De War on Drugs in Mexico #4 - Hoe lossen we de oorlog op?

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Op donderdag 31 mei 2012 14:22 schreef arucard het volgende:
Ik had trouwens gehoord dat in Mexico alle drugs nu gedecriminaliseerd zijn

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Op donderdag 31 mei 2012 15:25 schreef BlaZ het volgende:
Volgende maand presidentsverkiezingen in Mexico, dat gaat zeker veel invloed op het conflict hebben.

Zetas zouden de grens met de VS ook wel eens over kunnen steken, die zijn momenteel ook al actief in Honduras, Guatemala en El Salvador

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Op donderdag 31 mei 2012 15:43 schreef Viajero het volgende:

[..]

Alle Latijns Amerikaanse drugscartels zijn allang in de VS vertegenwoordigd, inclusief de Zetas.

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Western banks 'reaping billions from Colombian cocaine trade'

While cocaine production ravages countries in Central America, consumers in the US and Europe are helping developed economies grow rich from the profits, a study claims

The vast profits made from drug production and trafficking are overwhelmingly reaped in rich "consuming" countries – principally across Europe and in the US – rather than war-torn "producing" nations such as Colombia and Mexico, new research has revealed. And its authors claim that financial regulators in the west are reluctant to go after western banks in pursuit of the massive amount of drug money being laundered through their systems.

The most far-reaching and detailed analysis to date of the drug economy in any country – in this case, Colombia – shows that 2.6% of the total street value of cocaine produced remains within the country, while a staggering 97.4% of profits are reaped by criminal syndicates, and laundered by banks, in first-world consuming countries.

"The story of who makes the money from Colombian cocaine is a metaphor for the disproportionate burden placed in every way on 'producing' nations like Colombia as a result of the prohibition of drugs," said one of the authors of the study, Alejandro Gaviria, launching its English edition last week.

"Colombian society has suffered to almost no economic advantage from the drugs trade, while huge profits are made by criminal distribution networks in consuming countries, and recycled by banks which operate with nothing like the restrictions that Colombia's own banking system is subject to."

His co-author, Daniel Mejía, added: "The whole system operated by authorities in the consuming nations is based around going after the small guy, the weakest link in the chain, and never the big business or financial systems where the big money is."

The work, by the two economists at University of the Andes in Bogotá, is part of an initiative by the Colombian government to overhaul global drugs policy and focus on money laundering by the big banks in America and Europe, as well as social prevention of drug taking and consideration of options for de-criminalising some or all drugs.

The economists surveyed an entire range of economic, social and political facets of the drug wars that have ravaged Colombia. The conflict has now shifted, with deadly consequences, to Mexico and it is feared will spread imminently to central America. But the most shocking conclusion relates to what the authors call "the microeconomics of cocaine production" in their country.

Gaviria and Mejía estimate that the lowest possible street value (at $100 per gram, about £65) of "net cocaine, after interdiction" produced in Colombia during the year studied (2008) amounts to $300bn. But of that only $7.8bn remained in the country.

"It is a minuscule proportion of GDP," said Mejía, "which can impact disastrously on society and political life, but not on the Colombian economy. The economy for Colombian cocaine is outside Colombia."

Mejía told the Observer: "The way I try to put it is this: prohibition is a transfer of the cost of the drug problem from the consuming to the producing countries."

"If countries like Colombia benefitted economically from the drug trade, there would be a certain sense in it all," said Gaviria. "Instead, we have paid the highest price for someone else's profits – Colombia until recently, and now Mexico.

"I put it to Americans like this – suppose all cocaine consumption in the US disappeared and went to Canada. Would Americans be happy to see the homicide rates in Seattle skyrocket in order to prevent the cocaine and the money going to Canada? That way they start to understand for a moment the cost to Colombia and Mexico."

The mechanisms of laundering drug money were highlighted in the Observer last year after a rare settlement in Miami between US federal authorities and the Wachovia bank, which admitted to transferring $110m of drug money into the US, but failing to properly monitor a staggering $376bn brought into the bank through small exchange houses in Mexico over four years. (Wachovia has since been taken over by Wells Fargo, which has co-operated with the investigation.)

But no one went to jail, and the bank is now in the clear. "Overall, there's great reluctance to go after the big money," said Mejía. "They don't target those parts of the chain where there's a large value added. In Europe and America the money is dispersed – once it reaches the consuming country it goes into the system, in every city and state. They'd rather go after the petty economy, the small people and coca crops in Colombia, even though the economy is tiny."

Colombia's banks, meanwhile, said Mejía, "are subject to rigorous control, to stop laundering of profits that may return to our country. Just to bank $2,000 involves a huge amount of paperwork – and much of this is overseen by Americans."

"In Colombia," said Gaviria, "they ask questions of banks they'd never ask in the US. If they did, it would be against the laws of banking privacy. In the US you have very strong laws on bank secrecy, in Colombia not – though the proportion of laundered money is the other way round. It's kind of hypocrisy, right?"

Dr Mejia said: "It's an extension of the way they operate at home. Go after the lower classes, the weak link in the chain – the little guy, to show results. Again, transferring the cost of the drug war on to the poorest, but not the financial system and the big business that moves all this along."

With Britain having overtaken the US and Spain as the world's biggest consumer of cocaine per capita, the Wachovia investigation showed much of the drug money is also laundered through the City of London, where the principal Wachovia whistleblower, Martin Woods, was based in the bank's anti-laundering office. He was wrongfully dismissed after sounding the alarm.

Gaviria said: "We know that authorities in the US and UK know far more than they act upon. The authorities realise things about certain people they think are moving money for the drug trade – but the DEA [US Drugs Enforcement Administration] only acts on a fraction of what it knows."

"It's taboo to go after the big banks," added Mejía. "It's political suicide in this economic climate, because the amounts of money recycled are so high."

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Mexico suspends, probes judges of key drug cases

Associated Press= MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexican court authorities have suspended two federal judges who presided over high-profile drug cases, saying investigators are looking into possible irregularities involving the jurists.

The Federal Judiciary Council said Friday evening that it was temporarily relieving appellate Judge Jesus Guadalupe Luna and district Judge Efrain Cazares of their duties, but its statement didn't describe the allegations being investigated. The Attorney General's Office declined to comment Saturday.

Both judges have taken part in cases involving well-known people with alleged ties to Mexico's drug business.

In April 2008, Luna ordered the release of the son of purported Sinaloa drug cartel chief Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman. Ivan Archivaldo Guzman Salazar had been sentenced by a lower court to five years in prison for money laundering, but the appellate judge ruled that there was no proof the money he used to open two bank accounts came from drug trafficking and that being the son of the infamous capo wasn't grounds for imprisonment.

Last summer, Luna upheld a lower court ruling that cleared Sandra Avila Beltran of organized-crime charges despite efforts by Mexico and the U.S. to prosecute the woman nicknamed "Queen of the Pacific." Avila is wanted on a 2004 U.S. indictment as a suspect tied to the seizure of more than nine tons of U.S.-bound cocaine on Mexico's west coast.

A judge acquitted Avila in December 2010 of charges stemming from that drug confiscation, and Luna backed that decision by citing a lack of evidence.

U.S. authorities have sought extradition of Avila, a niece of Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo, known as "the godfather" of Mexican drug smuggling, but that has been rejected twice by other judges on grounds she shouldn't be prosecuted in the U.S. on charges that have been dismissed in Mexico.

The other suspended judge, Cazares, has been accused by Mexico's government of ignoring credible evidence when he released some of the mayors detained in a mass arrest of officials in the western state of Michoacan in 2009. The federal attorney general alleged the officials had ties to the La Familia drug gang, and prosecutors filed a complaint against Cazares saying he improperly acquitted the officials.

With all of the officials freed by various judges, the crackdown became one of the most embarrassing episodes in President Felipe Calderon's 5 1/2-year-long offensive against drug cartels.

Most recently, drug battles have escalated as Mexico's two most powerful drug cartels, the Sinaloa and Zetas gangs, wage a war in several regions considered strongholds of one or the other.

Late Friday, a group of armed men opened fire on a police station in the border city of Matamoros, which is across the Rio Grande from Brownsville, Texas. Tamaulipas state Interior Secretary Morelos Canseco Gomez said they threw an explosive, possibly a grenade, but no one was injured in the attack. Canseco said he did not know the motive or the gang behind it.

The attack came only days after suspected drug cartel gunmen set off a car bomb near a police barracks in the same state, wounding eight officers.

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Bloomberg Backs Plan to Limit Arrests for Marijuana

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said on Monday that he would support a proposal by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo to significantly curb the number of people who could be arrested for marijuana possession as a result of police stops.

Mr. Cuomo urged lawmakers on Monday to change state law to decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana in public view, an offense that critics say leads to unfair charges against thousands of people who are ordered to empty their pockets during police stops that have proliferated under the Bloomberg administration's stop-and-frisk practice.

Mr. Bloomberg, whose administration had previously defended low-level marijuana arrests as a way to deter more serious crime, said in a statement that the governor’s proposal “strikes the right balance” in part because it would still allow the police to arrest people who were smoking marijuana in public.

Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat, announced his plans to seek the change in state law at a news conference at the Capitol on Monday. The governor said he would seek to downgrade the possession of 25 grams or less of marijuana in public view from a misdemeanor to a violation, with a maximum fine of $100 for first-time offenders.

The New York City police commissioner, Raymond W. Kelly, attended the news conference as a way of demonstrating the city’s support for Mr. Cuomo’s proposal. Echoing the mayor, he described the governor’s proposal as a “balanced approach.”

Mr. Kelly noted that when he had been asked in the past about the city’s high number of marijuana arrests, he responded that people unhappy with the arrests should lobby the Legislature to change state law, which he called a better option “than having police officers, New York City police officers, turn a blind eye to the law as it was written and as it is still written.”

“This law will make certain that the confusion in this situation will be eliminated,” he said, adding, “Quite frankly, it will make the application of this law much clearer.”

Mr. Cuomo’s proposal followed a memorandum to officers that Mr. Kelly issued in September clarifying that they were not to arrest people who take small amounts of marijuana out of their pockets after being stopped by the police. Mr. Bloomberg and Mr. Kelly said the governor’s proposal was consistent with the city’s directive.

Mr. Cuomo said changing the law was a better approach in the long term, saying, “I think it puts the police in an awkward position to tell them: enforce some laws, don’t enforce other laws.”

“This is nice and clean: change the law, period,” the governor added.

Critics of the Police Department’s marijuana-arrest policies have complained that Mr. Kelly’s memorandum has had little effect. But a city spokesman said that since the commissioner’s memorandum the number of low-level marijuana arrests has fallen by nearly a quarter.

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Fourteen dismembered bodies found in northern Mexico

Bodies of eleven men and three women discovered in the sugar-cane farming town of Ciudad Mante

Fourteen dismembered bodies were found in a truck in the centre of a town in northern Mexico on Thursday in what appeared to be the latest atrocity committed by rival gangs battling over drug-smuggling routes, local media said.

The bodies of 11 men and three women were discovered in the sugar-cane farming town of Ciudad Mante in the south of Tamaulipas state, which borders on Texas, daily Milenio reported on its website.

Tamaulipas has been one of the bloodiest battlegrounds in Mexico's drug war.
More than 55,000 people have been killed in the conflict since President Felipe Calderon sent in the army to fight drug gangs shortly after he took office in December 2006.

Calderon's conservative National Action Party, or PAN, looks likely to lose power in the presidential election on 1 July, due partly to rising frustration with the violence.

The government has blamed the turf wars between the brutal Zetas gang, founded by army deserters, and the Sinaloa cartel of Mexico's most-wanted man,
Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman, for an escalation of killings in recent weeks.

Suspected drug cartel killers dumped 49 decapitated and dismembered bodies on a highway near the affluent northern city of Monterrey in May. Days before, 18 mutilated bodies were found near Mexico's second-largest city, Guadalajara.

At the beginning of May, the bodies of nine people were hung from a bridge and 14 other dismembered victims were found in the city of Nuevo Laredo, also in
Tamaulipas state and just across the border from Laredo, Texas.

Seven people were wounded on Thursday, including a boy who was seriously hurt, when a male suspect threw a grenade into a restaurant in the town of Amecameca outside Mexico City, a state of Mexico official said.

Authorities are investigating a possible extortion attempt against the business as well as the conflict between two gangs in the area, she said.

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Efforts to relax pot rules gaining momentum in US

Associated Press= PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — Catharine Leach is married and has two boys, age 2 and 8. She has a good job with a federal contractor and smokes pot most every day.

While she worries that her public support for marijuana decriminalization and legalization could cost her a job or bring the police to her door, the 30-year-old Warwick resident said she was tired of feeling like a criminal for using a drug that she said is far less harmful than the glass or wine or can of beer enjoyed by so many others after a long day's work. Like others around the nation working to relax penalties for possession of pot, she decided to stop hiding and speak out.

"I'm done being afraid," she said. "People in this country are finally coming around and seeing that putting someone in jail for this doesn't make sense. It's just a changing of the time."

Once consigned to the political fringe, marijuana policy is appearing on legislative agendas around the country thanks to an energized base of supporters and an increasingly open-minded public. Lawmakers from Rhode Island to Colorado are mulling medical marijuana programs, pot dispensaries, decriminalization and even legalization. Seventeen states and the District of Columbia now authorize medical marijuana and 14, including neighboring Connecticut and Massachusetts, have rolled back criminal penalties for possession of small amounts of pot.

Rhode Island is poised to become the 15th state to decriminalize marijuana possession. The state's General Assembly passed legislation last week that would eliminate the threat of big fines or even jail time for the possession of an ounce or less of pot. Instead, adults caught with small amounts of marijuana would face a $150 civil fine. Police would confiscate the marijuana, but the incident would not appear on a person's criminal record.

Minors caught with pot would also have to complete a drug awareness program and community service.

Gov. Lincoln Chafee has said he is inclined to sign the legislation.

One of the bill's sponsors, state Rep. John Edwards of Tiverton, has introduced similar proposals in past years but the idea always sputtered in committee. Each year, though, he got more co-sponsors, and the bill passed the House this year 50-24. The state Senate passed it 28-6.

Some supporters of decriminalization say they'd like to go even further.

"America's 50-year war on drugs has been an abysmal failure," said Rep. John Savage, a retired school principal from East Providence. "Marijuana in this country should be legalized. It should be sold and taxed."

Opponents warned of dire consequences to the new policy.

"What kind of message are we sending to our youth? We are more worried about soda — for health reasons — than we are about marijuana," said one opponent, Rhode Island state Rep. John Carnevale a Democrat from Providence.

A survey by Rasmussen last month found that 56 percent of respondents favored legalizing and regulating marijuana. A national Gallup poll last year showed support for legalizing pot had reached 50 percent, up from 46 percent in 2010 and 25 percent in the mid-'90s.

Medical marijuana helped bring marijuana policy into the mainstream back in 1996, when California became the first state to authorize the use of cannabis for medicinal use. Other states followed suit.

"It's now politically viable to talk about these things," said Robert Capecchi, legislative analyst with the Marijuana Policy Project, a Washington, D.C.-based group that supports the reduction or elimination of penalties for medical and recreational pot use. "The public understands that there are substances that are far more harmful — alcohol, tobacco — that we regulate. People are realizing just how much money is being wasted on prohibition."

Colorado and Washington state will hold fall referendums on legalizing marijuana. A ballot question on legalization failed in California in 2010.

This month, Connecticut's governor signed legislation to allow medical marijuana there. Last week, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo proposed cutting the penalty for public possession of small amounts of pot.

Liberal state policies on marijuana have run into conflict with federal prohibition. Federal authorities have shut down more than 40 dispensaries this year in Colorado, even though they complied with state and local law. In Rhode Island, Gov. Lincoln Chafee blocked three dispensaries from opening last year after the state's top federal prosecutor warned they could be prosecuted. Chafee and lawmakers then rewrote the dispensary law to restrict the amount of marijuana dispensaries may have on hand.

Robert DuPont, who served as the nation's drug czar under presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, said Americans should be wary of a slippery slope to legalization. While marijuana may not cause the life-threatening problems associated with heroin, cocaine or methamphetamine, it's far from harmless.

"It is a major drug of abuse," he said. "People ask me what the most dangerous drug is, and I say marijuana. Other drugs have serious consequences that are easy to recognize. Marijuana saps people's motivation, their direction. It's a drug that makes people stupid and lazy. That's in a way more dangerous."

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Op dinsdag 6 maart 2012 14:45 schreef Papierversnipperaar het volgende:

Ron Paul on Drugs and Personal Choice (05/05/11)

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Op donderdag 14 juni 2012 19:12 schreef Papierversnipperaar het volgende:
Canadese Dokter: 'Pure XTC is veilig'

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U.S. To Landlords: Shut Down Pot Shops Or Lose The Property

ST. LOUIS, June 12 (Thomson Reuters Accelus) - Federal prosecutors are targeting medical marijuana shops in California, seeking forfeiture of the properties in which they do business.

