War on Drugs

waltky · 06-20-2008, 03:06 PM

Drug war refugees...

Mexicans Moving Across Border to Flee Drug Crime
20 June `08 - A growing stream of Mexican professionals are relocating to the USA to get away from Mexico's drug wars, USA Today reported.

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In February, Salvador Urbina decided he was tired of the shootouts, the kidnappings and the military patrols in the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juárez. So he put his house up for sale, packed up his car, and moved his wife and children across the border to El Paso, joining a growing stream of professionals who are relocating to the USA to get away from Mexico's drug wars.

"I didn't want to leave," said Urbina, a lawyer. "But there's a very deep psychosis developing in Juárez. Criminals are taking advantage of the situation there. Every day I worried about the safety of my wife and family." In U.S. cities along the border, middle-class Mexicans are buying homes or renting apartments and even moving their businesses across the border, say real estate agents, chambers of commerce and city officials. Many are getting investor visas for a long-term stay.

Dropping housing prices in the USA are part of the draw, said Mireya Durazo, a real estate agent in San Diego, across the border from Tijuana. But the main impetus is a wave of violence unleashed by Mexico's 18-month-old crackdown on drug cartels, she said. "First it was the dentists, then lawyers and doctors … now it's teachers, owners of little stores, people from the working class," Durazo said. Drug gangs are increasingly bringing civilians into the fray as they battle soldiers and each other for control of drug smuggling corridors, known as "plazas."

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waltky · 06-27-2008, 12:33 AM

Drugs fueling terrorists...

UN drug chief: Insurgents complicating drug war
Jun 26, `08 - More than ever before, authorities waging the global war on drugs are up against real insurgents.

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Worldwide, illicit cultivation of opium and coca - the raw materials for heroin and cocaine - is rising as militants in Afghanistan, Colombia and Myanmar consolidate their control of key drug-producing areas, the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime warns in a new report. "The explosion of narcotics in those areas is explained by their presence and the protection they offer," agency chief Antonio Maria Costa told The Associated Press in an interview Wednesday.

"I believe that slowly these people, although politically motivated at the beginning, are becoming a kind of organized crime," he said. "Money tends to stick to fingers, and a big lump of money becomes very problematic." In its World Drug Report 2008 being released Thursday, Costa's office calls the glut of opium and coca "a very recent surge" and draws a direct link to Taliban militants in Afghanistan, armed revolutionaries in Colombia and several ethnic insurgency groups in Myanmar.

Afghanistan had a record opium poppy harvest in 2007, nearly doubling worldwide illegal opium production. U.N. experts say 80 percent of the poppy was grown in five southern provinces where Taliban fighters profit from drugs. "In the southern areas controlled by the Taliban, counter-narcotics and counter-insurgency must be fought together," Costa said. Officials say the expanding role of insurgents in the global narcotics trade is especially worrisome because their drug profits are used to bribe police and government authorities and to help finance terrorists.

More My Way News - UN drug chief: Insurgents complicating drug war

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China could have 2.3 million drug addicts
June 26,`08 : With drug abuse on the rise in China, there could be estimated 2.3 million drug addicts in the country, according to a health official.

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The new 2008 Annual Report on Drug Control in China has revealed that number of known drug addicts in the country has risen to 1 million from 900,000 in 2006 "Our investigations in some high-risk cities show the ratio between known and unidentified drug addicts is about 1:1.3," China Daily quoted Yang Fengrui, director of the anti-drug bureau of the Ministry of Public Security, as saying.

That means it is suspected up to 1.3 million addicts are yet to be identified. Fengrui blames the increasing number of drug addicts to the new types of drugs such as Ice and Ketamine made in China. He said that nearly 80 percent of the drug addicts in China are addicted to heroin, but the number of those addicted to new types of drugs such as Ice and Ketamine is growing rapidly, especially among people below 35.

"Migrant workers in cities have become a high-risk group," he said. According to the police figures, 5.8 tons of Ice was seized in the country last year, up 26 percent over 2006, though heroin seizures fell to 5.9 tons from the 6.6 tons in 2006.

China could have 2.3 million drug addicts

waltky · 07-01-2008, 02:30 AM

San Fran harboring drug dealers...

