Pubdate: Wed, 22 Nov 2000
Source: San Jose Mercury News (CA)
Copyright: 2000 San Jose Mercury News
Contact:  750 Ridder Park Drive, San Jose, CA 95190
Fax: (408) 271-3792
Website: http://www.sjmercury.com/
Author: Kevin G. Hall

COCAINE WAR'S NEGLECTED FRONT: CHEMICALS

Refining Process Requires Large Shipments That Can Be Tracked

MANAUS, Brazil -- Although the Clinton administration has declared a risky 
$1.3 billion war against Latin America's cocaine trade, it isn't fighting 
on what may be the easiest and most promising front.

The administration is providing massive military and other aid to help 
Colombia and other Andean nations stop coca growing, processing and 
trafficking, but experts say the chemicals needed to refine cocaine from 
coca leaves continue to flow unhindered to drug labs. Each country involved 
blames another for the problem.

Widespread Involvement

"I don't remember in the past decade a systematic and massive campaign in 
South America to control precursors," said Roger Rumrill, a Peru-based 
expert in Andean narcotics production. "This is a contraband product, and 
many people are involved, ranging from businessmen to the government -- 
including police."

In theory, it's much easier to interdict shipments of the chemicals used to 
make cocaine than it is to ferret out cocaine smuggling. The companies that 
make the chemicals, known as precursors, are well-known. The precursors are 
usually shipped by land or sea, and their bulk and modest value make it 
hard to hide them.

So why not declare war on 55-gallon drums of sulfuric acid, acetone, 
potassium permanganate and other chemicals chugging up the Amazon?

Not so fast. Global free-trade rules permit little regulation of chemicals 
that have legitimate uses. And the same chemicals that are used to refine 
cocaine have many legitimate uses, including water purification, so 
shipments can't be seized unless authorities have reason to believe they're 
intended for use in making cocaine.

The United States has asked South American countries to document who's 
using these chemicals. The effort to track precursors hasn't been very 
disciplined, however, and seizures remain meager, despite years of 
encouragement by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the State 
Department.

U.S. anti-drug czar Gen. Barry McCaffrey acknowledged in an interview that 
effective measures to keep precursor chemicals out of the hands of cocaine 
producers "ain't there yet." As proof the initiative "has been a failure," 
McCaffrey noted that Colombia produced 520 metric tons of cocaine last year.

To make cocaine, jungle drug-lab operators need lots of kerosene. It's 
poured with water into plastic-lined pits filled with leaves from the coca 
plant. Barefoot workers stomp the mixture into a mushy paste.

Next, sulfuric acid and potassium permanganate are added to dry and 
condense the paste.

Solvents such as acetone are then used to dissolve the cocaine base, which 
is poured or pressed through cloth to yield snowy white and highly 
addictive cocaine hydrochloride crystals.

Colombian Defense Minister Luis Ram(acu)rez Acu=F1a, interviewed in 
Brazil's steamy Amazon capital of Manaus, said precursor chemicals are 
shipped to clandestine cocaine labs via canoes and riverboats on "water 
highways" in the Amazon River system in Brazil and the Orinoco River system 
in Venezuela.

Not so, said Venezuelan Defense Minister Gen. Ismael Hurtado, who, like 
Ram(acu)rez, was in Manaus for a regional military conference.

"Let's not forget that one of the biggest exporters of these chemicals is 
the United States, not Venezuela or Brazil," Hurtado said. He said his 
country, a major petroleum exporter and a leading manufacturer of solvents 
used to make cocaine, had been cracking down hard on precursors.

Venezuelan police interdicted shipments of 75 tons of potassium 
permanganate last year, according to government figures, plus 1,585 gallons 
of solvents. This year seizures are running lower, possibly because of 
tougher import regulations.

Colombia says it sidelined 522,000 gallons of liquid precursors and almost 
523 pounds of solid precursors this year. Colombian police closed 27 
companies and indicted 59 people for precursor-related offenses.

Colombia blames Brazil, home to South America's biggest chemical industry, 
particularly the vast free-trade zone in Manaus, where legitimately 
imported chemicals are often repackaged and diverted to upriver drug labs.

According to Mauro Sposito, the head of Brazil's anti-drug operations in 
the Amazon region, 256 companies in Manaus import chemicals that also could 
be used to make cocaine for their manufacturing operations.

Sao Paulo, in southern Brazil, also produces lots of precursor chemicals, 
but they're trucked to Bolivia, not shipped by river. So Sposito sees no 
Brazilian precursor problem. ``Up to now, we haven't had a single 
apprehension of chemical products (on the rivers),'' he said of his force 
of 180 men and 18 patrol boats.

State Department Report

The U.S. State Department, in its March 2000 report on international 
narcotics, said Argentina and Brazil are the leading makers of precursors. 
Paraguay and Bolivia are transit points for the chemicals, it said, and 
Brazil, Venezuela, Peru and Ecuador are increasingly the hosts of 
clandestine cocaine labs.

"Everybody needs to do more in this area, needs to be more aware of 
chemical control as a potentially potent law enforcement tool," said a U.S. 
Drug Enforcement Administration official charged with fighting the 
diversion of precursor chemicals, who asked not to be identified. "We can 
include ourselves in this area, too."

Mexico, the chief transit point for cocaine that's headed for the United 
States, limits precursor chemicals to entry and exit through 12 points. 
Mexico has pressed, unsuccessfully, for the United States to adopt similar 
restrictions=2E

Under federal law, U.S. exporters of 22 regulated precursor chemicals must 
notify the DEA 15 days before export and must list the recipient. A 
speedier process covers exports to longstanding customers.

U.S. chemical manufacturers say they have worked with the DEA to identify 
"warning indicators" such as uncommon routes, unusual delivery times or 
requests and unfamiliar buyers.

"They are more aggressive now than I have ever seen. The illegitimate 
customers are getting a lot more savvy," said Marybeth Kelliher, senior 
manager of international trade for the American Chemical Council, whose 193 
members boast 90 percent of U.S. manufacturing capacity.

Shipments Tracked

Progress is being made in controlling one key precursor, potassium 
permanganate -- a chemical used in water purification that is produced in 
only a dozen or so countries. Paperwork on any shipment greater than 97 
pounds is shared with authorities. The DEA says more than 35 million pounds 
was tracked between April 1999 and September 2000, with 51 shipments 
stopped totaling almost 6.6 million pounds, with 35 arrests. The effort is 
believed to have cut cocaine production sharply in Bolivia.

One weakness continues to be brokers: legitimate intermediaries in 
international trade who are harder to regulate because they are not the 
chemicals' final users. They often operate in free-trade zones such as 
Manaus and elsewhere, where the DEA says controls are weaker.

"The real problem is that what you are really doing is controlling licit 
trade," said a State Department official who's working to prevent the 
diversion of precursor chemicals and requested anonymity. "A lot of 
countries don't like to provide information on what they consider licit trade."

Morris Thompson of the Mercury News Mexico City Bureau contributed to this 
report.
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