Cuba says it curbs narcotics flow without US help
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| Published on Saturday, March 3, 2007 |
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HAVANA, Cuba (Reuters): Fewer drug traffickers are using Cuba as a corridor to the United States thanks to tough enforcement and cooperation with other countries, the ruling Communist Party newspaper Granma said on Friday.
Cuba intercepted 1.7 tonnes of marijuana and cocaine in 2006, the lowest level of seizures in 11 years, it said.
Smugglers fly shipments of narcotics up from Jamaica and Colombia and drop bales into the sea between thousands of uninhabited islands off Cuba's north coast for pick up in speedboats that ship the drugs to the US market.
Severe prison sentences and the exchange of information with police forces of neighboring countries -- though not the United States -- have helped crack down on the illegal trade, Granma said.
"The shipments decrease. The routes of international drug traffickers are moving away from our coasts," the paper said.
The US government, Cuba's longtime ideological enemy, has not cooperated with Havana's war on drug trafficking and Washington has refused to sign agreements proposed by Cuba to jointly fight the narcotics trade, Granma said.
Nonetheless, Cuba last month deported suspected top Colombian drug lord Luis Hernando Gomez to Bogota where he is wanted for extradition by Washington to face trafficking charges in the United States.
Gomez, known as "Scratch" and one of the heads of the powerful Norte del Valle drug gang, was arrested at Havana airport in 2004 for entering Cuba on a forged Venezuelan passport.
During 2006, Cuba picked up 1,243 pounds (564 kilos) of marijuana and 225 pounds (102 kilos) of cocaine along its coast, and a tip from another country helped its coast guard intercept a shipment of 1,980 pounds (900 kilos) of marijuana, Granma said.
Information provided by Cuba led to the seizure of five tonnes of cocaine by neighboring countries, it said.
Cuba has a small drug use problem -- police seized only 79 pounds (36 kilos) of narcotics in the country last year.
Cuban authorities say the country's incipient domestic drug market has grown since Cuba opened up to international tourism in the 1990s. Foreigners caught smuggling drugs are given stiff jail terms.
Last year small quantities of narcotics for personal use were seized from 284 foreigners visiting Cuba, Granma said. | | | | Reads : 205 | | | |
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