The Drugs War

Ending the 'War on Drugs'

2009-09-21T02:20:00.000-07:00

In this Guest Op-Ed in the New York Times, the author Misha Glenny raises some important issues surrounding the legalization of narcotics. As a society, we must have this debate and it must be open and honest. Apparently, politicians in the California Assembly have a bill decriminalizing marijuana already written including projected revenues from taxation. The problem with the article is there is no talk about which narcotics should be legalized. Are marijuana and cocaine the same? What about cocaine derivatives like crack? The Controlled Substance Act established a schedule that classified the various narcotics. Do we legalize regardless of a narcotics placement on this schedule? Glenny is silent on the issue and this is where this opinion piece loses its forcefulness and, thus, utility as a point of departure in a necessary debate.

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By MISHA GLENNY
Published: September 18, 2009

Vancouver in British Columbia, Ciudad Juárez in northern Mexico and Helmand Province in southern Afghanistan are unlikely cousins. But together these three places and their ilk have wrought a remarkable change in one of the world’s most important debates over the past two years.

For decades, the idea of legalizing narcotics was supported by only a small minority. But as global markets in illicit drugs have expanded exponentially since the early 1990s, policy makers and law enforcement agencies alike have been overwhelmed by the challenge posed by the prohibition of a long list of drugs. Markets have spread to places that for decades had no significant drug problem, like China and Indonesia, while the numbers of addicts in countries like Iran have grown hugely.

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Mexico goes after mother of cartel leader

2009-08-21T20:01:00.000-07:00

from the Christian Science Monitor...

Mexico City - The reputed head of the La Familia cartel, an increasingly notorious drug trafficking organization in Mexico, did not mince words in his threat: "If anybody attacks my father, my mother, my brothers, they're going to have to deal with me," Servando Gomez warned the government on local television last month.

But instead of backing down, the administration of Mexican President Felipe Calderón, who has deployed 45,000 troops throughout Mexico to clamp down on traffickers, responded this week by detaining not just Mr. Gomez's brother, but his mother too.

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Briefing: How Mexico is waging war on drug cartels

2009-08-21T19:59:00.000-07:00

from the Christian Science Monitor

Mexico City -

Who are the main players?

The Gulf Cartel, whose territory, along with that of Los Zetas (see below), extends from the US border to the Yucatán Peninsula, was until recently Mexico's most powerful drug-trafficking organization. But government pressure, particularly over the past two years, has weakened it. The former leader, Osiel Cardenas Guillen, was arrested in 2003 and extradited to the United States in 2007. The group is headquartered in the northern state of Tamaulipas, where it has long smuggled drugs into Texas, employing Los Zetas as its ruthless, private army. Along with the Sinaloa, Beltran Leyva, and Zetas groups, it is a main player in the cocaine trade.

Los Zetas grew out of the military special forces deserters that Gulf Cartel leader Mr. Guillen recruited in the 1990s as his private security detail. They eventually became the paramilitary arm of the group, then split off in late 2007 or early 2008. The relationship between Los Zetas and the Gulf Cartel is unclear today, since the two are believed to still work together in an organization referred to as "The Company." The group, led by Heriberto Lazcano, is organized as a formal drug-trafficking organization, but Los Zetas also subcontracts work to other cartels. New members are recruited from federal and local law enforcement agencies, as well as Mexican and Guatemalan special forces. Los Zetas are increasingly suspected of involvement in kidnapping, extortion, and immigrant smuggling.

Read the rest of the briefing here

Is Mexico the new Colombia?

2009-08-21T19:54:00.000-07:00

from Foreign Policy...

By Eurasia Group analysts Allyson Benton and Patrick Esteruelas

As the Mexican government continues to face serious public security problems caused by the nation's drug cartels, fears are mounting that investors may lose confidence. In Mexico's current economic climate, where GDP could contract by as much as 8 percent in 2009, according to the OECD, any potential downward pressure on the economy sets off alarm bells.

Since he took office in 2006, President Felipe Calderon has pursued a twofold strategy against organized crime. The government has deployed the military to key drug trafficking regions in the north and along the west coast to root out cartels. It has also pushed important institutional reforms through congress to help make the country's police forces and judicial system more efficient. Nonetheless, the level of narcotrafficking violence has grown nearly threefold during Calderon's time in office, from an average of 2,195 deaths in 2006 and 2007 to an estimated 6,000 total deaths expected in 2009. In addition, drug traffickers appear to be moving into other illicit activities like extortion rackets and kidnapping rings, as the number of such reported crimes has risen dramatically in the past two years. These rising public security problems could suggest that Mexico is heading along the same path as Colombia, but there are some important distinctions to consider.

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Sen. Leahy Blocks Positive Report on Mexico's Rights Record

2009-08-06T10:57:00.000-07:00

From the Washington Post...

MEXICO CITY, Aug. 4 -- A key senator rejected a State Department plan to issue a report this week affirming that Mexico is respecting human rights in its war against drug traffickers, delaying the release of millions of dollars in U.S. anti-narcotics assistance, according to U.S. officials and congressional sources.

The State Department intended to send the favorable report on Mexico's human rights record to Congress in advance of President Obama's visit to Guadalajara for a summit of North American leaders this weekend, U.S. officials familiar with the report said.

That plan was scrapped after aides to Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), chairman of the Senate Appropriations foreign operations subcommittee, told State Department officials that the findings contradicted reports of human rights violations in Mexico, including torture and forced disappearances, in connection with the drug war.

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U.S. security firms vie for Mexican drug war work

2009-07-28T21:24:00.000-07:00

From Reuters

By Mica Rosenberg

MEXICO CITY, July 16 (Reuters) - As Mexico battles to keep a lid on raging drug war violence, U.S. companies are fighting over millions of dollars in contracts for military equipment and training under a long-promised U.S aid package.

Private U.S. security firms will get the bulk of a $1.4 billion package pledged by the United States in 2007 to help its southern neighbor crush rampant drug gang carnage. Only a fraction of the aid has been delivered so far.

Almost all of an initial $400 million tranche approved by the U.S. Congress in 2008 and being released bit by bit to buy helicopters and inspection gear and train Mexican police will be doled out to 30 or 40 U.S. companies, said a U.S. embassy official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

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Mexican drug cartels expand abroad

2009-07-21T18:06:00.000-07:00

From the Associated Press...

GUATEMALA CITY — Guatemalan drug boss Juan Jose "Juancho" Leon was summoned by Mexican traffickers for what he was told was business. Instead, dozens of attackers ambushed his entourage with grenades and assault rifles, killing Leon and 10 others in a brazen demonstration of power.

Mexican drug traffickers are branching out as never before — spreading their tentacles into 47 nations, including the U.S., Guatemala and even Colombia, long the heart of the drug trade in Latin America.

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Drug Dealing for Jesus: Mexico's Evangelical Narcos

2009-07-19T20:26:00.000-07:00

News anchor Marcos Knapp had been broadcasting reports of narco carnage all week from his western state of Michoacan: the mutilated corpses of 12 federal police officers dumped on a road; police headquarters attacked by dozens of gunmen with grenades; three officers called out to a traffic accident and then murdered in an ambush. But, as violent as the incidents were, Knapp was only truly shocked when a caller phoned his news show and said he was one of the cartel capos behind this bloodshed. "Our fight is with the federal police because they are attacking our families," the voice said calmly while Knapp stared worriedly at the camera. "If someone attacks my father, my mother or my brother then they are going to hear from me... If they only act against us, then we will respect them."

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