CANADA WILL 'COMPLEMENT' FIGHT AGAINST DRUGS IN COLOMBIA

CARTAGENA, Colombia (CP) -- Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy has committed
Canada to help Colombia in its struggle against the drug trade and has
offered to help with negotiations to end a decades-long insurgency by
Marxist guerrillas.

Axworthy emerged from talks Saturday with Colombian President Andres
Pastrana and U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright to elaborate on
several Canadian initiatives he said he hopes will contribute to stability
and security in the strife-torn South American country.

"Illicit drug-trafficking is a major challenge facing all of us in the
Americas," Axworthy said earlier.

He added that increasingly, countries that supply illicit drugs are "being
infected as much by the drug traffic" as the consuming countries.

Under an agreement signed Friday, an unspecified number of RCMP officers
will be sent to Colombia to help train police in human-rights issues and to
help in the fight against drug-trafficking and money-laundering, Axworthy
said by telephone from Cartegena.

The agreement calls for Canada and Colombia to "exchange experiences and
practices" to deal with drug-trafficking, the chemicals used to produce
illicit drugs and money-laundering.

The two countries will also co-operate on promoting treatment and
rehabilitation for Colombians affected by the drug trade.

Axworthy said: "It was a very moving experience yesterday, when we attended
a street project funded by the Canadian Embassy here in which young people
ages 10 or 12 who had been on the streets for years were being given a
chance to establish a new life, to have confidence in themselves. Those are
the small projects but boy do they ever have a powerful impact."

"You only have to meet this group of 20 or 30 children who for the first
time in a long time had some smiles on their faces."

Axworthy said Canada will provide an as-yet undetermined amount of funding
for more community programs designed to wean Colombian youth away from the
drug culture and retrain them.

He said the Canadian International Development Agency is reviewing its
programming in Colombia, where it spends about $15 million to $20 million a
year already. Canada also contributes to UN programs in Colombia.

Axworthy said Canada hopes to be able to help with negotiations between the
Colombian government and guerrillas to end a civil war that has gone on for
more than 30 years and has killed an estimated 35,000 people and created
1.2 million refugees.

He said the Canadian contribution would be similar to its efforts in
Northern Ireland, where Gen. John de Chastelain heads the disarmament
commission to dispose of weapons of paramilitary organizations.

Axworthy said Canada also hopes to provide expertise on conflict-resolution
in reintegrating guerrilla fighters back into civilian life.

"You've got people on the other side, in the guerrillas, who've been up in
the mountains for 20 or 30 years. They don't know what the world is
outside. ... How do people get reintegrated, how do they demobilize?"

He said Canada has an interest in building a secure environment in
Colombia. He noted he had discussions with Canadian businessmen who said
they consider Colombia an attractive place to invest but are prevented from
doing so by the unrest.

He noted the suspected Colombian guerrilla kidnappers who held seven
Canadian mining company workers for ransom in Ecuador last year still have
not been caught or positively identified.

Canada's approach differs from that of the United States. Earlier this week
U.S. President Bill Clinton offered Colombia $1.6 billion in largely
military aid to help fight the drug war.

But Axworthy insists the Canadian effort is "complementary" to the U.S.
effort.

"The U.S. effort is very strongly oriented toward the military side, while
Canada is working on the civil side, on human rights," Axworthy said.