Pubdate: Mon, 27 Nov 2000
Source: Washington Times (DC)
Copyright: 2000 News World Communications, Inc.
Contact:  http://www.washtimes.com/
Author: Jeremy McDermott, London Sunday Telegraph

INTERNATIONAL RAID NETS 2,876 ARRESTS

MEDELLIN, Colombia - U.S.-led agents have arrested thousands of people and 
seized tons of drugs in the world's biggest anti-narcotics operation - a 
venture that involved hide-outs in snake-infested bunkers and powerboat 
chases worthy of James Bond.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) coordinated the drug bust, 
named Operation Liberator, which took place across the Caribbean this 
month. Officials from Britain and 30 other countries were involved.

Powerboats, modified helicopters, highly trained sniffer dogs, trackers and 
spy aircraft were used to trap suspects. Cocaine laboratories were smashed 
and heroin-poppy fields were burned.

Some agents had tracked their quarry for months along mountain goat trails 
in Venezuela and Colombia and on tracks across the desert near the 
U.S.-Mexican border.

Other agents hid in caves where tons of cocaine had been bagged and made 
ready for loading onto ships. Some posed as buyers, setting up meetings in 
restaurants with suspected dealers or parachuted into jungle encampments 
located with the help of satellites.

One trail ended in a speedboat chase complete with volleys of bullets 
similar to the opening sequence of the latest Bond film, this time with the 
Orinoco delta as a backdrop rather than London's Docklands. The agents 
finally forced the two boats laden with cocaine onto an island, although 
the crews escaped.

More than 39,000 searches were carried out in three weeks of raids 
unprecedented both in scale and the extent of cooperation among countries.

Michael Vigil, the Caribbean director of the DEA, said 2,876 persons were 
arrested, more than 20 tons of cocaine seized and $42 million in other 
assets confiscated.

Agents also dismantled 94 drug factories, seized 82,170 Ecstasy tablets and 
burned 9 square miles of poppy, coca and marijuana fields.

Some of those arrested were kingpins of the drug world, such as Martires 
Paulino Castro, who is accused of running a network from St. Martin in the 
West Indies to New York, and shipping two tons of Colombian cocaine to New 
York every month.

Named after Simon Bolivar, the champion of Latin American freedom, 
Operation Liberator was the fourth and most extensive in a two-year program 
of raids. A raid two months ago led to the capture of Ivan De La Vega, 
thought to be the leader of the biggest cocaine-trafficking operation in 
Colombia, along with $910 million worth of cocaine, much of which was 
destined for Scotland.

Among the goods seized in the operation were a selection of speedboats used 
by smugglers, known as "go-fasts," painted blue to make them difficult to 
spot at sea.

At the naval base of the historic Colombian city of Cartagena, Capt. Jose 
Gabriel Escobar, the commander of the Atlantic coast guard, which took part 
in the operation, pointed out an impounded go-fast moored alongside the 
naval workshop.

"This baby would not stop," he said. "We have no boats fast enough to catch 
her. It took four Special Forces men abseiling from a helicopter to capture 
her. She was carrying half a ton of coke."

Capt. Escobar said it is almost impossible to catch the go-fasts.

"The drug traffickers usually scuttle the boats once the load has been 
delivered," he said.

"What's a boat worth less than $70,000 when you are making more than $20 
million pure profit for even a small load?"

Although a senior British Customs official said Operation Liberator had 
landed "a crippling blow" on the narcotics industry, the business is so 
large and decentralized that the raids may have had only limited effect: 
The street price of drugs in New York remains unchanged.

The seizure of 20 tons of cocaine is not even a dent in supply compared 
with the estimated 700 tons of cocaine leaving Colombia every year.

Even so, the operation has been heralded as beginning a new era in 
international cooperation.

"This operation succeeded because of the relaxation of sovereignty issues 
that many times in the past had acted as a barrier to law-enforcement 
operations," said Mr. Vigil.
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