The authorities are pressuring landlords to shut down the shops or face possible loss of the real estate through the unconventional and low-key use of a civil statute designed primarily to seize the assets of drug-trafficking organizations.

While some states, including California, have legalized medical marijuana businesses, the federal government does not recognize their authority to do so and has targeted the shops for violations of the 40-year-old Controlled Substances Act.

The goal of the Justice Department's effort, part of a crackdown announced last October, is to fight the medical marijuana industry, estimated at $1.7 billion annually, without confronting it head-on with costly and potentially embarrassing criminal prosecutions, industry sources and legal experts said.

This indirect strategy is reminiscent of the department's attempts, which have met with only limited success, to sever the medical pot industry's access to banking services. Many businesses have found ways around those restrictions, experts said.

"Filing asset-forfeiture lawsuits against these commercial properties is a very clever way to handle an otherwise horribly difficult and controversial situation," said Greg Baldwin, a partner at the Miami law firm Holland & Knight and a former federal prosecutor.

"If you bring criminal charges against these medical marijuana businesses, the federal government gets pilloried in the press for attacking California law and sick people."

Baldwin, who specializes in complex commercial litigation and white-collar criminal defense, added that with all four U.S. attorneys in California employing the same strategy, it is clearly official Justice Department policy rather than an anomaly involving rogue prosecutors.

The new approach stems from Justice's difficult position under President Barack Obama, said Allen St. Pierre, the executive director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML).

The department cannot rely on heavy-handed criminal prosecutions to combat medical marijuana, St. Pierre said. But it also cannot ignore the issue and risk being labeled soft on drug crime.

"It's being done softly, because if they tried to go the harsh criminal route there is a very good chance they would not only fail but become even more unpopular, something you tend to not want to do going into your last election," he said.

LAWSUITS AND LETTERS

Federal prosecutors in Los Angeles last week filed two asset-forfeiture lawsuits against buildings housing three marijuana stores in Santa Fe Springs. They also sent so-called warning letters to dozens of area property owners threatening similar legal action.

The letters - only the latest of hundreds mailed to property owners in recent months - gave the owners two weeks to comply with federal law, which prohibits involvement in marijuana distribution.

The civil-forfeiture statute allows the government to seize any real estate used to commit or facilitate drug trafficking.

The provision has traditionally been applied to residential properties used by drug traffickers to grow, store or distribute marijuana. Legal experts say there is no reason it cannot be used against properties that house medical marijuana shops.

The U.S. Supreme Court has recognized the federal government's authority to enforce the national ban on medical marijuana. Still, such enforcement remains unpopular. A Gallup survey last October found that 50 percent of Americans favored full legalization of marijuana and 70 percent favored allowing its medical use to alleviate pain and suffering.

Colorado, a key state in Obama's reelection effort this year, has a medical marijuana law. In November voters will decide on a ballot measure aimed at all-out legalization.

As the first state to legalize medical marijuana in 1996, California has been a bellwether for the industry and federal law enforcement efforts to combat it.

If the move against commercial property owners succeeds in California, it could spread to other states with medical marijuana laws, legal experts said.

For-profit storefront marijuana shops, especially those opposed by the cities where they operate or located near schools or playgrounds, are the Justice Department's favored targets.

Federal prosecutors across California launched a coordinated enforcement campaign in October 2011, stating that California is the top marijuana-producing state in the country and that it exports the drug to other states.

Under the leadership of U.S. Attorney Andre Birotte Jr, the Central District of California, based in Los Angeles, has been particularly aggressive. Federal prosecutors there said last week they have brought a dozen civil lawsuits seeking to forfeit properties housing marijuana businesses.

"Three of those actions have been resolved with the closure of the marijuana stores and court-approved consent decrees in which property owners agreed that they would no longer rent to people associated with illegal marijuana operations, or the property would be subject to an immediate forfeiture to the government," the U.S. Attorney's office said.

LESS MANPOWER REQUIRED

The Justice Department's Thom Mrozek, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Central District of California, told Reuters that it requires less manpower to combat marijuana businesses by mail and civil actions than it does to bring criminal prosecutions.

"We can get on the Internet, identify a store and have someone drive by and find out if it is operating. That is a whole lot different from conducting a criminal investigation, going out and making buys and conducting surveillance. These are two very different balls of wax," he said.

The letters and lawsuits have "so far been extremely effective in securing the closure of about 200 illegal marijuana storefronts in our district," Mrozek said.

Baldwin, the Miami lawyer, was not surprised. Few property owners are going to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to defend against a government lawsuit to keep a tenant, let alone risk losing their investments, he predicted.

"Most of these things are going to end up with the landlord kicking out the offending enterprise," he said. "It's like a flank attack against these stores that leaves them in the most disadvantageous position possible."

NORML's St. Pierre said the federal government "has not sufficiently broadcast this threat (of eviction) as a deterrent," so a lack of widespread awareness among landlords in California and other states may soften its impact on the industry. He said that when marijuana businesses are kicked out of one property, "they will simply move next door and the whole process, as we've seen time and time again, simply starts over."

Although authorities have made public the strategy of targeting landlords, they have not made a national campaign of it, and so far only landlords who rent to marijuana shops have received warning letters.

CHALLENGING EVICTIONS

The letters' prospects might also be affected by the weak real estate market, actions by the municipalities where the properties are located, and California's strict eviction laws.

Ken Carter, a property owner who rented commercial space in Murrieta to the Greenhouse Cannabis Club, which opened for business in January, said he soon received a warning letter from the U.S. Attorney's office in Los Angeles.

Carter said that although he was intimidated by it he was not about to panic, because the value of the property had fallen to roughly half the $1 million he owed on it. Although authorities summoned Carter to the property during a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) raid this year, federal prosecutors never took legal action against him. He said he could not explain the lack of action.

However, he said the city of Murrieta, which banned medical marijuana shops in 2005, began issuing a $2,500 fine for every day Greenhouse remained on the property. He said that persuaded him to begin an eviction process, but it took several months to complete. The city has sued Carter and wants him to pay $150,000 in fines, he said.

Eric Safire, a San Francisco lawyer, is representing the owner of commercial property in the Mission District of San Francisco where an existing tenant opened the Shambhala Healing Center, a medical marijuana business that began operating in January 2011.

In late February of this year, the property owner received a warning letter from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of California, Safire said. He eventually had to file suit to evict his tenant. The matter was complicated by the fact that the tenant had made substantial improvements to the property before opening Shambhala, Safire added.

Safire said the tenant agreed to end the marijuana business by this July 1. Reuters left a telephone message seeking comment from Shambhala's owner but did not receive a response.

SCARING BANKS

St. Pierre likened the campaign to the Justice Department's effort to scare banks away from doing business with medical marijuana outfits.

"There will still be landlords leasing to these businesses, so I don't think it's ultimately going to be successful, just like the effort to thwart the banking," he said.

The DEA began warning banks and credit-card companies away from medical marijuana businesses in late 2007 or early 2008.

Some marijuana outfits have been forced to operate as cash-only businesses, but by and large the industry has survived and, by some expert accounts, thrived by operating through front companies or personal accounts.

HIGH RISK, HIGH REWARD

St. Pierre said the federal ban has made medical marijuana a "high risk, high reward" business. Entrepreneurs willing to flout the federal ban can earn hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars each year, and may be willing to face the challenge of eviction, he said.

Those who fail to heed these measures may face greater sanctions, however. The Justice Department's Mrozek said property owners or marijuana sellers who are not persuaded by warnings and civil action could find themselves in the dock on criminal charges, a fact he said was spelled out in the 220 warning letters dispatched by prosecutors in Los Angeles thus far. (This article was produced by the Compliance Complete service of Thomson Reuters Accelus. Compliance Complete (http://accelus.thomsonreu(...)compliance-complete/) provides a single source for regulatory news, analysis, rules and developments, with global coverage of more than 230 regulators and exchanges.)

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Colombia's legendary police chief heads to Mexico

Associated Press= BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — A signature trophy that Gen. Oscar Naranjo has carefully displayed in glass at Police Intelligence headquarters is odd by any measure: the neatly folded uniform of a rebel commander slain in 2008, clearly showing the holes from the shrapnel that killed him.

The four-star general, who retired as Colombia's police director this week, is proud of that and the others that line a hallway at the Police Intelligence Directorate in northern Bogota. They are testament to an intelligence empire he built that is unrivaled in Latin America.

Naranjo, 55, has played a central role in the capture or death of nearly every top Colombian drug trafficker, beginning with Pablo Escobar. The dismantling of the Medellin and Cali cocaine cartels and the splintering of successor trafficking organizations into ever-smaller groups was, as much as anyone's, Naranjo's doing.

On Thursday, Mexican presidential front-runner Enrique Pena Nieto said Naranjo has agreed to serve as his adviser on fighting drug trafficking if Pena Nieto wins the July 1 election.

The candidate has pledged to reduce violent crime affecting ordinary people in Mexico's drug war, a contrast to President Felipe Calderon's strategy of going after drug kingpins. Analysts have said Pena Nieto's strategy could mean that drug dealers who conduct their businesses discreetly will be left alone.

But Naranjo, standing with Pena Nieto at a news conference, said all cartels should be treated equally because "there can't be inequalities in the treatment of criminals."

Naranjo's 36-year career in Colombia, the last five as commander of 170,000 cops, coincides with his country's tortured journey from the verge of a near-failed state to what U.S. officials, Naranjo's chief patrons, tout as a model for the region's deadliest drug-war battlegrounds.

For a man who navigated the depths of the underworld for most of his career, whether battling rebels or ferreting out drug traffickers, his approval ratings in Colombia have been as high as any other public figure save Alvaro Uribe, Colombia's pugilistic law-and-order president in 2002-1010.

In a leaked 2009 Wikileaks cable, former U.S. ambassador William Brownfield said Naranjo was "perhaps the smartest, best informed member" of Colombia's government.

A leading Colombian rights activist, Gustavo Gallon, said Naranjo "has been upstanding, and has favored rights of civilians over the military."

And this from Myles Frechette, the U.S. ambassador in 1994-97: "It was Naranjo's analysis and many of the strategies he put together that slowly and eventually got Colombia to where it is today."

Yet Naranjo acknowledges making dark alliances when it was a question of national survival.

Colombians tend to agree that they were worth it.

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With his urbane manner and generous six-foot frame, Naranjo is unusually patrician for a cop.

Though the son of a former Colombian police chief, Naranjo's teen years were more bohemian than boy scout. He wore his hair long and read Kafka, Camus and papal encyclicals. He played volleyball competitively. He wobbled between studying sociology and journalism before getting hooked on police work after tagging along with some detectives on a kidnapping case.

Naranjo graduated first in his class at the police academy and, when his father retired in 1983, went into intelligence work.

That's when his education began to get especially dangerous.

Medellin cartel kingpin Pablo Escobar would soon emerge as an existential threat to the state. In Escobar's fight against the extradition of drug traffickers to the United States, he waged all-out war, including targeted assassinations and indiscriminate bombings of civilians.

In 1989, after Naranjo escorted out of the country his first "extraditable," an Escobar money-launderer, the long reach of drug cartels touched him personally.

"When I returned to Bogota the next day," he recalled, "I found my wife had to move because a funeral wreath was delivered to the small apartment where we lived that said: 'Maj. Naranjo, Rest in Peace.'"

The Medellin cartel put a $5,000 bounty on his head. Escobar offered smaller bounties for rank-and-file policemen. About 500 were killed in Medellin alone in the worst year.

In 1991, Escobar surrendered and entered a custom-built prison he'd helped design. A few months later, he was a fugitive again.

Naranjo, who had moved to Buenos Aires, was brought back to Colombia and named intelligence chief of the "Bloque de Busqueda," a special force formed to hunt down the arch criminal. He gave weekly briefings to a group led by the defense minister that included the top CIA and DEA officers in Colombia. And he designed the clandestine operation that led to Escobar's killing in December 1993.

At the time, the kingpin's family had returned to Bogota after Germany rejected its asylum request. Fearful that Escobar's underworld foes would try to assassinate members of the family, they agreed to be put up in a residence hotel suite.

Naranjo had bugged the suite beforehand. Then he positioned himself one floor up, where, with the help of U.S. agents, he directed one of the earliest successful cellphone triangulations.

The Bloque de Busqueda's operations chief, now retired Gen. Leonardo Gallego, said Naranjo succeeded in forcing Escobar "into errors that made him break his own strict security rules."

Obsessed over his family's safety, Escobar lingered too long on the phone with his son.

His location pinpointed, his fate was sealed. He was gunned down on a rooftop in Medellin while trying to make his escape.

---

People looking to draw lessons for today's Mexican drug warriors from Colombia's defeat of the Medellin cartel should not overlook the ethical compromises and dark alliances made in that epic struggle, says Vanda Felbab-Brown, a drug war analyst at the Brookings Institution in Washington.

To weaken and isolate Escobar, Colombia's government and police allied themselves with the Cali cartel and estranged former Escobar henchmen, including men who would go on to lead the far-right militias known as paramilitaries.

The government's criminal allies killed several hundred of Escobar's mid-level operatives and thus paralyzed the group, Felbab-Brown said.

Naranjo does not deny that bloody marriage of convenience.

It's easy to be critical in hindsight, he says, "but when two or three car bombs are going off in Bogota, in Medellin or in Cali and there are 120 dead every week from this war, the truth is that the state and society said, 'Do whatever you need to do to stop this.'"

That included leaning on Danilo Gonzalez, one of Naranjo's police academy classmates who had gone rogue.

Gonzalez always had the best intelligence on Escobar, Naranjo argued, because he got it from the Cali cartel, the next big target in the U.S.-sponsored drug war.

Naranjo says that in 1995, he persuaded the incoming police director, Gen. Rosso Jose Serrano, not to forcibly retire Gonzalez because the latter provided "very useful information."

Serrano eventually forced Gonzalez out when it became clear he was deep into drug trafficking with other rogue policemen.

In 2004, Gonzalez was killed in a gangland-style shooting.

Naranjo attended the wake.

---

During Serrano's 1995-2000 tenure, Naranjo gravitated to the "yuppies" — educated cops who favored well-cut suits and worked shoulder-to-shoulder with the DEA, CIA and Scotland Yard. The two men purged about 10,000 police officers. During Naranjo's time as director, nearly 2,900 were forcibly retired.

No one questions Naranjo's effectiveness against drug traffickers and leftist rebels, but analysts say Colombia's police under Naranjo have achieved far less on other fronts.

Kidnapping and murder are down dramatically, but criminal bands continue to thrive in the provinces, running drugs, extorting, "taxing" illegal gold mining. Colombia also remains the world's most deadly nation for trade union organizers.

"The strategy of going after high-value targets has its limits," said Maria Victoria Llorente, director of the Bogota think tank Fundacion Ideas para La Paz. "You capture the capos, but they have a great capacity for regeneration."

That's one reason drug decriminalization has a growing number of proponents in Latin America.

Naranjo is not among them, and his personal experience can't help but influence his thinking.

"Drug trafficking is good at transforming values into anti-values," he says, "and ends up enslaving societies."

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Criminele drugsinfiltrant VS jarenlang actief in Nederland

De Amerikaanse drugsbestrijdingsorganisatie DEA heeft een criminele burgerinfiltrant ingezet in Nederland. Het AD heeft de hand weten te leggen op geheime rapporten van de DEA.

De burgerinfiltrant speelde een hoofdrol bij de gecontroleerde doorvoer van een grote hoeveelheid drugs in Europa. Doel was het in de val lokken van drugscriminelen. Op de partij kwamen meerdere Nederlanders af. Infiltrant 'Mono' werkte maandenlang vanuit Amsterdam.

De rol van de DEA-infiltrant ligt gevoelig, omdat het een bom kan leggen onder het proces tegen de potentiële kopers die momenteel in Haarlem terechtstaan. De verdachten vermoeden dat de DEA in Nederland buiten haar boekje is gegaan en eisen inzage in de operatie. De Amerikanen weigeren dat.

Justitie claimt dat ze eind 2009 voor het eerst hoorde dat Mono voor de DEA werkte. Een artikel uit de Poolse krant Gazeta Wyborcza zet vraagtekens bij die verklaring. Nederland zou namelijk al op 11 februari 2009 een bemiddelende rol hebben gespeeld tussen de DEA en de Poolse geheime dienst ABW.

CDA, PvdA en SP eisen opheldering van justitieminister Opstelten. PvdA-Kamerlid Recourt: 'Of de DEA neemt een loopje met ons, of wij nemen een loopje met onze eigen regels. Beide kunnen we niet hebben.'

Sinds de IRT-affaire is de inzet van burgerinfiltranten in Nederland strikt verboden.

quote:

Op de brommer naar Albanië

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Daan Vonk en Theo Roelofs trokken op de brommer naar Albanië. Ze troffen een dorp aan, Lazarat, waar iedereen van de wietteelt leeft (zie onderstaande video vanaf 25.44 minuut). Overal waar je kijkt, zie je wietplanten groeien. De politie komt er niet en de bewoners van Lazarat staan nogal vijandig tegenover buitenstaanders, maar twee jongens uit Nederland zijn wel welkom.

