5nation WoD alliance

"Partnership urged to fight drugs: Sen. Paul Coverdell's
vision of a fivenation alliance is gaining bipartisan support"
by Ken Foskett

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"Partnership urged to fight drugs: Sen. Paul Coverdell's vision of a
fivenation alliance is gaining bipartisan support" by Ken Foskett

Washington An unusual coalition of liberal Democrats and conservative

Republicans is pushing a proposal by Sen. Paul Coverdell (RGa.) to
create an international alliance in the war on drugs.

Under Coverdell's proposal, the United States and its regional
partners would coordinate military strategy, set goals and negotiate
outstanding disagreements over drug enforcement jurisdiction.

"This is the time to strike on this," said Sen. Christopher Dodd
(DConn.), who next to Coverdell is the proposal's most vocal backer.

Democrats such as Dodd like the idea because they think more regional
cooperation would help avoid the annual partisan battles over
certification, when the administration decides which countries have
cooperated in the drug war and are worthy of U.S. aid.

Many Democrats believe certification fights such as the one Congress
just picked with the administration over Mexico do more harm than
good, alienating the United States' Latin American neighbors.

Conservative Republicans such as Coverdell argue that a multilateral
drug war strategy would be more effective in cutting and interdicting
supply. It also would give the drug war higher visibility in the
region.

"It allows the rest of the hemisphere to come to us as partners in the

battle rather than a situation that tends to make everyone stand off,"

said Coverdell.

Coverdell's alliance would include the United States, Mexico, Bolivia,

Colombia and Peru. The institutional framework still has not been
worked out, but Coverdell envisions an entity based in a neutral
country such as Panama or Guatemala and staffed by representatives
from all five nations.

The alliance might, among other things, help eliminate barriers to
international interdiction by, for example, developing agreements to
allow U.S. Coast Guard boats to pursue suspected drug traffickers in
territorial waters of neighboring countries.

The Senate resolution expressing concern over Mexico's progress in
fighting the drug war that was passed last week calls on the Clinton
administration to explore formation of "a coordinated multinational
alliance."

The language, drafted by Coverdell, was the Senate's first official
recognition of the drug alliance concept and represented a significant

victory in Coverdell's twoyear effort to win Senate backing.

Independent analysts offer guarded praise for Coverdell's proposal,
but they warn that most Latin American countries are likely to regard
it as simply another attempt by the United States to impose its
policies on them.

"The United States will always feel that its drug control agenda
should be followed more strictly than others," said Peter Sanchez, a
political scientist at Loyola University in Chicago.

"These countries in their heart of hearts do not see this is [sic] a
problem of supply. They see it as a problem of demand," added
Swarthmore College professor Kenneth Sharpe, author of "Drug War
Politics: The Price of Denial." "A really multilateral policy might
put the kinds of conditions on the United States that the United
States couldn't meet."

Sharpe argues that any drug policy that focuses on interdiction and
enforcement without tackling demand is doomed to fail. He notes that
even if the United States could cut the cocaine supply by onehalf, an

impossible goal, the street price of cocaine would increase only 3
percent to 4 percent.

But Coverdell argues that the current bilateral approach to the drug
war, in which the United States deals independently with Mexico,
Colombia, and other drugproducing countries, ig ....[END OF TEXT
FAXed from Sen. Coverdell's office.]
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For remainder of article, see 3/27/97 edition of The Atlanta
Constitution.

The office of Sen. Paul Coverdell (RGa.) can be reached at
(202) 2243643.