now arming themselves and organizing themselves 

to deal with it, but we, unfortunately, had a jump start on the 

problem, and therefore, we have a jump start on the solution. 

They are still working with the solution and we in CICAD are 

trying to help them improve their capacity to come up with a solution that includes a serious prevention program at the school level. 

Mr. BURTON. I have one more question for both of you, and then 

I would like to submit questions for you to answer for the record 

if you wouldn’t mine, in addition to getting your proposals. 

What kind of an effect do you think our anti-drug programs are 

having on the governmental structures in Central and South America? We are trying to create a stable environment for fledgling democracies down there. We are working on trade programs, and 

other things like CAFTA, to try to help create jobs and create better economies. 

But the drug problem, and the way that we are approaching the 

drug problem, is it causing problems for the stabilization, or the 

strength of these new democracies down there? 

Ambassador MACK. Mr. Chairman, that really is a question probably best directed to also Ambassador Patterson. Countries are 

now—and because of our relationship with the countries that are 

members of our organization, there is a very fluid relationship. 

And all of them feel that they have a stake in the problem, all 

aspects of the problem today, and I think not only their capacity 

improving, but the willingness to sit down and discuss in a multilateral setting has I think opened them up to cooperation with the 

United States in many cases simply because the United States is 

at the table as a peer in the process that I described of evaluating 

70

the progress in drug controls in the member states. And in a way 

I think it improves the atmosphere for cooperation. 

Ms. OLSON. Well, I have never been a United States Government 

official, and so I can answer that question. First, the drug trade is 

producing in certain countries enormous problems related to 

governability, and often they are not necessarily that the entire 

Federal structure of the government has become infiltrated or corrupt. 

But certainly in localized areas, and in certain areas, this is the 

case, you see tremendous corruption taking place on the United 

States-Mexican border, especially in certain cities. 

You see huge problems with drug corruption and other kinds of 

organized crime and corruption in Guatemala. And certainly one of 

the things that we are seeing with the paramilitary demobilization 

in Colombia is that again in certain areas there are traffickers who 

are now involved in both licit and illicit activities, and the influence 

on political structures locally is really serious, and should be very 

disturbing. 

In terms of U.S. programs in relation to all of this, and whether 

or not there is instability or not, I think that some of them have 

been very good. We have had programs focusing on money laundering, for example, that were discussed earlier. 

And, efforts to harmonize legal structures around money laundering, I think that is incredibly important. We have done some investment in judicial reform issues, which I also think is very important. 

But there have been other things. For example, we set target 

eradication levels each year with different countries, and then they 

have to meet them. In a place like Bolivia, over the past 3 or 4 

years, that became a whole part of the political turmoil there, and 

those targets in and of themselves were a part of what was causing 

some of the political turmoil. Certainly not all of it, but it wasn’t 

helping. So a different kind of approach would have probably led 

toward greater stability in Bolivia. And then the other thing that 

I raised that I think is important is that at times, in terms of long 

term thinking, governability, and consolidation of democracy, we 

have invested in the wrong institutions. 

In 1991, the U.S. gave our military, made them the single lead 

agency for the detection and monitoring of drugs coming into the 

United States, and while the people in the U.S. military did object 

to that role at the time, being a good democratic military, what 

they did was assume the role and tried to do the best job with it 

that they could. 

And what they ended up doing was turning to the people that 

they knew in Latin America, their partners. So who they have 

ended up interacting with to a great extent have been Latin America militaries. 

And while this Committee looks at programs like INL, much of 

the United States counterdrug program in Latin America is executed through the 1004 account, the account on drug authority in 

the Pentagon budget, and that is where, through SOUTHCOM, the 

interaction takes place. 

71

So what I would say is that for consolidation of democracy in the 

long term, one of the most critical investments is going to be on police reform and judicial reform in the region. 

Mr. BURTON. Okay. Thank you. I would like to have that information from both of you, and I will submit other questions for the 

record. Mr. Engel. 

Mr. ENGEL. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me ask a few 

quick questions, since I know that we are drawing to an end. Let 

me start with Ambassador Mack. Ambassador, can you give us a 

sense of how your crop substitution program is working for replacing drug crops with tree based agricultural products? 

Ambassador MACK. Our cocao project is just starting, sir, and so 

it has had no impact as of yet. It is a pilot project beginning in a 

few small areas in the coca producing zones of the major coca producing countries. I am hoping that I can get sufficient funding that 

we can broaden it out and then have a major impact. 

But at this point, it is very, very minor. We have conducted successful projects in Bolivia, small level projects involving several 

thousands of people to promote organic banana production, and 

kava. 

They have been successful, and by and large, those people have 

ceased growing coca, but these projects operate on a very small 

scale. We don’t have the kind of funding that permits us to operate 

on a very large scale. 

Mr. ENGEL. Well, speaking of funding, we had on the last panel 

some discussion about the Europeans and the EU, and what they 

were doing or whatever. Have you had any contact with the European Union perhaps and for them to have some help with the funding for your program? 

Ambassador MACK. In the past, the European Union has funded 

small programs on assessing drug use in the Caribbean. However, 

we do receive substantial assistance from the Government of Spain 

in a couple of ways. One is to help the Andean countries decentralize their drug programs, particularly in the prevention area, 

down to the municipal level, and that has been under way for several years. 

And Spain has three really nice training centers in Latin America that they allow us to use. Spain also actually funds people to 

conduct programs for us ranging from prevention programs, to drug 

treatment program training, to training of judges and prosecutors 

in money laundering areas. 

So, Spain has been very, very active, and they are a major contributor to CICAD. The U.K. provided substantial funding to do the 

assessment of the environmental and human impact of coca spraying in Colombia. 

France had a very senior level money laundering police official 

assigned to us for 3 years, and who did a terrific job, and Spain 

is about ready to assign another police official in money laundering. 

So the Europeans individually have actually been quite active 

and very supportive of what we do. 

Mr. ENGEL. Let me ask you one final question. The MEM program, the multilateral evaluation mechanism program, are all 

72

countries that participate in this program cooperating effectively, 

or some at a lower level? Could you specify? 

Ambassador MACK. All are cooperating, some more enthusiastically than others, but all have voluntarily joined the process. Some 

are very, very small countries, and they simply do not have the 

staff or the organizational capacity to answer rather complex questionnaires. 

So we have been sending missions down to help them organize 

to better do this, but by and large, the countries cooperate and extremely actively, and in a very collegial way, and they are becoming much more accustomed to making pointed judgments about 

progress in their fellow republics, and to responding positively to 

recommendations for improvement, including the United States, I 

might add. 

Mr. ENGEL. Well, thank you. Ms. Olson, I want to wrap up a couple of questions, wrap them up together and it is about Colombia, 

and give you a chance to talk about it since you certainly have 

given us some food for thought, and have an interesting approach. 

In some instances, an alternative approach, but not necessarily, 

because I don’t think it is an either/or situation. I think there are 

certain things that we can do hand-in-glove. We may not think so, 

but I believe that we really can. 

So I want to talk to you about Colombia. We talked about the 

eradication spraying program in the last panel, and we say that 

the spraying does not pose unreasonable health or safety risks to 

humans and the environment, but we get the reports that many 

Colombians do believe that it does. 

Also, that the health consequences of aerial fumigations are 

grave, and that many NGOs are criticizing certification of the herbicide for being analytically inadequate. So I wanted to know if you 

could tell us what you know and what you think about the environmental and health effects of eradication, and to what extent does 

aerial spraying destroy good crops and the fate of farmers whose 

livelihoods have been hurt by that. 

I want to also tie that into Colombia’s human rights. We hear, 

and again I am not commenting one way or the other, but we hear 

reports, and I would like to know what your feelings are, that Colombian security forces have often turned a blind eye to paramilitary activities, considering and saying that these groups are 

augmenting their fight against the FARC and ELN. 

The Secretary of State by law has to certify on an annual basis 

that the Colombian military is complying with specific human 

rights conditions in order for the Government of Colombia to receive United States military and police assistance. 

Whatever I have read has shown that the Colombian military 

has made good strides in improving security in the country, but we 

continue to receive these reports, these disturbing reports of gross 

violations of human rights committed by members of the military, 

as well as alleged collaboration by security force members with illegal paramilitary groups. 

So I am wondering if you could comment about what you know 

about those two things involving Colombia. 

Ms. OLSON. Okay. Starting out with the spraying issue and fumigation. Certainly there are back and forths on this one. One the 

73

one side, people are saying that there is no environmental damage, 

and on the other side people are saying that there is, and while you 

may not be able to quantify it scientifically, they say that they get 

rashes, and that there is an impact. 

But we also see that the way that spraying takes place is that 

it just doesn’t just hit crops. I mean, it was originally designed to 

be put on a crop so that the leaves fall off. But it ends up going 

into water supplies, and it ends up hitting animals, and it ends up 

hitting people. 

So its impact I think is distinct from what the traditional interpretation of the scientific community might be. But I am not a scientist, and I don’t have a scientific perspective on that. 

What I can tell you is that fumigation is causing production to 

spread. In Colombia, coca production started out at the beginning 

of Plan Colombia in three departments. It is now in I believe 23 

departments the last time I checked. And every time production 

moves, people move into new areas and they are devastating the 

environment. 

With production comes the use of precursor chemicals, and deforestation takes place in those areas, and so I would say that the biggest impact, negative impact, that I have been able to see, and 

really been able to get a quantifiable sense of, is actually the environmental devastation that is coming from the continuing spread 

of coca production into new areas. 

And then getting to the humanitarian side of it, just to reiterate, 

I think that the issue of displacement is an enormous problem. I 

just don’t think this, it is the second largest number of displaced 

persons in the world. 

I find it just appalling that so few people in this country have 

any clue about that, and I don’t think that the magnitude of that 

figure, and the problem that it represents in terms of human suffering, and in terms of political stability in the long term in Colombia has been captured by policy makers as of yet. 

Finally, I think that fumigation and forced eradication contributes to displacement. I just don’t think that, there has been a recent study out in Colombia that documents it. 

And finally the issue of collaboration between the military and 

the paramilitary organizations. This is a continuing problem that 

we are monitoring. We are preparing for the next State Department consultation right now. We are just gathering information on 

the cases that we are following, and new information, and I would 

like to submit that to you if that is possible. 

Mr. ENGEL. Yes, it is, and I thank you both for——

Ms. OLSON. Could I add just two quick points? 

Mr. ENGEL. Sure. 

Ms. OLSON. When it comes to the European community, I think 

if there is somebody really looking at alternative development, trying some different alternative development strategies in the Andean countries, it is the German Government’s alternative development agency. They have done some really interesting work that 

has been done. 

And then I would like to go back simply to say that the biggest 

thing that I think we can do to help Latin America fight the 

scourge of drugs is treatment on demand in the United States. The 

74

degree to which we can lessen demand here will have the biggest 

impact on the region. 

Mr. ENGEL. Thank you, and thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. BURTON. Thank you, Mr. Engel, and I look forward to working with you. Thank you, panelists, for being so patient. I know 

that this has been a tough day for you, and if you would submit 

to the Committee for the record the answers to the questions, and 

any other information that you have, we would really appreciate it. 

Thank you very much. We stand adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 1:40 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 

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A P P E N D I X 

MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING RECORD

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE JERRY WELLER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF ILLINOIS

Thank you, Mr. Chairman for holding this hearing today and to our distinguished 

witnesses for their testimony and insight. It is a particular pleasure to welcome to 

this Committee Ambassador Anne Patterson who I have worked with closely as Ambassador in Colombia and also now in her role as Assistant Secretary for INL 

Mr. Chairman, one of my main priorities has been the establishment of the International Law Enforcement Academy for Latin America. The ILEA will be key in our 

cooperative efforts with our friends in Latin America to not only combat narco-trafficking, but also to fight corruption and to increase security in the hemisphere by 

sharing information across national boundaries and building relationships and trust 

between police forces. ILEA will be a powerful catalyst for strengthening efforts to 

work together in partnership for combating terror, drugs, and money laundering. I 

commend you for the great work that has been hone to moving the ILEA forward 

to completion this year and look forward to working with you, Ambassador, on this 

project. 

Mr. Chairman, we know we have lots of work on our hands in the hemisphere 

when 14 of the 20 major illicit drug producing or drug transit countries are in Latin 

America and the Caribbean. We must continue with a multi—faceted strategy that 

includes eradication, alternative crop development, and increasing economic opportunities in the hemisphere. 

When I talk to leaders from the region, it is clear that poverty reduction and increasing economic opportunity are keys to the stability of the region and to eradicating the cultivation of narcotics. President Toledo has made this point repeatedly 

in his visits to the United States and has been a true leader in poverty reduction, 

making enormous successes in Peru. President Toledo and other leaders also note 

that export opportunities help create jobs and move people into licit work, away 

from narcotics. ATPDEA expires next year, and, should congress fail to ratify Trade 

Promotion Agreements with Peru, Colombia, and Ecuador, we know that he jobs lost 

without exports will be filled in the vacuum of narcotics cultivation and trafficking. 

We must not let this happen. 

Mr. Chairman, thank you again for holding this hearing today and I look forward 

to the testimony of our witnesses. 

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