B.C. BUD BUYS GUNS FOR AFGHANS

Coleman: Solicitor-General Claims Weapons Shipped From Canada

B.C. marijuana is financing guns being used by Afghan insurgents, the
province's top law enforcement official said Friday.

Solicitor General Rich Coleman told the Vancouver Board of Trade that
weapons used in Afghanistan were tracked and the trail led back to the
sale of B.C. marijuana, he said.

Asked later by reporters how he knew this, Coleman said he has been
briefed by organized crime agencies and police in the province, the
United States and other countries.

"I can tell you that's the information I've been given," he said. "I'm
not going to give you police sources, but I can tell you we can track
the pattern of crime internationally."

He added: "It's an unfortunate fact that we have an active illegal gun
trade in Vancouver and the basis for . . . all that type of illegal
crime starts with marijuana grow ops."

Three Canadian soldiers have been killed since taking up peacekeeping
duties in Afghanistan -- two by a land mine last October and another
by a suicide bomber earlier this week, but none by firearms.

But Coleman insisted: "There are guns in Afghanistan that were
smuggled through [Canadian] ports."

In his speech he mentioned the latest fatality, Corporal Jamie Murphy,
though Murphy was killed in a suicide attack.

"That [the allegation] is a general statement," Coleman
said.

The movement of marijuana into the United States has so upset American
officials that they have tightened controls on the border with Canada,
Coleman said.

Commenting on the solicitor general's remarks, RCMP spokesman Sergeant
John Ward said Friday police know the proceeds of marijuana sales are
used to finance other illegal activities and that the drug is also
used to barter for other illegal commodities, such as weapons.

"It is a concern for us and it's an issue we need to deal with," Ward
said, adding that marijuana moving from B.C. is part of a vast,
lucrative bartering system by organized crime groups stretching from
North American to Central America and potentially overseas.

"I can't comment on whether weapons are getting to Afghanistan and
guns are going out of the country, but common sense tells us these
weapons are getting out of the country illegally and it is a huge
problem," he said.

U.S. Customs spokesman Mike Milne said American authorities have not
been able to trace a direct link between marijuana and the shipment of
weapons to Afghanistan.

"But it is a concern of ours. Part of our mandate is to protect
illegal exports from leaving through the ports of entry," Milne said
Friday. "B.C. bud is a big concern for us, both for the amount of
marijuana being smuggled in the U.S. and the outbound currency that
goes across the border."