PERU SET TO BE DRUG LEADER

Fears are growing in Peru that the country could soon regain its title of
being the world's number one cocaine supplier.

It is because of the huge US-financed anti-drugs operation in neighbouring
Colombia.

According to a report being prepared by the United Nations Drug Control
Project (UNDCP), the implementation of the $1.3bn Plan Colombia is already
increasing the price of the raw material used to make cocaine.

And that is encouraging Peruvian farmers to return to the industry.

There are around 77,000 hectares of abandoned coca fields in Peru, which
need only three to six months to become active again. New fields have
already been sighted in the south-east of the country.

The UNDCP representative in Peru, Patricio Vandenberghe, says that given
the eradication of crops in Colombia, the "logical move" for the narco
traffickers is to go across the border.

Jungle base

In an effort to control the flow of drugs through Peru, the United States
has invested $77.5m to set up a secret base in the Amazon jungle.

Here, members of the Peruvian navy train to become part of an elite squad
designed to capture traffickers operating in the rain forest.

The base has just received six new armed launches, at a cost of $700,000
each, paid for by the US.

Officials say since the centre was established two years ago, it has
captured around a ton of coca paste, an unrefined form of cocaine, in boats
bound for Colombia and Brazil.

While this is a small dent in Peru's estimated coca production of 250 tons
a year, the worry is that the amounts traveling along these rivers could
soon dramatically increase.

Bigger profits

The BBC accompanied a UN fact-finding mission to Iquitos, the principal
city of Peru's Amazon region.

A customs officer inspecting ships in the main port says that drugs are
"regularly" found, either strapped to people's bodies, or hidden in the cargo.

The UN investigator, Humberto Chirrinos, says it is clear that Peru's
cocaine industry is taking off once again.

His fear is that farmers who gave up growing the coca leaf, the raw
material used to make cocaine, are being lured back to the industry by the
rising prices.

The price of coca leaf in Peru has doubled over the last six to eight
months, from $2 to $4 a kilogram.

On the streets of western cities, a kilogram of refined cocaine can fetch
between $1,100 and $1,300.

Officials at the counter-narcotics river training base say they are "ready"
for the expected increase in trafficking in Peru.

But with far more US funds being channeled into Plan Colombia, Peru is set
to become the more attractive option for the cocaine producers.