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Het komende nummer van 360 is gewijd aan de oorlog tegen drugs.

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Uruguay wil cannabis verkopen aan burgers

Uruguay wil cannabis gaan verkopen aan haar burgers, zodat dealers niet langer verdienen aan de verkoop.

De Uruguayaanse regering heeft een nieuwe manier bedacht om de drugshandel tegen te gaan. Het Uruguayaanse Congres gaat zich buigen over een wetsvoorstel dat de verkoop van cannabis door de regering legaliseert.

Als de wet wordt aangenomen is de Uruguayaanse overheid de eerste nationale overheid ter wereld die cannabis gaat verkopen aan haar burgers.

Wereldwijd

Alleen de regering mag dan speciale sigaretten gaan verkopen, melden diverse lokale media. De bewustzijnsverruimende middelen komen echter alleen beschikbaar voor geregistreerde gebruikers.

Het drugsgebruik van de gebruikers wordt daarop bijgehouden in een database van de overheid. Uruguay pleit ervoor om de cannabisverkoop wereldwijd te legaliseren.

Misdaadcijfers

Volgens de regering van de linkse president José Mujica zijn de drugs zelf minder schadelijk dan de gevolgen van het verbod op sommige drugs. De zwarte markt waar cannabis wordt verhandeld en de criminaliteit die de handel met zich meebrengt, zijn Uruguay een doorn in het oog.

De Uruguayaanse minister van Defensie Eleuterio Fernandez Huidobro (foto) zei op een persconferentie in Montevideo dat de legalisatie is bedoeld om de misdaadcijfers in het land omlaag te brengen en criminelen de wind uit de zeilen te nemen. Hij hoopt ook dat softdrugsgebruikers door de maatregel minder snel overstappen op harddrugs.

Boeren

Kranten in het Zuid-Amerikaanse land melden verder dat een deel van de accijns op de cannabis gebruikt gaat worden om drugsverslaafden te helpen bij het afkicken. De regering geeft binnenkort meer details vrij, maar duidelijk is al wel dat de Uruguayaanse boeren de cannabis gaan verbouwen.

Bron: RT.com

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Mexico pakt zoon meest gezochte drugsbaron op

Het Mexicaanse leger heeft een van de zonen van de meest gezochte drugsbaronnen van Mexico opgepakt. Dat werd donderdag bekendgemaakt.

De zoon van Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman, Jesus Alfredo Guzman Salazar, kon dankzij informatie van de Mexicaanse inlichtingendienst worden ingerekend in de westelijke staat Jalisco, aldus een verklaring van het leger.

Guzman Salazar (26) en zijn vader, leider van het Sinaloa-kartel, werden in 2009 in de Verenigde Staten aangeklaagd voor drugshandel. El Chapo Guzman heeft kinderen bij meerdere vrouwen, van wie één onlangs in de Verenigde Staten van een tweeling beviel.

El Chapo Guzman ontsnapte in 2001 verstopt in een vrachtwagen met wasgoed uit een strengbeveiligde gevangenis. Andere zonen, onder wie Ivan Archivaldo 'El Chapito' Guzman Salazar (31) en Ovidio Guzman Lopez, zijn waarschijnlijk nauw betrokken bij de criminele praktijken van hun vader.

Forbes schatte het vermogen van El Chapo Guzman in 2009 op ongeveer één miljard dollar.

De oorlog tussen de verschillende drugsbendes en het leger heeft aan tienduizenden Mexicanen het leven gekost.

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Mexico admits arrested 'drug kingpin' is actually a car salesman

Embarrassing comedown for Felipe Calderon's government and country's military after they paraded 'El Gordo' for the cameras

Mexico has admitted it mistakenly claimed to have captured a son of Mexico's most wanted druglord, Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman, which the ruling party had hailed as a major victory in its war on cartels.

Mexican marines seized the man on Thursday outside Guadalajara and flew him to Mexico City, where they paraded him in front of the media and identified him as Jesus Alfredo Guzman, aka El Gordo or The Fat One.

The man's lawyer, Veronica Guerrero, told a news conference earlier on Friday her client's real name was Felix Beltran and that he was an innocent car dealer. The federal attorney general's office said late on Friday the man arrested was indeed Beltran, without giving any further details.

The mixup is a major embarrassment for the government, which has been heavily criticised for failing to contain the violence and flow of drugs since president Felipe Calderon sent in the military to fight the cartels shortly after taking office in December 2006.

Marines said they apprehended the man with an arsenal of rifles, pistols and grenades and about $160,000 (£102,000) in cash.

Javier Oliva, a political scientist from the National Autonomous University of Mexico, said the snafu showed how poor co-ordination is between US intelligence agencies and their Mexican counterparts.

"This is really serious. Nothing like this has ever happened before," he said, wondering how the agencies had gone public on the arrest without making the proper checks. "The main responsibility here lies with the DEA."

Thursday's arrest won praise from the US Drug Enforcement Administration, which has sought Jesus Alfredo Guzman since he was indicted for cocaine trafficking in 2009. His father, the elder Guzman, faces dozens of charges of racketeering and drug smuggling in US courts. There is a $5m reward for his capture.

The arrest came just over a week before Mexicans vote for a leader to replace Calderon, whom the constitution bars from seeking a second term. Brutal clashes between drug cartels and Mexican authorities have killed more than 55,000 people since Calderon launched his crackdown on the gangs.

"This is confirmation that President Calderon's strategy doesn't work," said Alberto Islas, a security expert at the consultancy Risk Evaluation. He said the botched arrest demonstrated the weakness of Mexico's own intelligence apparatus.

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Mexico elections: failure of drugs war leaves nation at the crossroads

On 1 July, Mexicans will vote in vital presidential elections. But the issue no candidate dares to address is the cartel violence tearing the nation apart. Diplomats say the time has come to challenge drug policy – but can they get the US to agree?

One after another, Mexico's presidential candidates sat in silence amid the grand setting of Chapúltepec Castle while, across the room, the leader of the country's movement of victims of drug war violence – a poet – chastised them.

"The 60,000 dead, the more than 20,000 who've disappeared, the hundreds of thousands of people displaced, wounded and hunted, the tens of thousands of widows and orphans that this stupid war against drugs is costing us, do not exist for you and your parties," Javier Sicilia accused. "For you, the national emergency does not exist." One after the other, the candidates promised action and showed concern, then they left. It was time to get back to the real business of running for president.

The meeting with Sicilia last month was unavoidable, given the moral weight of the movement he represents, but it was also the only time in the entire three-month campaign when the undisputed issue of the day was the drug war ravaging Mexico.

Polls show that most Mexicans consider security, along with the economy, to be the two biggest issues facing their country, but neither has featured particularly heavily. "Everybody asks me where the security issue is. Why the candidates don't talk about the economy. The elephant in the room is President Felipe Calderón's record, and that is hardly talked about," says pollster Jorge Buendía. In Ciudad Juárez, which has just lost its title as the world's most dangerous city, now ranked second, the chronicler of the violence, journalist Julián Cardona, says: "To look at the candidates speak, you would think they were talking about another country."

But whatever the politicians' speeches, Mexicans know that the country must take urgent measures now to try to put an end to the appalling violence if it is to claim the place in the world its economy justifies. And although Mexico is umbilically tied to the US war on drugs, and fights on the frontline of that war, senior Mexican diplomatic officials suggest to the Observer in private that, whoever wins the election, this must change; that there must be a major rethink and a shift towards initiatives in Latin America that challenge the "war on drugs" to which the US remains committed.

Mexico's ambassador to London, Eduardo Medina Mora, a former attorney general, speaking to the Observer yesterday, said: "I dislike the term 'war on drugs' – it is an over-simplification of a problem that is extremely complex. We have to increase our efforts, deepen our understanding of the problem, look back at what we have done, and correct it. We have to ask ourselves: 'Can there be a better way?'" He added: "We have to look at every aspect: the health aspects and the economic aspects as well as the rule of law. Our priority must be to assure peace for our citizens."

Ahead in the polls is Enrique Peña Nieto of the Institutional Revolutionary party (PRI), which ruled Mexico for seven decades until 2000. His main campaign slogan – "Change" – reflects his efforts to construct an image of an effectiveness and reliability that contrasts with the widespread sense that under the rival, incumbent National Action party Mexico has lost its way, not least because of the drug wars. "This is my pledge," Peña Nieto says, looking straight at the camera, "and you know that I am going to fulfil it."

Running second is leftwinger Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who lost the last vote by a whisker; he heads the Party of the Democratic Revolution, promising "real change" and insisting he is the only candidate who is honest and genuinely cares about the troubles of the country and its population, especially its poor.

Trailing the polls, in the awkward position of being the candidate of a governing party that has manifestly failed to get the country under control, Josefina Vázquez Mota claims to be "different", though it is unclear in what way.

The drug wars are taking place against the backdrop of an economy that has responded robustly to the global crisis. Mexico is becoming a manufacturing powerhouse at a time of vindication for those countries that kept or developed their industrial bases, unlike its crisis-ridden giant northern neighbour. Its aeronautical and auto industries have helped propel growth rates since the crisis of 2008 and recession in 2009, with manufactured goods accounting for 84% of exports. Mexico aims for trade to account for 85% of GDP by 2017.

So the violence is a ball and chain around the ankles of a country with considerable potential. The hope among so many of the electorate, exhausted by the violence, is that the PRI, if it wins, will change gear with regard to America's "war on drugs", maybe even forge a coupling of overt force with other forms of coercion and entreaty. It is of significance that Peña Nieto has co-opted as his main security adviser Oscar Naranjo, the recently retired Colombian police chief who played a major role in confronting and decommissioning the cocaine syndicates. The drug policy expert Alejandro Hope argues that the old arrangement between the PRI and the cartels creates a "possible model, but not a very good one". He points instead to the "so-called demobilisation, disarmament and reintegration in Colombia, initially conceived as a mechanism for reintegrating guerrilla groups… and used to pacify criminal groups".

It is beyond question that during its seven-decade reign over Mexico the PRI operated a modus operandi of conviviality with the cartels. The rationale was that individual politicians and law enforcement officers would benefit, of course, but there was a wider motive – that which in Italy is known as the pax mafiosa, the mafia's peace. Broadly speaking, this means that a modicum of understanding between the cartels and government – national, regional and local – allows for a sufficiently blind official eye to products rolling across the border into the US, in return for which the cartels maintain a balance of power between each other, respect each other's "plazas", or turf, and a general peace.

This is what prevailed throughout the 1970s and 1980s, when Mexican crime syndicates were generally organised within a pyramidal structure under the "don" of drug trafficking, Félix Gallardo, and his formidable Guadalajara cartel.

But in 1989, under pressure from the US, the Mexican government arrested Gallardo, igniting a war for succession to his mantle, and for sections of the border in which he had ordained control. The present savagery began in December 2006, when Calderón sent in the army to try to pacify the battle at the fulcrum of border trade – both illegal and illegal – at Nuevo Laredo, between the Sinaloa cartel, heir to Gallardo's syndicate, and the paramilitary enforcement wing of the Gulf cartel, Los Zetas, now a terrifying cartel in its own right.

Through the ensuing war, Mexico has been rife with rumours that Calderón favoured the Sinaloa cartel and protected its elusive, fugitive leader, Joaquín Guzmán, the world's richest and biggest mafia criminal. According to some US intelligence estimates, only 12% of those arrested since 2006 belong to the main Sinaloa cartel. In the runup to the election, however, two Sinaloa leaders have been arrested, one last week. Accordingly, politics in those areas affected by the drug war – the US border states, Veracruz, Michoacán, Zacatecas and elsewhere – became contaminated by the cartels' positioning themselves politically.

As Rebecca Rodríguez, a human rights worker in war-torn Reynosa in the border state of Tamaulipas, says: "There are elections between the PRI and PAN, but they are no more than Calderón and the army backing the PAN, so the narcos back the PRI. You have the army on one side, the narcos and police on the other, and – in the middle – the economy, education, political life collapsing, normal communication broken down."

The narco cartels have moved on from the 80s. They are pioneers of modern capitalism, and operate a fragmented free market, outsourcing to a miasma of killing interests and street gangs on which it would be impossible for even cartel leaders to impose a pax mafiosa.

The cartels have "substituted the old pyramidal chain of command for the same concession or franchising system as any other corporation", says Ignacio Alvarez Alvarado, a reporter from Ciudad Juárez. "Like a good modern capitalist, the cartel outsources, it puts contracts out to tender, to give other people a chance to compete. They're a business like any other, and the cartels have got much more democratic in the modern, capitalist sense: outsourced, meritocratic and opportunistic," he adds, drolly.

There has been a generational as well as economic evolution: the Zetas epitomise a new "style" of narco that is working-class, uninterested in patronage and the "honour" of the classical mafia represented by Gallardo or the Sicilian "godfather" figure. They are a form of insurgency and extreme violence is their "brand"; they operate across the internet with sick, black humour. They are less interested in playing politics than getting politics to play their game. "It used to be," says a campaigner in Tamaulipas, Mario Trevino, "that the politicians told the narcos what to do. Now the narcos tell the politicians what to do."

There is of course a long-term and genuinely radical course a new Mexican government could take: to shift the gear of its fight against drug cartels closer to the cogent initiatives emerging from Latin America, and notably Colombia, where President Juan Santos launched his call for a complete rethink of global drug policy to incorporate social issues and an assault on the laundering of the vast drug profits by banks in the US and Europe. This is extremely delicate for a country so dependent on the US and a recipient of a vast military aid budget. But, crucially, there are signs that, for all Mexico's bounden relationship to the US, and its acceptance of military aid along with political heavy-handedness, many of those steering the policy of whatever government comes next are anxious to move towards the Colombian position.

Medina Mora speaks with a blend of care and forthrightness. "If we want to face the problem," he says, "we have to have a thorough understanding of what that problem is, and we have to have a leadership that is committed to doing just that. This is not only an issue of drug trafficking, it is an issue of security institutions that are structurally weak, and cannot guarantee peace and security to Mexican people in the areas affected. This is where we want to go: to work on the police, on the judicial system, towards social cohesion and creating opportunities and jobs for the young people who are vulnerable to the criminals – this is quite clear now. We have to re-examine what we have done. We will have to learn from the Colombian achievements, and from Colombian mistakes." A former attorney general, Mora adds: "Consumption and possession of drugs is not criminal in Mexico, and this is right, but it doesn't end there, and I think it's wrong to talk about blanket legalisation – again, this oversimplification of a very, very complex issue."

In a clear reference to Mexico's northern neighbour, the ambassador said: "There has to be an acceptance of responsibility by countries at the consuming end – with a high drug consumption rate – and countries which cannot control their flow of weapons, and countries at the end of the value-added chain – which is always closer to the consumer in any business." But on the matter of money-laundering, he added: "Of course, the money flows to the US bankers, but it is not enough to be always blaming Wall Street – we all have to do something about the value-added end of the chain, again: another very complex issue that needs to be evaluated. This is how the debate should be: what are the policy choices? And to accept that this is not a matter of good and bad, but bad and worse, worse and much worse."

A senior Mexican diplomatic official admitted to the Observer last week: "What we did was to implement only the enforcement side of the drugs crisis. We did not implement a strategy for going after the money-laundering. We did not implement a strategy for restoring the social fabric. Now our priorities have to be: 1, bring peace to the Mexicans in their communities; 2, break the organised crime business model; and 3, turn this from being a national security threat to a public security issue."

And another senior government official said: "Let's have a full, global debate on drug policy. Not on legalisation – that will just polarise everyone again. Let's have a debate that is not ideological, not moral or emotional, but expert and scientific. Let's get the facts, and sit the Americans down to discuss them. And if the Americans close their minds, let's try to open them."

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Marines said they apprehended the man with an arsenal of rifles, pistols and grenades and about $160,000 (£102,000) in cash.

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Mexico City airport shooting leaves three police officers dead – video

The bodies of two Mexican federal police officers are carried away after they were killed in a shootout with suspected drug smugglers at Mexico City's airport on Monday. A third police officer died in hospital. Mexico City has seen relatively low murder rates compared to the rest of the country

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Drugsgeweld drijft Mexicaanse kiezer terug in armen van machtspartij PRI

Het voetbalgekke Mexico heeft vandaag iets anders aan het hoofd dan de EK-finale tussen Italië en Spanje. Xavi en Balotelli zijn even vergeten, onderwerp van elk gesprek zijn Peña Nieto en Obrador; geen voetballers maar presidentskandidaten. De stembussen zijn geopend. Rond middernacht lokale tijd wordt de uitslag verwacht.


In de laatste regeringstermijn van zes jaar, onder leiding van de conservatieve PAN (Partij van Nationale Actie), is het drugsgeweld enkel toegenomen. 'Daar wordt de PAN nu op afgestraft', vertelt Volkskrant-correspondent Marjolein van de Water vanuit Mexicostad. Na twaalf jaar en twee termijnen van de PAN is de kans groot dat de PRI (Institutionele Revolutionaire Partij) terugkeert aan de macht.

