DRUG PROBLEM WILL 'WORSEN'

Demand for ecstasy increasing rapidly, heroin being sold at higher purity
rates: AFP

Australia could only expect its drug problems to get worse, according to
the Australian Federal Police.

In its annual report, the AFP said Australia was at the geographic centre
of one of the most important growing and distribution centres of heroin,
the Golden Triangle in South-East Asia.

Federal agents were detecting cocaine, sourced to South America and often
sent through the United States.

Demand for ecstasy, coming mostly from Holland, was increasing rapidly and
indications were that importations of all of these drugs were increasing
due to higher demand and to the rapid increase in trade flows, immigration
and tourism.

Producers and traffickers of illicit drugs also took advantage of
opportunities created by technological, political and economic change.

Globalisation had inextricably linked Australia to the international
illicit drug trade, the report said.

Seizures of illicit drugs, coupled with intelligence reports, confirmed the
vast majority of drug importations were through Sydney and destined for the
Sydney market.

Increasingly, street seizures confirmed that heroin was being sold at
higher purity rates and lower prices.

This was particularly disturbing as the lower the heroin price, the wider
the customer base becomes; and the higher the purity, the higher the
frequency of overdose and deaths.

An increased cost to the community grew at the same rate as drug
importations and usage increased.

These costs included rehabilitation, the treatment and care of HIV,
hepatitis B and C, and the procedures surrounding fatal overdoses.

The report said drug-related intelligence repeatedly suggested that most of
criminals in the Australian drug trade were of Anglo-Saxon or ethnic
European background.

As a group they were able to control sizable sectors of the drug trade
because they were able to collaborate easily.

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski