Pubdate: Sun, 15 May 2005
Source: Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)
Contact:  2005 The Sydney Morning Herald
Website: http://www.smh.com.au/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/441
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/colombia.htm (Colombia)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)

$460M COCAINE SEIZED IN WORLD'S BIGGEST DRUG BUST

Colombian authorities have seized $US350 million ($460 million) worth
of cocaine stashed on a jungle riverbank by far-right paramilitary
groups in what police called the biggest cocaine bust in history.

Police and navy personnel confiscated 13.8 tonnes of cocaine hidden on
the banks of the River Mira, near the Pacific Ocean port of Tumaco in
southern Colombia, in an operation that ended on Friday.

With a street value of about $US25,000 a kilogram in the US, where
police think the drugs were headed, the cocaine would sell for a total
of about $US350 million.

"This is the biggest haul ever seized in the world in a single
operation, in a single day and in a single place," Colombia's national
police chief General Jorge Castro said.

The drugs belonged to members of the United Self-Defence Forces of
Colombia, an outlawed far-right militia known by its Spanish initials
AUC that has killed thousands of people in its brutal campaign against
Marxist rebels, police said.

The seizure came just as the US Congress debates a request from the
Bush Administration for $US600 million in aid money for Colombia's
anti-cocaine effort.

Some congressmen have complained there is no evidence showing that the
amount of cocaine on US streets has declined despite more than $US3
billion in assistance to Colombia since 2000.

In the Tumaco operation, armed agents made five arrests and seized
nine assault rifles, communications equipment and eight boats.

Working with the US, Colombian authorities have significantly
increased seizures in recent years, and last year they confiscated 148
tonnes of cocaine.

The lawlessness caused by a four-decade-long guerilla war has helped
make Colombia the world's largest producer of the drug, with the US
Government estimating the country's criminals produced about 430
tonnes in 2004. But this is down from about 700 tonnes in 2001, thanks
to a US-backed program of spraying illegal coca crops.

Critics of the program point out that US street prices for cocaine
have hardly budged over the period, indicating that as much as ever is
probably flowing into the country.

The AUC and Marxist rebels both draw on cocaine money to buy weapons
in a conflict that claims thousands of lives a year. While they are
bloody rivals on the battlefield, the AUC often cooperates with the
rebels in the drug trade.

Police believe the paramilitary groups probably bought the cocaine
found last week from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake