Colombian Cartels Find New Drug Paths to U.S.

Narcotics: In effort to cut out Mexican traffickers, South Americans have
forged ties with smugglers in Caribbean and Guatemala, sources say. Russian
mafia is reportedly a partner in Europe.

BOGOTA, ColombiaDetermined to keep control of their lucrative, illegal
business, Colombia's drug cartels are finding new partners to move their
cocaine and heroin into the United States and Europe. Imprisoning the
country's top drug lords and deporting their traditional European contacts
weakened the cartels for a time, but now law enforcement officials fear that
they are rebuilding their illicit empires with reliable new routes. The
cartels are capitalizing on the legendary smuggling prowess of Arubans,
Puerto Rico's status as a U.S. territory and the Dominican Republic's strong
New York City ties. Guatemala, once merely a stop on the drug route into
Mexico and the United States, has become a jumpingoff point for Europe as
well. And the Russian mafia is now helping deliver the drugs to the European
market, according to Colombian and Caribbean law enforcement sources. The
alliances emerged in an attempt to make an end run around Mexico's drug
distributors, who had taken advantage of the Colombian cartels'
vulnerability to grasp a tremendous share of the market.

"There are great efforts to break the Mexican monopoly," said one highlevel
intelligence source. "Groups who don't have anything and who don't want
anything to do with Mexico are exploring new possibilities."

The growing importance of heroin in the mix of Colombia's illegal drug
exports has permitted another distribution shift that circumvents the
Mexicans. Heroin is worth nine times more by weight than cocaine, making
small quantities of heroin highly profitable. So drug traffickers no longer
need to hide large shipments of cocaine in freighters that dock at Mexico's
Pacific ports. Instead, they can rely on "mules" to take heroin directly to
the United States in their luggage or their stomachs. These couriers
transport about 90% of the Colombian heroin that enters the U.S., according
to the intelligence source. Mexico became a necessary stopover point for
Colombian drugs headed to the U.S. about three years ago, when tighter
controls made transshipment through the Bahamas, Jamaica and other
traditional Caribbean routes highly risky. By the time Miguel and Gilberto
Rodriguez Orejuela, the selfconfessed heads of the monolithic Cali cartel,
were arrested in 1995, the Colombians were hooked on Mexican help.

"With the fall of the Rodriguezes, Mexican 'narcos' began to take control
away from the Colombian cartels," said the intelligence source. "Today,
Colombian organizations depend on the Mexicans for getting 60% to 70% of
their drugs into the States, and the Mexicans have moved from being simple
intermediaries to the owners of the trade."

But as the big Colombian cartels fragmented, the infrastructure they used to
get drugs across the U.S. border crumbled. Emerging traffickers on the South
American country's Atlantic coast to the north and in Valle del Cauca
province, of which Cali is the capital, in the southwest developed different
contacts to export their narcotics. Distribution in Europe posed a different
problem. The Colombians traditionally worked with the Italian Mafia,
especially to launder money in Europe, according to intelligence sources.
But that alliance has weakened over the last two years as nine Italian capos
have been extradited from Colombia. Further, the fragmenting of the
Colombian cartels has made the business less attractive to the Italians,
sources say, because now they must deal with several small players rather
than a single, dominant drug lord. While the ties between the Italians and
Colombians have not broken, they have definitely frayed.

Poolside Drug Deals As the Mexican traffickers extended their tentacles
deeper into the narcotics business, their services became pricier. They
doubled their smuggling fee to 40% to 50% of a cocaine shipment, said
Special Agent Bill Mitchell, who heads the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration's Miami field office. In response, Colombian traffickers
began testing alternative routes in the Caribbean. In recent months, they
have struck longterm alliances with Dominicans, who charge a 20% smuggling
fee, according to Felix Jimenez, a DEA special agent in San Juan, Puerto
Rico. The Dominicans provide a fullservice smuggling package for
Colombians, DEA officials say.

"They have the language, proximity and a full network in New York, so they
have no problems bringing money back," one official said.

