DRUG PROSECUTIONS RISING: AGENCY

Prosecutions for drug possession, dealing and manufacturing have
increased more than 400 percent during the past five years, the
National Narcotics Agency says.

Agency chief Made Mangku Pastika said Wednesday that the number of
prosecutions for drug possession had quadrupled to 14,515 last year
from 3,617 in 2001.

The number of recorded drug crimes -- including the dealing,
trafficking and manufacturing of drugs -- also increased, from 4,924
suspects in 2001, to 20,023 in 2005, or an 101 percent average annual
rise.

"The situation has become very alarming. The drug business is very
lucrative, people will take great risks to get involved and strong
syndicates make it hard to combat drug crime," Made said.

From 2001 through 2005, the agency has confiscated 117 tons of
marijuana and derivatives; 90.8 kilograms of heroin; 18 grams of
morphine, 68.3 kilograms of cocaine; 864,681 ecstasy pills and 327
kilograms of shabu-shabu (crystal methamphetamine), its statistics
show.

Police have also raided several major ecstasy and shabu-shabu
factories and destroyed large cannabis plantations in several regions
in the country.

The United Nations Information Service in a report Wednesday said that
the illicit manufacture of methamphetamine has been increasingly
detected in Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines.

The UNIS also warned about the rise of drug smuggling by mail, which
required close international cooperation.

Meanwhile, the Love the Nation's Children Foundation For A Drug-free
Indonesia said despite the increasing number of cases, the number of
people seeking drug counseling and rehabilitation was on the decline.

Executive director Veronica Colondam said the foundation's free
telephone counseling program recorded its lowest-ever number of
callers in 2005, with only 507 people asking for counseling.

There were 1,020 callers in 2003 and 920 callers in 2004 who came from
70 cities throughout the country, she said.

"We don't know what caused the decline. We're afraid people might be
becoming apathetic about their drug problems," Veronica said.

Rehabilitation centers were also seeing a drop-off in the numbers of
patients, she said.

"Again, we don't know what is causing the downturn, but it's alarming
because drug abuse keeps increasing. Maybe people think they don't
need rehabilitation if they consume amphetamines, but this isn't
true," Veronica said.

She urged families and communities to be more supportive of drug
addicts. Many people who were aware of addicts in their families or
neighborhoods often did nothing to help them, she said.

"Our survey in 2004 showed that four out of five families were aware
of the dangers of drugs and the legal consequences, and one out of two
people knew of addicts in their communities. But social support in
Jakarta, for instance, is very low, which makes the drug problem even
worse," Veronica said.