Pubdate: Wed, 21 Dec 2005
Source: Indianapolis Star (IN)
Website: http://www.starnews.com/
Feedback: http://www.indystar.com/help/contact/letters.html
Address: P.O. Box 145, Indianapolis, IN 46206
Copyright: 2006 Indianapolis Newspapers Inc.
Author: Associated Press
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)

BOLIVIA'S PRESIDENT-TO-BE MAPS COCA PLAN

LA PAZ, Bolivia -- Bolivia's soon-to-be president, Evo Morales, a 
coca farmer under pressure to crack down on cocaine, pledged Tuesday 
to keep controls on coca but said he will study expanding the area 
where it can be legally grown.

Morales also called on the United States to work with him to develop 
better ways of ending drug trafficking while preserving the 
traditional market for coca in his Andean nation, where people have 
chewed the plant to stave off hunger and used it as a medicine for 
thousands of years.

"There won't be free cultivation of the coca leaf," said Morales, who 
still has his own coca plot and came to prominence leading fellow 
growers -- "cocaleros" -- in fighting U.S.-backed efforts to 
eradicate coca in Bolivia, the No. 3 supplier of cocaine to the 
United States after Colombia and Peru.

Morales' apparently wide victory margin in Sunday's election 
virtually assures that Congress will declare him president in 
January, even if he falls shy of the majority needed to win outright 
in the eight-man race. And a majority win appears increasingly 
likely, since Morales already had slightly more than 50 percent 
Tuesday with half the vote -- including much of his rural support -- 
still uncounted, according to official results. His opponents have conceded.

The U.S.-led war on drugs inadvertently helped bring Morales, a 
leftist Aymara Indian, to power. The battle against coca eradication 
that he led helped mobilize Indian organizations angered by poverty 
and political domination by a rich elite.

Indians are a majority in Bolivia, but never has the nation had an 
Indian president.
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman