Pubdate: Mon, 23 Jun 2003
Source: Register-Guard, The (OR)
Copyright: 2003 The Register-Guard
Contact:  http://www.registerguard.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/362
Author: T. Christian Miller, Los Angeles Times

VIOLENCE STAINS COCAINE'S NEW HAVEN

ZACAPA, Guatemala - An exploding drug trade aided by extensive government 
corruption has turned Guatemala into the primary safe haven for Colombia's 
cocaine headed through Mexico to the United States, according to U.S. and 
Guatemalan authorities.

An estimated 200 metric tons of cocaine passed through Guatemala last year, 
more than two-thirds of U.S. consumption of the drug, according to State 
Department officials.

The increased flow - nearly triple the amount estimated a decade ago - has 
turned parts of Guatemala into lawless zones ruled by family-controlled 
transit cartels.

Here, where men wear holstered 9 mm pistols in public and judges fear for 
their lives, violence and corruption have exploded in recent months, say 
local judicial officials.

"It's a kind of Old West," said Alberto Brunori, the regional director of 
the United Nation's mission here. "There are a lot of people involved in 
the drug trade. You can see that."

The drug trade has become so rampant that the Bush administration earlier 
this year blacklisted Guatemala for failing to cooperate in the fight 
against drugs - one of only three such countries in the world, including 
Burma and Haiti. However, the government waived the requirement that the 
United States cut aid to Guatemala, citing the country's ongoing poverty 
and social unrest.

The U.S. government has also convened a federal grand jury to investigate 
charges of corruption involving highly placed government and ex-military 
officials for laundering money through U.S. banks, according to Guatemala's 
former top anticorruption prosecutor, Karen Fischer.

Fischer, who resigned in March after allegedly receiving pressure to drop a 
money laundering case involving President Alfonso Portillo, said she has 
offered to serve as a witness for the U.S. case, which involves the 
diversion of $15 million in government funds.

Guatemalan government officials deny that there are any direct, high-level 
links to drug traffickers, though they acknowledge that there have been 
shortcomings in the drug war the past few years. They blame the United 
States for failing to provide enough assistance to combat drug traffickers, 
whose speedy boats and airplanes overwhelm the underfunded Guatemalan 
police force.

Portillo has repeatedly declared his innocence, though the investigations 
have placed him under pressure

Indications of collaboration between drug traffickers and government 
officials are numerous. Last year, officers from Guatemala's anti-drug 
police force were accused by local prosecutors of stealing more cocaine 
from police warehouses than they seized. Cocaine seizures have dropped from 
an average of 9.7 tons per year in the two years before Portillo took 
office to an average of 2.8 tons per year over the past three years.

U.S. officials believe the decline reflects the effects of paid-off 
government officials, not a decline in drug trafficking.
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