San Francisco 'Protecting the Rights' of Young Honduran Crack Dealers
Sunday, June 29, 2008 - Feds probe S.F.'s migrant-offender shield

Quote:

San Francisco juvenile probation officials - citing the city's immigrant sanctuary status - are protecting Honduran youths caught dealing crack cocaine from possible federal deportation and have given some offenders a city-paid flight home with carte blanche to return. The city's practices recently prompted a federal criminal investigation into whether San Francisco has been systematically circumventing U.S. immigration law, according to officials with knowledge of the matter.

City officials say they are trying to balance their obligations under federal and state law with local court orders and San Francisco's policies aimed at protecting the rights of the young immigrants, who they say are often victims of exploitation. Federal authorities counter that drug kingpins are indeed exploiting the immigrants, but that the city's stance allows them to get away with "gaming the system."

San Francisco juvenile authorities have been grappling for several years with an influx of young Honduran immigrants dealing crack in the Mission District and Tenderloin. Those who are arrested routinely say they are minors, but police suspect that many are actually adults, living communally in Oakland and other cities at the behest of drug traffickers who claim to be their relatives. Nonetheless, city authorities have typically accepted the suspects' stories and handled the cases in Juvenile Court, where proceedings are often shielded from public scrutiny.

Unorthodox strategy

Eagle One · 07-01-2008, 05:19 AM

"Many are getting investor visas for a long-term stay."

How "many" of the millions of dirtbags illegally infesting the USA have investor visas?

To the few Mexicans who immigrate legally with investor visas I say welcome and good luck to you, but leave your Mexican 'culture' in Mexico.

I don't care too much about a person's nationality of country of origin, but Mexicans have fouled their own nest with their third-world way of thinking, and are flooding into America, not to be American, but only because they need a new nest. They bring with them the same fouled up way of thinking that has made Mexico the toilet it is today.

Mexico's drug wars, corruption, killing and crime are only the symptoms, not the cause of their problems.

waltky · 07-16-2008, 12:15 AM

Who needs a visa when you can bribe border patrol...

Drug smugglers bribing U.S. agents on Mexico border
Tue Jul 15, 2008 - U.S. Border Patrol agent Reynaldo Zuniga was arrested last month lugging a bag of cocaine up from the Rio Grande, one of a growing number of law enforcement officers accused of taking bribes from drug gangs.

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Former colleagues say Zuniga used to wait until agents in the south Texas town of Harlingen were distracted with paperwork, then slip down to the river and help smuggle in drugs from Mexico. The increasing use of bribes by Mexican drug cartels to corrupt U.S. agents comes as Washington is sending $400 million to help Mexico's army-led war on the trafficking gangs, whose brutal murders have surged to unprecedented levels.

"Zuniga was a good agent and a hard worker. I can't understand why he would do this. We're supposed to be protecting our borders," said Border Patrol agent Daniel Doty, a former colleague. Data on agents convicted of graft are not made public, but the U.S. government is probing hundreds of border corruption cases where a decade ago it saw a few dozen a year. The FBI-led Border Corruption Task Force says it is busier than ever.

"We've seen a sharp increase in investigations along the border over the past three years," said Andy Black, who oversees the San Diego task force, near the busy border crossing of San Ysidro. "We are talking about a minority of agents but they are a very significant threat, a weak link in efforts to secure the border."

More Drug smugglers bribing U.S. agents on Mexico border | International | Reuters

waltky · 08-01-2008, 12:43 AM

Mexican gov't. official's family found murdered...

Mexican minister's family found dead
August 01, 2008 - SIX relatives of Mexico's Agriculture Minister Alberto Cardenas, including two girls aged seven and eight, were found executed in his home, authorities said today.

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The bodies were discovered yesterday by a man who told authorities that he had last seen the family on Tuesday, said Marco Moran Ferrer of the state attorney general's office.

The man, whose identity was witheld, had not heard from the family so he went to check on them and found them all shot dead inside the home in western Jalisco state.

The victims included a couple, their three children and the woman's sister. The two sisters are cousins of the minister, who owns the property where the crime took place. The family had been forced to abandon a previous home two months ago after two other relatives were abducted.

Mexican minister's family found dead | NEWS.com.au

waltky · 08-13-2008, 02:27 AM

Druglords gonna be runnin' Bolivia pretty soon...

Bolivia to sideline U.S. in anti-cocaine war
Tue Aug 12, 2008 - Frustrated by the way the United States spends money to fight cocaine production in Bolivia, the government has decided to take over the program, the country's anti-drug tsar said on Tuesday.

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"We're planning to nationalize the war against drug trafficking," Felipe Caceres told Reuters. "We will still welcome cooperation in the future, but the Bolivian government will decide how that money will be spent." "It's a question of sovereignty, of dignity," added Caceres, President Evo Morales' deputy minister of social defense and controlled substances.

Caceres, who like Morales owns a plot for growing coca, the raw material used to make cocaine, advocates cultivation of the plant for traditional uses such as making tea and fighting altitude sickness and hunger. But as South America's poorest country distances itself from its colonial past with Morales' reforms and seeks to break away from U.S. influence, the government also wants to be the leading voice in the domestic war against narcotics.

Bolivia is the world No.3 cocaine producer after Colombia and Peru. The United States has contributed about $25 million to interdiction efforts this year. It also funds programs to encourage coca farmers to switch to alternative crops like peppers, bananas, citrus fruits and coffee.

More Bolivia to sideline U.S. in anti-cocaine war | Special Coverage | Reuters

waltky · 09-01-2008, 11:35 AM

Chavez not much help...

Venezuela: No anti-drugs pact with US
Sun Aug 31, `08 - Venezuela on Sunday rejected U.S. requests to resume cooperation in the war on drugs, saying it has made progress despite an alleged fourfold-gain in the amount of Colombian cocaine now passing through its territory.

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In the latest barb-trading over the issue, Venezuela dismissed U.S. attempts to renew talks on drugs as "useless and inopportune," saying U.S. officials should focus on slashing demand for drugs at home rather than blaming setbacks on other nations' supposed lack of cooperation. "The anti-drug fight in Venezuela has shown significant progress during recent years, especially since the government ended official cooperation programs with the DEA," Venezuela's foreign ministry said in a statement. President Hugo Chavez suspended cooperation with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration in August 2005, accusing its agents of espionage.

Since then, Venezuela has refused to help U.S. officials combat drug trafficking, White House drug czar John Walters said. U.S. law enforcement has detected a wave of flights that depart Venezuela and drop large loads of cocaine off the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, while other multi-ton loads are moved by boat and air to west Africa — a way station for shipments to Europe, Walters said. He said the flow of Colombian cocaine through Venezuela has quadrupled since 2004, reaching an estimated 282 tons (256 metric tons) last year.

On Sunday, Chavez responded angrily to Walter's comments, calling him "stupid" for suggesting that drug smuggling through Venezuela has increased. Chavez also took issue with recent statements made by U.S. Ambassador Patrick Duddy, saying the diplomat is risking possible expulsion from Venezuela and would soon be "packing his bags" if he's not careful. Duddy told reporters on Saturday that deteriorating diplomatic relations between Caracas and Washington are giving drug smugglers the upper hand.

Source

waltky · 10-03-2008, 05:45 PM

Coast Guard intercepts big cocaine shipment...

Feds Bust Ship Smuggling $58M in Cocaine
Oct. 2, 2008 - Authorities Stopped the Panamanian Ship Megan Star in the Caribbean

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In another reminder of how huge the cocaine market remains, U.S. law enforcement and authorities in the Caribbean have seized $58 million worth of cocaine on the Megan Star, a ship bearing the Panamanian flag. A team of Drug Enforcement Administration and U.S. Coast Guard authorities recently discovered the cocaine after the U.S. Naval Frigate USS Farragut intercepted the Megan Star near Puerto Rico. Authorities have detained the 10-member crew of the ship, composed of nationals of Costa Rica, Ecuador, India, Nicaragua and Spain. The recent cocaine bust is indicative of robust drug smuggling from South America to Africa, Europe and the United States, according to law enforcement sources.

Police officials say they have seen a surge in seaside busts in the Atlantic and Pacific as the United States has tightened its border with Mexico. Authorities caught alleged smugglers on the fishing vessel Mar Pacifico in September 2007. Officials say they found an estimated three metric tons of cocaine that had been mixed with fuel in an effort to conceal it on the ship, which was sailing the Pacific Ocean, west of Ecuador

A month before, officials stopped a semisubmersible vessel they believe was carrying about five metric tons of cocaine, with an approximate street value of $353 million. Smugglers allegedly sank the sub on purpose to thwart authorities, so only 1,210 pounds were recovered. In April 2007, officials spotted the fishing vessel Emperador in the Pacific Ocean; a search of the boat yielded almost 11,000 pounds of liquid cocaine. One month before, the U.S. Coast Guard seized more than 40,000 pounds of cocaine from the Panamanian ship Gatun.

ABC News: Feds Bust Ship Smuggling $58M in Cocaine

waltky · 10-08-2008, 01:36 AM

FARC supplyin' Mexican druglords...

Colombian official: FARC, Mexican cartels linked
October 7, 2008 -- Mexican drug cartels buying drugs from FARC rebels, Colombian official says; Organized crime among greatest threats to region's stability, OAS leader says; Mexican president urges regional database on criminals and their activities; Mexican leader calls on U.S. to do more to stop flow of weapons into his country

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Mexico's powerful drug cartels are buying drugs directly from Colombia's main rebel group, a senior Colombian defense official said Tuesday at a hemispheric meeting on crime. The finance chief of the FARC rebel unit along the Ecuador-Colombia border is the main contact with the Mexican gangs that purchase cocaine from the rebels, said Sergio Jaramillo, Colombia's deputy defense minister. "We are particularly worried about the strengthening connections between Mexican cartels and the FARC," Jaramillo said. "The Mexican cartels are buying directly from the FARC."

He identified the finance chief as Oliver Solarte, a member of the 48th Front of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, which operates on the border. Jaramillo refused to give more details, saying he didn't want to compromise intelligence reports. He spoke at the inauguration of a two-day security meeting of the Organization of American States in Mexico City. Ecuador broke diplomatic relations with Colombia on March 3 over a cross-border raid by Colombia on a FARC camp that killed a top rebel leader and 24 others. The camp was in an area where the 48th Front operates.

Jaramillo said the FARC controls most of Colombia's cocaine trade, though right-wing paramilitary bands and other mafias also are involved. The FARC in recent years often has operated on the Ecuadoran side of a highly porous jungle border. It smuggles arms and other supplies into Colombia and smuggles out much of the cocaine that funds the rebels' more than four-decade-old insurgency. U.S. officials say, however, that Venezuela has become the FARC's preferred cocaine smuggling route. OAS leader Jose Miguel Insulza said drug trafficking and other organized crime, such as kidnapping and people smuggling, are among the greatest threats to the region's stability.

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waltky · 10-20-2008, 06:55 AM

Columbian drug-gang busted in Mexico...

Mexico busts drug-trafficking ring
Sun., Oct. 19, 2008 : 15 detained during raid in upscale Mexico City neighborhood

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Mexican authorities said Sunday that they had arrested more than a dozen members of an alleged drug-trafficking ring in an upscale neighborhood of this capital city, seizing weapons, vehicles — and lions. Eleven Colombians, a U.S. citizen, two Mexicans and an Uruguayan were detained during a raid in a sprawling mansion in Desierto de los Leones on Saturday, organized-crime prosecutor Marisela Morales told a news conference. Morales identified the gang's leader as Teodoro Fino Restrepo, who allegedly arranged for sea-borne cocaine shipments from Colombia to Mexico's Beltran Leyva cartel.

Also detained in the police raid was U.S. citizen Raul Munoz Montalvo of Texas. Police did not release the name of his hometown, and no one from the U.S. Embassy in Mexico was available to comment. All the suspects are being held on suspicion of drug trafficking, money laundering and organized-crime activities, Morales said. Nine Mexicans working as waiters and disk jockeys were briefly held and released.

Authorities had been investigating the group since 2005, the prosecutor said. The mansion, whose walls, ceilings and furniture are made almost entirely of ornately carved wood, appeared to have been used by the traffickers for parties on nights and weekends, authorities said. It was equipped with a private zoo housing a collection of animals, including two tigers and two lions. Police turned the exotic animals over to prosecutors. It was unclear what they planned to do with them.

Mexico busts drug-trafficking ring - Americas - MSNBC.com

waltky · 10-27-2008, 01:07 AM

Mexican druglord nabbed...

Mexican drug kingpin captured
27 October 2008 : Mexican police have arrested one of the alleged leaders of the notorious Arellano Felix drug trafficking cartel after a shootout in the violent city of Tijuana near the US border, an official said.

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"As a result of the intelligence work by the Federal Police and the exchange of international information, Eduardo Arellano Felix was located in a house" in the US border area of Tijuana, Deputy Secretary of Police Intelligence Facundo Rosas told reporters on Sunday. Arellano Felix, 52, alias "The Doctor," is under indictment for drug smuggling by a California court in the United States which had offered a US$5-million reward for his capture. He is also sought by Interpol. He is considered the number two in the cartel, known to be one of Mexico's most ruthless, after taking control in 2006 along with his nephew Luis Fernando Sanchez Arellano. He moved up after the arrest of Eduardo's brother Francisco Javier Arellano Felix, alias "The Little Tiger," according to Rosas.

Arellano Felix fired on federal agents after being encircled and was found with a girl, aged 11, police said. The identity of the girl was being investigated, but sources close to the case suggested she was his daughter. The Tijuana cartel, one of the four large drug mafias operating in Mexico, is blamed by the US Department of Justice for importing and distributing hundreds of tons of cocaine and marijuana in the United States. It has also been blamed for the murder and torture of police officers, informants and rivals.

The arrest of Arellano Felix is another high-profile success for Mexican authorities in the last week. A top drug trafficker from the powerful Sinaloa cartel was arrested last Monday after a shootout with police in Mexico City. Jesus Zambada Garcia was picked up with 15 other suspects, a federal prosecutor said. Another suspected leader of the Tijuana cartel of the Arellano Felix brothers was detained Thursday in the northwestern state of Baja California.

More Channelnewsasia.com

waltky · 10-28-2008, 02:16 AM

Moles inside anti-drug agencies don't help...

Mexican official: Drug spy says he leaked DEA info
Oct 27, `08 - A major drug cartel has infiltrated the Mexican attorney general's office and may have paid a spy inside the U.S. Embassy for details of DEA operations, Mexican prosecutors said Monday.

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The Drug Enforcement Administration's intelligence chief expressed concern about the alleged spy's claims, but said he couldn't confirm that the Embassy had been infiltrated, and that it was too early to pull out undercover agents for fear their identities may have been compromised. Mexico's Attorney General Eduardo Medina Mora said five officials of his Organized Crime unit were arrested on allegations they served as informants for the Beltran-Leyva cartel. He said there are indications other spies still work inside his agency. The Embassy employee, who also at one time worked for Interpol at the Mexico City airport, is now a protected witness after telling Mexican officials in Washington that he leaked details of DEA operations to the cartel, an attorney general's official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. The official said he was not authorized to speak on the record.

"We are not planning changing anyone at the embassy at this point," DEA intelligence chief Anthony Placido said at a Washington news conference called to celebrate Mexico's capture of Eduardo Arellano Felix, a leading member of a violent Tijuana-based cartel. "Law enforcement work anywhere in the world, and certainly in Mexico, can be perilous," Placido said in response to a question about whether the infiltration endangered undercover agents. "Is it dangerous? Absolutely." U.S. Ambassador Tony Garza congratulated Mexico for Arellano Felix's arrest in a statement late Monday. He said the DEA and the U.S. Marshals provided information on Arellano Felix's whereabout to Mexican authorities which helped them locate him. "This is another example of the positive results when U.S. and Mexican law enforcement agencies share information," Garza said. The revelations of corruption inside the control centers of the U.S.-Mexican anti-drug effort were a major blow to President Felipe Calderon's anti-drug campaign, in which he has sent tens of thousands of troops and federal police across Mexico to combat violent cartels.

