Pubdate: Tue, 30 May 2000 Source: Houston Chronicle (TX) Copyright: 2000 Houston Chronicle Contact: Viewpoints Editor, P.O. Box 4260 Houston, Texas 77210-4260 Fax: (713) 220-3575 Website: http://www.chron.com/ Forum: http://www.chron.com/content/hcitalk/index.html Author: Karen DeYoung Washington Post U.S. ANTI-DRUG EFFORT IN COLOMBIA HURT BY LACK OF FUNDS WASHINGTON -- U.S.-backed anti-drug programs in Colombia are running out of money and have effectively ground to a halt as Congress delays emergency funding for military training and other activities, senior Clinton administration officials say. Anticipating that Congress would quickly pass a $1.3 billion supplemental appropriation requested on an emergency basis in January, the administration began expanding the anti-drug effort early this year and stepped up spending. But the funding package has been held up in the Senate for months and now appears unlikely to move forward until at least midsummer. In the meantime, according to officials seeking to emphasize the urgency of the problem, leftist guerrillas and right-wing paramilitary forces involved in the drug trade have stepped up deployment and strengthened their defenses in the main regions where coca, the basic ingredient of cocaine, is grown. Instead of leveling off, as the administration had hoped, production of cocaine is likely to increase this year. Among the results of the funding shortfall cited by officials: . Fumigation flights against coca, a centerpiece of the anti-drug effort have been scaled back or stopped in many key areas. Officials estimate that Colombian cocaine supplies more than 80 percent of the U.S. market. Aerial fumigation of opium poppies, the raw material of heroin, has been stopped. . A special Colombian army anti-drug battalion, trained at U.S. expense last year, has yet to undertake its first mission, because the helicopters it is supposed to use are not available. . A second 1,000-man battalion -- recruited, vetted for human rights violations and moved two months ago to a training base in southern Colombia -- is "doing jumping jacks" while waiting for U.S. Army Special Forces trainers for whom no funding has been approved, said one official. Administration officials previously had reassured Congress that the proposed remedy would begin to turn the tide in Colombia and, some years from now, stem the flood of drugs into the United States. That was enough to sail the emergency $1.3 billion supplemental appropriation through the House in March and send it to the Senate. But some senators remain opposed to the package, holding that the Colombian military should be ineligible for aid because of human rights abuses, that the plan itself is poorly conceived and risks U.S. involvement in a guerrilla war, or that anti-drug money is better spent on prevention efforts at home. "The administration has yet to say what they expect to achieve, in what period of time, at what cost, and at what risk to hundreds of American advisers there," said Tim Rieser, an aide to Sen. Patrick J. Leahy, D-Vt., one of the leading opponents of the measure. But "if the Republican leadership wanted to get the aid passed," Rieser said, "they could do it." Aid opponents agree that the votes are there to pass it. All sides blame the delay on Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., who took the lead last year in urging the administration to deal expeditiously with Colombia and who repeated last week, "I'm for the president's proposal with regard to the Colombian drug war." But Lott's refusal to consider the aid an emergency measure and his insistence on attaching it to the regular foreign operations bill -- which has become bogged down in an unrelated Senate fight -- doomed it. Even if the bill passes this summer, Colombia might not see a dime before the end of the year. - --- MAP posted-by: Allan Wilkinson