AID TO MEXICO HELPS U.S., TOO

Funding Would Help Fight Drug Cartels

When a Peruvian federal judge was gunned down as he lunched with a
nephew near his office last summer, his murder was a big wake-up call
about the power of Mexican drug cartels. Federal Judge Hernan Saturno
Vergara probably would be alive today if he had not been on a major
case against alleged members of the Tijuana cartel, one of the five
Mexican cartels believed to be bankrolling state-of-the-art cocaine
processing labs in Peru.

Closer to home, the Tijuana and Gulf cartels are behind the
escalating violence along the border, especially in South Texas, the
leading port for cocaine.

That's why a group of Texas lawmakers - all from border districts -
has filed a bill in the House seeking $850 million for federal aid to
Mexico over five years. That may sound like a lot of money, but not
when you consider that, for last year alone, Colombia received $561
million in U.S. dollars to combat narcotics cultivation and
trafficking. Peru got another $146 million. Mexico, our neighbor and
trading partner, received only $69 million.

Now that Mexican cartels are the dominant drug-trafficking
organizations in the hemisphere, Washington must look for ways to
stop these vicious empires from spreading. Already Mexican cartels
are blamed for drug-related murders in North Texas. And despite
recent federal deployments of military and police officials to
Mexican border states, the violence continues to spread across the Rio Grande.

The aid bill - introduced by Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo - also
calls for greater cooperation between U.S. and Mexico law enforcement
agencies, especially when it comes to finding missing Americans.
Included in the bill are plans to upgrade law enforcement technology
and train judges and prosecutors handling drug-related cases,
hopefully strengthening Mexico's judicial branch.

Some of the money would go to creating anti-corruption programs and
for economic and social development, such as micro-lending and
trade-capacity building, to address the chronic poverty that feeds
the success of the drug wars.

These resources could give authorities in both countries the needed
boost to build a solid partnership to whack away at the far-reaching
tentacles of the drug cartels.