Zeventig jaar
Voordat de PAN in 2000 de verkiezingen won, regeerde de PRI zeventig jaar het land. Nog steeds is er veel protest tegen de partij waaronder Mexico op een dictatuur leek. Maar de mensen zijn het geweld zat. De harde hand van PAN-president Felipe Calderon deed het geweld van de drugskartels alleen maar toenemen. PAN verklaarde de oorlog aan het drugsgeweld en bracht het leger in het straatbeeld. In de afgelopen zes jaar zijn 60 duizend mensen omgekomen.

PRI-kandidaat Enrique Peña Nieto belooft nu een terugkeer naar rustiger tijden. Het leger moet terug naar de kazerne, de politie moet weer de orde gaan handhaven op straat; net als toen PRI nog aan de macht was. Vermoedelijk was die rust van toen vooral te danken aan corruptie, toch verlangen veel Mexicanen terug naar de stabiliteit van het PRI-tijdperk. Van de Water: 'Ze denken: laat ze maar dealtjes maken, als het geweld maar ophoudt.'

PAN-kandidate
Kandidate Josefina Vazquez Mota is het nieuwe gezicht van PAN. Maar waarschijnlijk zal ze geen derde PAN-termijn in de wacht kunnen slepen. Ze wil de harde lijn tegen de kartels van Calderon voortzetten, precies het beleid dat de mensen zat zijn. In de peilingen stevent ze af op een derde plaats.

De echte uitdaging voor Peña Nieto komt van Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, kandidaat van de PRD (Partij van de Democratische Revolutie). De linkse Obrador verloor in 2006 nipt van Calderon. Hij beweerde door fraude de verkiezingswinst te zijn ontnomen. Sindsdien noemt hij zich 'de legitieme president van Mexico'. Wat de uitslag ook zal zijn, ook na deze verkiezingen zullen de verhalen over fraude en corruptie weer de ronde doen.

De verkiezingsstrijd overheerst het dagelijks leven, zegt Van de Water. Letterlijk; sinds vrijdag is een droogleggingswet van kracht. 48 uur voor de verkiezingen tot aan het sluiten van de stemlokalen mag er in Mexico niet worden gedronken. Maar ook emotioneel; mensen maken zich grote zorgen over het geweld en hun toekomst. Heel anders dan zes jaar geleden, toen de sfeer eerder apathisch was dan betrokken.

Vandaag komt er na twaalf jaar weer verandering in Mexico, zoveel is zeker. Maar het is vooral het drugsgeweld dat de Mexicaanse kiezer terugdrijft in de armen van de PRI. Een nieuw avontuur met de PRD van Obrador is onder de huidige omstandigheden mogelijk te gedurfd. Rond middernacht weten de Mexicanen wat ze hebben gekozen, in Nederland is het dan zeven uur maandagochtend .

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Colombian ex-police chief flown to US to face drug charges

Mauricio Santoyo, the former president's head of security, alleged to have carried out wiretaps and identified murder targets

A retired police general who served as chief of security for former Colombian president Alvaro Uribe has surrendered to the authorities and was flown to the US to face drug-trafficking charges.

Mauricio Santoyo handed himself over to US agents and was flown to Dulles International airport in Virginia in a US government plane, authorities said. He was to appear before a federal judge in Alexandria, Virginia, on Thursday, the local US attorney's office said in a statement.

An indictment in eastern Virginia charges Santoyo with conspiracy to export cocaine and alleges that he betrayed international counter-narcotics operations from 2002 to 2008. It claims he conducted unauthorised wiretaps on behalf of drug-traffickers and identified murder targets for them.

He is alleged to have received at least $5m (£3.2m) in return.

Santoyo was Uribe's security chief from 2002 to 2005.

The case has been a major issue in Colombia, source of most of the cocaine sold in the US, because of Santoyo's privileged post in Uribe's government, which forged a peace pact with far-right militias, whose leaders included major drug-traffickers.

Before being appointed to the post, Santoyo had run an anti-kidnapping unit in Medellin, where individuals under his command are alleged to have engaged in illegal wiretaps, including of two human rights activists who later disappeared.

The US indictment alleges Santoyo betrayed the Colombian state on behalf of a criminal organisation called the Envigado Office, which in addition to engaging in drug-trafficking also provided "enforcers" including assassins.

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New approaches to drugs in Mexico and South America

Mexico has just elected a new leader, President Enrique Pena Nieto. His predecessor was well known for his commitment to waging the war on drugs that resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of Mexicans.

The new President seems to be calling for a new approach to the drugs issue, moving away from headline-grabbing drugs busts and concentrating instead on protecting people from gangs.

With his policies on drugs so far unclear, it will be interesting to see how this develops. One interesting aside is how calling for new approaches to tackling drugs is now a political positive – not the negative that most people think it is. More leaders should be brave and change the way they deal with drugs.

One country that is doing so is Colombia, which is decriminalizing the possession of small amounts of cocaine and marijuana for personal use. Anyone caught with less than 20 grams of marijuana or one gram of cocaine for personal use may receive physical or psychological treatment depending on their state of consumption, but may not be prosecuted or detained, the court ruled.

This follows the government of Uruguay’s announcement that it will submit a proposal to legalize marijuana under government-controlled regulation and sale.

Let’s hope more countries in the rest of the world follow these brave examples.

http://www.virgin.com/ric(...)co-and-south-america

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Op donderdag 5 juli 2012 09:22 schreef Nielsch het volgende:

[..]

En door de samenwerking met o.a. de Italiaanse 'Ndrangheta - die bijvoorbeeld ook in de haven van Rotterdam zitten - is Europa ook geinfiltreerd.

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Report challenges Mexico's choices in drug war

Associated Press= WASHINGTON (AP) — A congressional report says Mexico's reliance on the military to combat widespread drug violence has been largely ineffective and has led to increases in human rights violations.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee report did commend the administration of President Felipe Calderon for making progress in confronting organized crime bosses. The report, released Thursday, said that effort enjoys strong support from the Mexican people.

At the same time, however, Mexicans doubt that the government can crack down on violence that since December 2006 has led to more than 55,000 drug-related homicides. The report said many Mexicans have little faith in the police and judicial system due to systemic corruption and ineffectiveness.

The report recommends that Congress provide $250 million over four years to help Mexico speed up police and judicial reforms.

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'Stewardessen gedwongen tot drugssmokkel'

Drugsbendes op Curaçao dwingen stewardessen van Nederlandse vliegmaatschappijen drugs naar Nederland te smokkelen. Ook worden families van lokale vliegmedewerkers met de dood bedreigd als ze de drugs niet meenemen, schrijft De Telegraaf vrijdag op basis van verklaringen.

Arkefly-topman Steven van der Heijden bevestigt volgens de krant dat lokale medewerkers worden bedreigd. Een steward van Arkefly is onlangs aangehouden nadat op de luchthaven van Curaçao acht kilo cocaïne in zijn koffertje werd gevonden.

De veiligheid van vliegers en cabinemensen is volgens Van der Heijden in gevaar. "We willen snel maatregelen om smokkeldwang te voorkomen." Een oplossing zou zijn om al het personeel te controleren zodat de methode niet meer loont.

KLM zou zich niet in de situatie herkennen. De krant oppert dat KLM 'niet wil toegeven' of dat de bendes Arkefly pakken omdat het een gemakkelijker doelwit is.

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Op vrijdag 13 juli 2012 09:05 schreef Nielsch het volgende:

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En gelijk heb je. Drugsbendes zouden nooit zoiets gemeens doen als familieleden bedreigen.

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Op vrijdag 13 juli 2012 09:09 schreef Boris_Karloff het volgende:

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Niet snel bij hun onbekende mensen, dat roept nogal negatieve reacties op als ze willekeurig mensen gaan lopen bedreigen. Waardoor ze niet meer aan geld verdienen toe komen.

vergelijk het met al die mensen die roepen dat er iets in hun drinken is gedaan tijdens het stappen. Het is aangetoond dat meer dan 90% van die verhalen gewoon onzin is. En dat die mensen vrijwillig die drugs gebruikt hebben, alleen hebben ze iets teveel gebruikt. Wat is dan makkelijker dan beweren dat iemand dat door je drinken heeft gegooid, dat is veel makkelijker als zelf toegeven dat je fout zat. Maar ondertussen ontstaat wel een beeld dat drugshandelaars in disco's willekeurig bij mensen drugs in het drinken staan te gooien.

Nu gaan we een beeld neerzetten dat drugssmokkelaars mensen gaan lopen bedreigen om drugs te smokkelen terwijl ze genoeg cash hebben om die mensen om te kopen. Welke optie zou jij kiezen als drugssmokkelaar?

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Op vrijdag 13 juli 2012 09:29 schreef Viajero het volgende:

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Beide natuurlijk. Als omkopen niet werkt dan gaan ze bedreigen. Bekend onder de Spaanse formule "Plomo o Plata" (lood of zilver).

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Honduras counts the human rights cost of America's war on drugs

American agents accused of illegal acts in new front line against the narco-traffickers

The deep bullet wound in Hilda Lezama's thigh is a livid pointer to Honduras's unwanted status as the latest front line in America's war on drugs.

For all of her 53 years Lezama has lived in Ahuas, a village of wooden homes built on stilts, close to the fast-flowing Patuca river in the remote Mosquitia region of eastern Honduras. For 25 years, her family have run a business ferrying locals up and down the waterways that link the isolated jungle settlements.

On such a trip two months ago, she was shot from an American helicopter in a counter-narcotics raid involving US drug enforcement agents and Honduran troops. Four other local people, including two women, were killed.

"We were returning from a trip downriver with the fishermen," she remembered. "We were travelling at night to avoid the heat. We heard the helicopters above us, but we couldn't see them. They could have let us dock and then searched the boat, but instead they shot us. Maybe they were thinking we were someone else."

US officials say Lezama's boat had picked up a stash of drugs flown into an airstrip close to the river, a charge she categorically denies. "If we were criminals we could not complain, but we are innocent working people," she insisted.

The Americans say none of their agents opened fire. According to the US ambassador in Honduras, Lisa Kubiske, a preliminary investigation by the Honduran authorities "suggests there was no wrongdoing" by the security officials. That proposition may be tested in the Honduran courts. A human rights group, the Committee of the Relatives of the Disappeared (Cofadeh), has filed a legal complaint against the Honduran and US governments citing violations of human rights.

The Ahuas raid was no isolated incident. Within the last month agents from the US drug enforcement administration (DEA) have shot dead two suspected traffickers in raids in eastern Honduras.

The increasingly aggressive anti-trafficking strategy – codenamed Operation Anvil – is aimed at intercepting illegal drugs flown into the sparsely populated Mosquitia region from South America. More than 80% of the cocaine entering the United States is now thought to be transshipped through Honduras.

The US has long had a military presence at the Palmerola base in central Honduras, but what was once a key asset in the war against the Sandinistas in neighbouring Nicaragua is now focused on the war on drugs.

Honduras has granted the Americans access to three "forward operating bases" in remote areas frequented by the traffickers. DEA agents have been embedded with the Honduran security forces and the operation is supported by six state department helicopters, piloted by non-US security contractors not bound by strict rules of engagement for US service members.

According to Kubiske the new strategy is working: "More than 100 planes came into the country last year with drugs. Now interdictions of drug operations happen on a regular basis … Death or injuries are not the norm."

That is of little comfort to Lezama. She was sent home from hospital when she ran out of money. Heavily bandaged and unable to walk, she scoffs at the US ambassador's talk of a thorough investigation of the Ahuas raid. US officials have not contacted the victims, she said. "My son-in-law was killed, two of my neighbours were killed, and I was wounded, so where are the Americans? Don't you think they should talk to me?"

The Honduran government insists its efforts to combat the traffickers will continue, and so will co-operation with the Americans. Officials point to evidence suggesting Mexican cartels have moved significant resources and manpower into Honduras as a result of the military crackdown on their operations in Mexico.

"Every day, the narco-traffickers are innovating how they work, and changing what they do," said Colonel Ronald Rivera Amador, in charge of Honduran military operations along the Mosquito Coast. "If we place obstacles in the way of their aircraft, they look for other routes, by sea or by land. They have communications, navigation and night-vision equipment that is better than ours."

In the Mosquitia region, long-neglected by the Honduran government, cocaine offers an unrivalled opportunity to make money. But the vast sums are having a corrosive effect throughout Honduras. As the trafficking has risen so have levels of violence, and Honduras now has the world's highest per capita murder rate. Its dominant criminal gangs – Barrio 18 and MS 13 – have forged alliances with some of Latin America's biggest narco-trafficking cartels.

Marlon, 27, was a member of the MS 13 until this year, when he tried to leave the criminal underworld behind. He was shot six times by his own crew, and left for dead. Now he lives in a safe house run by a Honduran charity, and asked only to be identified with a pseudonym.

Acccording to Marlon, MS 13 works closely with the Zetas, one of Mexico's most ruthless cartels. "We were like their servants," he said. "The money was in the millions."

The key to the traffickers' success was corruption, said Marlon. "Always, always, always when drugs are being moved, a member of the military is involved," he said. "They allow police officers to intercept a certain amount of drugs while the other part, majority is coming in through another channel. The police take a minimal amount, just to make it look as if they are doing a good job. Narco-trafficking has taken control of our country, it's everywhere, in politics, even in the churches."

The government has acknowledged that thousands of police officers have ties to organised crime. Officials say they are in the early stages of a purge: lie detector tests and drug-testing are to become mandatory throughout the force.

But the criminal networks are fighting back. The last chief of Honduras's anti-narcotics directorate was assassinated. The man tipped to succeed him was gunned down this year.

Following Mexico's example, the Honduran president, Porfirio Lobo, has ordered the military to join the crackdown on organised crime, and the country's latest anti-drug tsar, Colonel Isaac Santos, was drafted in from the army.

"The narco-traffickers have a huge capacity to corrupt, both forces and individuals," Santos said. "In reality, they have a lot of power. But the government cannot allow Honduras to become a narco-state, with a narco-government and a narco-police force. A terrible war is being fought in Honduras – a war which may affect the destiny of humanity. And as long as there is one honest person we must keep on fighting."

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President Mexico geeft geen cijfers, maar 'drugsoorlog neemt af'

Volgens de Mexicaanse president Felipe Calderon is het aantal drugsgerelateerde moorden in de eerste helft van dit jaar met 15 tot 20 procent gedaald ten opzichten van dezelfde periode vorig jaar. Dat zegt hij in een interview met de Spaanse krant El Pais.

Calderon, die op 1 december wordt opgevolgd door de onlangs verkozen Enrique Peña Nieto, verstrekt in het vraaggesprek geen cijfers. De laatste officiële gegevens dateren uit 2011, toen in de eerste negen maanden 12.903 moorden werden gepleegd vanwege drugs, een stijging van 11 procent ten opzichte van dezelfde periode een jaar eerder.

Gruwelijker
Calderon geeft tijdens het interview toe dat er op dit moment meer mensen omwille van drugs worden vermoord dan aan het begin van zijn ambtsperiode, in 2006. Volgens hem heeft dat echter niets te maken met zijn beleid, maar met het het feit dat de drugskartels steeds gruwelijker te werk gaan.

Vorige maand zei Calderon in een interview met The Wall Street Journal dat het aantal drugsgerelateerde moorden in Mexico in de eerste vijf maanden van 2012 met 12 procent was gedaald. Ook toen kon hij zijn bewering niet staven met cijfers.

Op leven en dood
Sinds eind 2006 is het drugsgerelateerde geweld in Mexico explosief toegenomen. Criminele netwerken leveren een strijd op leven en dood om de beste smokkelroutes richting afzetmarkten in de Verenigde Staten. Tot september vorig jaar zouden daarbij 47.515 mensen om het leven zijn gebracht.

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16-jarige gepakt voor cocaïnesmokkel Schip

Op Schiphol is vandaag een 16-jarige Nederlander aangehouden op verdenking van drugssmokkel. De jongen reisde alleen op een vlucht vanuit Suriname.

Omdat rechercheurs vermoedden dat hij drugs bij zich had, werd hij gecontroleerd. De verdachte heeft inmiddels bolletjes cocaïne geproduceerd. Dat meldde de Koninklijke Marechaussee maandag.

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Spectaculaire drugsvangst in Moskou

De Russische autoriteiten hebben in Moskou een enorme drugsvangst gedaan. Het antidrugsagentschap legde in één klap beslag op 100 ton papaver, meldde persbureau Interfax vandaag.

Van papaver kan ruwe opium worden gemaakt en uiteindelijk ook de harddrug heroïne. De smokkelaars, die de planten uit het buitenland hadden meegebracht naar Rusland, zijn gearresteerd. Informatie over de waarde van de gevonden partij op de zwarte markt is niet gegeven.

Papaver wordt vooral in Afghanistan verbouwd en via Centraal-Azië naar Rusland gesmokkeld.