Dominican officials from President Leonel Fernandez down have openly
acknowledged that they are worried about the role their countrymen are
playing in the drug trade and are seeking closer cooperation with U.S. law
enforcement. DEA officials said many deals are struck on the eastern
Caribbean islands of St. Martinwhich is half French, half Dutchand
Antigua.

"St. Martin is a very comfortable place for Colombians to travel," one agent
said. "The U.S. can't get our hands on them."

Dominicans and Colombians check into entire blocks of hotel rooms for a week
or more and sit by the pool talking on rented cellular phones until the
shipment is set up, according to another DEA official. From there, the
official said, the Dominicans take charge. Dominican "armies for hire" have
taken over entire housing projects in Puerto Rico and in New York City's
Washington Heights neighborhoodstaging areas to vastly expand Colombia's
U.S. drug market, DEA officials contend. Dominicans also control a twoblock
area in Queens that is full of wiretransfer businesses set up to launder
money, said one DEA official.

"Everything's in line," he said. "They are set in the States."

Targeting Puerto Rico Colombians looking for new alliances in the drug trade
have also targeted Puerto Rico, a U.S. territory that lies 70 miles east of
the Dominican Republic. "Cocaine and heroin traffickers from Colombia have
transformed Puerto Rico into the largest staging area in the Caribbean for
smuggling Colombian cocaine and heroin [into] the U.S.," James Milford, DEA
deputy chief, said during testimony before a U.S. House subcommittee in
July. When Jimenez's agents cracked a major Puerto Rican drug ring in April,
they arrested two Colombians and nine Dominicans. The alleged leader of the
ring, Jouhan Rivera Rosa, had been arrested earlier in the Dominican
Republic on separate drug charges. Traffic has also picked up over the past
three years on the island of Aruba, a landing site for drug planes for
nearly two decades, according to law enforcement sources. Proximity to
Colombiaas well as connections to Europe and North America that the
tourist trade has already establishedhas made Aruba an excellent
transshipment point, U.S., Colombian and Caribbean authorities agree. In
addition, Aruba is well equipped to provide moneylaundering services, they
said. Aruban smuggling fame dates to the days of the Dutch pirates. In this
century, Arubans have established close contacts on the Guajira peninsula,
Colombia's traditional entry point for contraband. Still under the
protection of the Netherlands, Aruba is now a major passageway for cocaine
and heroin entering Europe, Dutch authorities say. The Colombians also
appear to be turning to Central America for new drug routes into Europe.
Guatemalan and German authorities are investigating a case that has so far
resulted in the arrest of Andreas Haeneggi, the local general manager of the
Swiss corporate giant Nestle, and his son. They, along with the police chief
of the tourist resort of Antigua, are suspected of being part of a major
drug ring that hid $100 million worth of cocaine in cut flowers bound for
Germany. All three have denied the charges. With the operations of Italian
allies curtailed, the Colombians are finding that their most reliable drug
partner in Europe is the Russian mafia, officials say.

Russian Connection With an explosion of drug consumption, especially heroin,
in the former Soviet Union, criminal organizationsmade up in part of
exmembers of the KGB and former military and police officialsare making a
bid for control of the East European market, according to Colombian
authorities. "The Russian mafia has set itself up on the Caribbean islands
so as to be able to contact the Colombians," said Gen. Rosso Jose Serrano,
commander of the Colombian police. For example, more than two dozen Russian
banks have offices on the island of Antigua, raising questions about why so
many faraway financial institutions would have so much interest in such a
small island, Caribbean law enforcement sources say. Serrano readily admits
that this emerging alliance worries him.

"These are tough people," he said. "An alliance between the Russians, the
Italians and the Colombians would finish us off."

Darling reported from Bogota, Puerto Rico, Miami, Barbados and Guatemala.
Times Caribbean Bureau Chief Mark Fineman contributed to this report from
Miami and Washington, and Special Correspondent Steven Ambrus contributed
from Bogota.

New Drug Partners In an attempt to break Mexico's preeminence in narcotics
smuggling, Colombian traffickers are establishing new ties to bring their
drugs to market. Places where they have found new allies: Guatemala
Dominican Republic Puerto Rico Aruba Russia