U.S. AND EUROPE DIFFER OVER COLOMBIAN DRUGS

Cocaine Trafficking To Continent Is Rising

BOGOTA As cocaine use in the United States has leveled off, trafficking to
Europe from Colombia and other cocaine-producing South American countries
has picked up, increasing at a particularly rapid pace since the mid-1990s,
according to the latest U.S. data.

Estimates by the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy
indicate that up to 220 tons of cocaine now flow to Europe annually, as
much as double the amount in 1996.

The United States, by comparison, receives about 330 tons annually, a
figure that has remained stable in recent years as consumption by casual
users has fallen.

"It is certainly true that a bigger portion of cocaine goes to Europe than
previously," said Klaus Nyholm, who oversees the UN Drug Control Program's
office in Colombia. "The U.S. was the country of cocaine consumption par
excellence, while heroin and opiates were for Asia and Europe. What we see
now is that the markets are coming to look more and more alike."

Europol, the European Union's fledgling police agency, said in a recent
report that 35 percent of Colombia's cocaine was winding up in the Union,
entering mainly through Spain and the Netherlands. Seizures in member
nations reached 43 tons in 1999, the report said, up 37 percent from the
year before.

The Spanish police seized more than 590 kilograms (1,300 pounds) of cocaine
over the weekend in the Galician port of Vigo, the Civil Guard said Sunday.

The dire warning from U.S. officials, some of whom say Europe is facing a
crisis, has irked some European officials and drug policy experts.

They question Washington's assessment and view the new data as part of its
effort to obtain more aid for Colombia's war on drugs, which was created
with U.S. pressure and involvement.

"There is very little sympathy and understanding," Martin Jelsma, a drug
policy expert in the Netherlands, said of how Europeans view U.S. policy
toward Colombia.

"Based on private conversations I've had this year with officials from
several European countries, the rejection of the current U.S. drug policy
approach to Colombia is growing very clearly," added Mr. Jelsma, of the
Transnational Institute, which analyzes drug use and international trafficking.

That approach relies on the U.S. expenditure of $1.3 billion, most of it in
military assistance, for the aerial spraying of herbicides on coca fields.

The Europeans have in general resisted supporting what they view as a
military-style strategy that they say could intensify Colombia's
37-year-long conflict with leftist rebels, who are active in coca-growing
areas and profit from the drug trade. The European Union instead recently
pledged $293 million for social development programs in Colombia's
impoverished countryside.

"There has been a tendency in Europe to look at the Colombian problem as
one of the Colombians, of course, and the United States," said a
high-ranking European official knowledgeable about drug interdiction
efforts. "The Europeans are clearly dragging their feet. They are engaging
more, yes, but from a very low level."

The Americans are irritated by Europe's stance. And in private
conversations, U.S. officials acknowledge working diplomatic channels to
obtain more aid for Colombia.

"It's big business in Europe, and we think it's going to get a lot bigger,"
one U.S. State Department official said of the cocaine trade. "And we're
trying to convince the Europeans to get concerned about it."

Robert Brown, acting deputy director for supply reduction at the White
House Office of National Drug Control Policy, which analyzes worldwide
consumption and trafficking data, said, "There is a definite, unmistakable
upward trend."

Large-scale cocaine trafficking to Europe was first detected in the 1980s,
when Colombian drug cartels, battered by aggressive law enforcement, opened
new routes to that largely untapped market. The demand in Europe remained
relatively modest through the early 1990s, dwarfed by a seemingly
unquenchable appetite in the United States.

The Colombians, for their part, have in recent months more openly pleaded
for aid from European governments. Speaking of the common goal of
eradicating drugs, President Andres Pastrana has traveled to Europe and met
here with numerous European delegations.

Other Colombians present the issue in starker terms. "They have been
ashamed to say they have a problem, even though everyone sees what is
happening," Rosso Jose Serrano, the former director of the Colombian
National Police, said of the Europeans. "It seems to me that this is what
happened in the United States, that they only took notice after the place
was inundated with cocaine."

The Europeans bristle under such criticism, saying an emphasis on treatment
and education in their own countries is a more viable solution to drug use.

European drug experts say that U.S. high-tech interdiction efforts and
harsh enforcement inside the United States have had little impact in
curtailing the flow of drugs to American users, an assertion that many U.S.
drug experts do not dispute.

The Europeans strongly oppose aerial spraying of coca crops in Colombia,
which they say fails to address the country's deep social problems. Their
opposition was highlighted in February when the European Parliament voted
474 to 1 to reject the U.S.-supported spraying program in Colombia.

Europeans generally acknowledge that cocaine use, along with that of other
drugs, is up, but they say U.S. data exaggerate the increase.

"It's a slow increase," said Ingo Michels, who runs the office for the
German drug commissioner.