COLOMBIAN ANTI-DRUG PLAN TAKING A TOLL ON COUNTRY'S YOUNGEST

PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island -- In the shade of a maple tree, Martin Leprowski
lays out the pictures he took in Colombia last month. They show mothers
holding children with rashes on their backs and red boils on their feet.

The United States is responsible for these injuries, Leprowski claims,
through its $1.3-billion drug fumigation plan in Colombia. The herbicide
spraying, aimed at destroying Colombia's cocaine and heroin trades, is
poisoning people, he says, and running them off their land.

"If the American people knew this," Leprowski says, his eyes welling with
tears as he points to the pictures, "they wouldn't want it done in their
name."

For almost two decades, Leprowski, 58, of South Kingstown, R.I., has been a
vocal critic of U.S. policies in Central America. Those policies, he says,
have too often exploited the poor for the sake of U.S. economic interests.

It is happening again in Colombia, he says, with the U.S.-backed program
known as "Plan Colombia."

With the support of Colombia's government, the United States in January
began a massive counter-drug operation that has funneled helicopters and
hundreds of military and civilian advisers into the South American country.
The objective: cut Colombia's cocaine production in half by 2005.

The helicopters fly protection for Colombian planes that drop the herbicide,
Roundup, on coca fields, destroying the plants that supply 80 percent of the
world's cocaine.

U.S. and Colombian officials have said they hope the plan will cripple the
country's drug production while also drying up the vast resources of cash
that various rebel groups are using to carry on Colombia's decades-old civil
war.

The war has left parts of the beleaguered country in anarchy and promoted
wide-scale fear of kidnapping - a popular means of raising money that
various rebel groups employ. It has also spurred a large exodus out of the
country to places such as Rhode Island with large Colombian populations.

But Leprowski says Plan Colombia is hurting the people it is supposed to
help.

The herbicide is killing not just poppy and coca plants but food plants like
yucca and bananas as well. And while U.S. and Colombian officials insist
that Roundup is harmless to humans and animal life, those whose houses and
farms have been sprayed are telling a different story, Leprowski says.

"These people pleaded with us to stop the spraying," he says. "We are only
making it worse by fumigating their food bases. We are exacerbating the
problem."

Leprowski spent nine days in Colombia last month with 20 human-rights
activists from North America. The delegation traveled to Putumayo, a
southern province where most of the country's cocaine is produced.

Leprowski says the farmers he spoke with told him they grow coca out of
desperation. Colombia is in such chaos that many produce markets have
collapsed, and moving through regions controlled by rebel groups is often
dangerous.

Coca remains the one staple where the market is growing; everyone, including
the warring rebel groups, can turn a profit on it.

"We will never eradicate cocaine when the demand is so high in this
country," Leprowski says, adding that production will only be moved
somewhere else.

The fumigation plan is coming under increasing criticism.

In Washington last week, a group of elected officials from Colombia called
on Congress to stop Plan Colombia, saying the fumigation is endangering
public health and the environment. The World Wildlife Fund has also called
for suspension of the fumigation plan, saying it holds the potential for
"grave environmental impact."

If the United States wants to help Colombia, Leprowski says, it should use
the money set aside for Plan Colombia to offer more incentives to farmers to
grow legitimate products, help repair the country's crumbling infrastructure
and clean up its corrupt judicial system.

"It's not just about the drugs," Leprowski says. "It's the people. It's the
poor. That's the reason I went to Colombia. I wanted to put a face on this
issue."