Pubdate: Sat, 18 Apr 2009
Source: National Post (Canada)
Copyright: 2009 Canwest Publishing Inc.
Contact:  http://www.nationalpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/286
Author: Diane Francis
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

AT WAR ON WAR ON DRUGS

As the Western Hemisphere's leaders begin their Summit of the 
Americas today in Trinidad and Tobago, the issue that dare not speak 
its name should be front and centre, as it was at the World Economic 
Forum here this week, but won't be.

The issue is the United States' foolish and expensive War on Drugs, 
which has not worked and threatens to ruin Mexico, Bolivia and 
Ecuador as it has ruined Colombia.

The issue was articulated this week at the Forum confab when a former 
Colombian president made an impassioned appeal for leaders in Latin 
America to condemn the War on Drugs because it threatens the 
stability of many countries in the hemisphere.

I believe that Canada should join that chorus as the country becomes 
increasingly a battleground between drug traffickers for both 
Canadian and trans-shipment "markets." Estimates are that Canada's 
crop of high-grade marijuana rivals forestry as an export to the 
United States and is worth US$6-billion a year.

Canada is negatively affected by Americans' vast appetite for drugs, 
but several countries in Latin America have been devastated by it.

"Drug usage is unstoppable and the cartels have coyotes [people 
smugglers] putting hundreds of thousands of illegals on the streets 
selling drugs," said Cesar Gaviria, president of Colombia between 
1990 and 1994. "The U. S. consumption has stayed level despite huge 
costs and the jailing of millions of people."

Colombia was the first casualty in the drug wars. Its economy 
collapsed, unemployment reached 20%, 200 municipalities in the rural 
areas were "destroyed" and four million residents fled, along with jobs.

U. S. military help to Colombia for the past several years has 
stopped mass kidnappings, political and police assassinations and 
helped curb "paramilitaries," but the growing of cocaine, opium and 
marijuana is unabated, Gaviria said.

His passionate plea focused on the fact that drug usage is a health 
issue, not a police matter. Americans must recant, abandon their 
drug-prohibition policies and adopt Europeanstyle health care to deal 
with the problem, he said. Because they have not, Mexico has the drug 
interdiction problem that has resulted in 10,000 drug-related murders 
in 2008. Mexico is engaged in a huge military battle with narcotics 
traffickers who have taken over the gigantic business from Colombia's 
cartels. Drugs that used to go from Colombia to the United States now 
flow via the Caribbean and Mexico and Canada.

In the past year, about 4,000 police chiefs, judges, mayors and 
politicians have been assassinated in Mexico as the country is 
gripped in an all-out war against the drug gangsters. This is the 
type of "war" that ruined Colombia's economy, democracy and society. 
After years of trouble, the country is slowly rebuilding.

Likewise, the United States is badly damaged by this unneeded "war," 
Gaviria said.

"The U. S. has half a million people in jail for drug trafficking," 
said Gaviria. "Another 100,000 people who are in jail are there for 
offences related to drugs. "

The United States is spending US$40-billion a year on this plus its 
drug-interdiction system and courts -- all to "keep drug consumption 
where it has been for years," he said.

Fortunately, Barack Obama, the U. S. President, understands that past 
efforts have simply not worked. In 2004, at Northwestern University, 
before he was nominated, he told an audience that the War on Drugs 
was an "utter failure."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom