VIOLENCE STAINS COCAINE'S NEW HAVEN

ZACAPA, Guatemala - An exploding drug trade aided by extensive government
corruption has turned Guatemala into the primary safe haven for Colombia's
cocaine headed through Mexico to the United States, according to U.S. and
Guatemalan authorities.

An estimated 200 metric tons of cocaine passed through Guatemala last year,
more than two-thirds of U.S. consumption of the drug, according to State
Department officials.

The increased flow - nearly triple the amount estimated a decade ago - has
turned parts of Guatemala into lawless zones ruled by family-controlled
transit cartels.

Here, where men wear holstered 9 mm pistols in public and judges fear for
their lives, violence and corruption have exploded in recent months, say
local judicial officials.

"It's a kind of Old West," said Alberto Brunori, the regional director of
the United Nation's mission here. "There are a lot of people involved in
the drug trade. You can see that."

The drug trade has become so rampant that the Bush administration earlier
this year blacklisted Guatemala for failing to cooperate in the fight
against drugs - one of only three such countries in the world, including
Burma and Haiti. However, the government waived the requirement that the
United States cut aid to Guatemala, citing the country's ongoing poverty
and social unrest.

The U.S. government has also convened a federal grand jury to investigate
charges of corruption involving highly placed government and ex-military
officials for laundering money through U.S. banks, according to Guatemala's
former top anticorruption prosecutor, Karen Fischer.

Fischer, who resigned in March after allegedly receiving pressure to drop a
money laundering case involving President Alfonso Portillo, said she has
offered to serve as a witness for the U.S. case, which involves the
diversion of $15 million in government funds.

Guatemalan government officials deny that there are any direct, high-level
links to drug traffickers, though they acknowledge that there have been
shortcomings in the drug war the past few years. They blame the United
States for failing to provide enough assistance to combat drug traffickers,
whose speedy boats and airplanes overwhelm the underfunded Guatemalan
police force.

Portillo has repeatedly declared his innocence, though the investigations
have placed him under pressure

Indications of collaboration between drug traffickers and government
officials are numerous. Last year, officers from Guatemala's anti-drug
police force were accused by local prosecutors of stealing more cocaine
from police warehouses than they seized. Cocaine seizures have dropped from
an average of 9.7 tons per year in the two years before Portillo took
office to an average of 2.8 tons per year over the past three years.

U.S. officials believe the decline reflects the effects of paid-off
government officials, not a decline in drug trafficking.