BANANAS AND DRUGS

The Oct. 11 front-page story "Caribbean Cash Havens Arouse U.S. Suspicions"
detailed the concerns of U.S. law enforcement agencies that offshore
financial services in the Caribbean are attracting money from drug
trafficking and other illicit activities. It mentioned that the "Eastern
Caribbean is eager to find new sources of business" given that banana
production has witnessed a significant downturn in the past decade.

That reference failed to appropriately capture the severe threat to the
national security interests of the Caribbean posed by the four-year,
U.S.-led campaign in the World Trade Organization to diminish the region's
access to the European banana market.

Caribbean governments have warned U.S. officials that the undermining of
Caribbean banana exports would weaken the region. They have iterated that an
economically weakened Caribbean would be vulnerable to international cartels
determined to find shipment routes and other logistical anchors for drugs
headed to U.S. shores.

Richard L. Bernal, Ambassador, Embassy of Jamaica, Washington