Calderon himself has long acknowledged corruption is widespread in police forces, and Placido said that with billions of dollars flowing to the cartels from U.S. consumers of illegal drugs, some corruption is inevitable on both sides of the border. Monday's case represents the most serious known infiltration of anti-crime agencies since the 1997 arrest of Gen. Jesus Gutierrez Rebollo, then head of Mexico's anti-drug agency. Gutierrez Rebollo was later convicted of aiding drug lord Amado Carrillo Fuentes. Despite the corruption, Mexico continues to arrest top smugglers. The latest came after a shootout with police and soldiers in Tijuana, across the border from San Diego, where Arellano Felix had allegedly been running the cartel with his sister and a nephew since several of their brothers were arrested or killed. In Mexico City, Assistant Attorney General Marisela Morales said two top employees of her organized-crime unit and at least three federal police agents assigned to it may have been passing information on surveillance targets and potential raids for at least four years.

One was an assistant intelligence director and the other served as a liaison in requesting searches and assigning officers to carry them out. The agents and officials each received payments of between $150,000 and $450,000 per month for the information, Morales said. All but one were arrested weeks ago. The prosecutors' official said separatelly that the Embassy employee became a protected witness after giving details of his involvement to Mexican officials in Washington. It wasn't clear Monday whether he is under the protection of Mexico or the U.S. The official did not divulge what details the infiltrator allegedly passed on to the cartel. The newspaper El Universal reported Monday that the man had worked as a "criminal investigator" at the embassy, had received at least $30,000 and may have revealed details about the DEA hunt for American drug suspect Craig Petties, who was later captured here. It cited unnamed sources. The Beltran-Leyva brothers lead a cartel that once belonged to northern Mexico's Sinaloa confederation, the country's largest drug-trafficking group.

My Way News - Mexican official: Drug spy says he leaked DEA info

waltky · 10-31-2008, 10:38 PM

Cartels infiltrate the Mexican military...

5 Mexican military members linked to drug cartel
Fri Oct 31, `08 - Four Mexican military officers and one soldier are under investigation for alleged links to one of the country's most powerful drug cartels, Mexico's Defense Department said Friday.

Quote:

The investigation capped a week of corruption scandals that have arisen from the January arrest of Alfredo Beltran Leyva, a reputed top lieutenant in the Sinaloa drug cartel believed to have penetrated many of Mexico's security agencies. The Defense Department said in the statement that Beltran Leyva's arrest led authorities to investigate the five military members. They were all turned over to prosecutors on Jan. 29, but their cases weren't made public until Friday. Officials would give no more details on their cases.

On Monday, officials in the federal Attorney General's office said five authorities in the organized crime unit had been arrested for informing the Beltran Leyva cartel and a spy inside the U.S. Embassy may have been handing over details of DEA operations. On Thursday, Reforma newspaper reported that, with Beltran Leyva's arrest, officials had found a list of military members who were allegedly being paid to work for the drug lord. Mexican authorities refused to comment on that report, or say it if was related to Friday's revelation.

The corruption scandals are the most serious known infiltration of anti-crime agencies since the 1997 arrest of Gen. Jesus Gutierrez Rebollo, then head of Mexico's anti-drug agency. Gutierrez Rebollo was later convicted of aiding drug lord Amado Carrillo Fuentes. President Felipe Calderon has long acknowledged that corruption is a problem among the federal police and soldiers charged with leading Mexico's anti-drug campaign, but this week's announcements were nonetheless a major blow to his nationwide campaign to take back territory controlled by cartels.

Source

waltky · 11-09-2008, 01:41 AM

Ireland scores a big bust...

Irish Cops Find $650M Of Cocaine On Yacht
Nov. 7, 2008 - Officials Reportedly Tracked Smugglers Boat From Caribbean To Ireland's "Cocaine Coast"

Quote:

Police say that armed officers from Ireland's navy and police have seized an Irish-record haul of cocaine on a yacht and arrested three men. Police say more than 1.5 tons of cocaine being smuggled from the Caribbean was found Thursday aboard the yacht about 150 miles off the southwest Cork coast. Two of the men arrested come from Britain, and one from Dublin.

Ireland's national police force estimates the street value of the seized cocaine at $650 million. That would break the previous $560 million record set last year when a similar smuggling operation off the Cork coast was detected - after the gang's ship capsized in a storm, dumping bales of cocaine into the sea. The Belfast Telegraph reported that officials had the 60-foot yacht, called Dances With Waves, under surveillance since it left its port of departure in the Caribbean. The exact location of the boat's departure was not released.

U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency officials have cited Ireland's southern coast, dubbed the "Irish Box," as a particularly difficult to patrol entry point for drug smugglers into the lucrative Irish market. A July 2007 article in The Guardian newspaper - after the previous record-setting cocaine haul - quoted the DEA as saying the coastline was "nearly impossible to patrol" due to the unpredictable and often treacherous weather and the irregular coast.

Irish Defense Minister Willie O'Dea told Britain's ITV News on Friday: "With these little inlets and the length of the Irish coastline, it was very attractive to bring drugs in... It's less attractive now. "I think it will be a salutary lesson to people who think they can easily get drugs in here and there's absolutely no risk whatsoever, as was the case for too long."

Irish Cops Find $650M Of Cocaine On Yacht, Officials Reportedly Tracked Smugglers Boat From Caribbean To Ireland's "Cocaine Coast" - CBS News

See also:

U.S. $5B Fails To Cut Colombian Drug Crop
Nov. 6, 2008 - Washington's "Plan Colombia" Has Reduced Violence, But Is Under Tough New Scrutiny

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The nearly $5 billion U.S. aid package known as Plan Colombia failed to meet its goal of halving illegal narcotics production in this Andean nation, says a U.S. congressional report released Wednesday. The General Accounting Office report does, however, note that the mostly military assistance helped Colombia markedly improve security, with kidnapping and murder rates falling and the armed forces greatly diminishing the leftist rebel threat.

Its release comes as U.S. officials make it clear that aid for Colombia, an estimated $657 million in fiscal 2008, will now be trimmed because of the U.S. financial crisis. A widening scandal over army killings of civilians to boost body counts that cost Colombia's army chief his job this week could, additionally, impact U.S. aid to the nation. President-elect Barack Obama is among U.S. Democrats who have expressed concern over state involvement in human rights violations in Colombia's long-running conflict.

Despite record aerial eradication, coca cultivation rose by 15 percent in this Andean nation during Plan Colombia's 2000-2006 run, the report by the U.S. Congress' research arm says. It added that cocaine production rose by less - 4 percent - because eradication efforts forced growers to more widely disperse their crops, contributing to lower yields. Opium cultivation and heroin production did, however, decline by 50 percent over the period.

More U.S. $5B Fails To Cut Colombian Drug Crop, Washington's "Plan Colombia" Has Reduced Violence, But Is Under Tough New Scrutiny - CBS News

waltky · 11-09-2008, 04:17 AM

Maybe they came upon something?...

Disabled policemen shot dead in Mexico
Sat., Nov. 8, 2008 - Assailants fire from car in Chihuahua; one victim was wheelchair-bound

Quote:

Two disabled police officers, part of a special unit to help the disabled, were shot dead while on traffic patrol in northern Mexico, an official said Saturday. Unknown assailants opened fire on the men from a car at an intersection in the northern city of Chihuahua on Friday, said state Public Safety spokesman Carlos Rodriguez. Tirso Reza, 50, and Jose Luis Paez, 47, worked for a police unit dedicated to helping disabled people, including by ensuring that parking spaces designated for them were not illegally occupied. Reza was wheelchair-bound, while Paez had extremely weak eyesight. Investigators did not know why they had been targeted, Rodriguez said.

Mexico is suffering a brutal crime wave as drug gangs step up attacks against rival groups and police. Soldiers and federal police have been waging an offensive against cartels for two years, but decapitated bodies regularly turn up in public. On Saturday, a judge ruled that three men detained in a September grenade attack will stay in jail pending trial, according to the Attorney General. The men allegedly threw grenades that killed eight revelers at an Independence Day celebration in the city of Morelia.

Prosecutors say Julio Cesar Mondragon, Juan Carlos Castro and Alfredo Rosas belong to a group of Gulf Cartel hit men known as "Zetas." In a video distributed by prosecutors days after the Sept. 15 attack, Castro tells an investigator their aim was "to frighten and provoke the government." But the defend