HATCH LINKS DRUGS, TERRORISM

WASHINGTON -- Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch said Tuesday
that the time has come to quit thinking of drug traffickers and terrorists
as separate types of groups.

The Utah Republican said the two groups are increasingly connected.

"If we really want to win the war against terrorism, we need to continue
and expand our commitment to cutting off all sources of terrorism
financing, including drug trafficking," he told a hearing about the
connection between drugs and terrorism.

"By doing so, we will not only cut off an important source of funding for
terrorists, but we will reduce the amount of illegal drugs that poison our
communities," Hatch said.

Of the 36 groups designated by the State Department as foreign terrorist
organizations, 14 (or 39 percent) are connected to drug activities,
testified Steven W. Casteel, assistant administrator for intelligence of
the Drug Enforcement Administration.

He said they range from Middle Eastern terrorist groups such as Hezbollah
and Hamas to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia, the Shining Path
in Peru and the Abu Sayyaf Group in the Philippines.

Larry C. Johnson, a former analyst for the CIA and State Department now
with Berg Associates, which specializes in money laundering probes, said
communist countries had supported terrorism until they collapsed at the end
of the Cold War, forcing many terrorist groups to turn to trafficking drugs
to finance themselves.

"Prior to 1991, almost all active terrorist groups relied on nation states
- -- namely the Soviet Union, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria and Cuba -- for
financing and materiel assistance. Few engaged in the production or
distribution of illegal drugs," he said.

But once communism fell, "many terrorist groups faced the dilemma of
ceasing operations or finding alternative sources of financing. Moving into
the production and distribution of illegal narcotics was a natural shift
for many of these groups," he said.

The hearing examined how terrorist groups around the world are now financed
by drug money, and how U.S. law enforcement agencies are trying better to
dovetail anti-drug and anti-terrorism efforts.

"The war on terror and the war on drugs are linked, with agencies
throughout the United States and internationally working together as a
force-multiplier in an effort to dismantle narco-terrorist organizations,"
Casteel said.

Hatch said the combined wars also hit close to home. For example, in San
Diego last year, he said two Pakistanis and one American were charged with
trying to exchange heroin, hashish and cash for four anti-aircraft missiles
for Taliban and al-Qaida associates.

Hatch said that just last month, the FBI and DEA arrested 16 people for
shipping heroin to the United States, and seeking to launder profits
through Afghan- and Pakistani-owned business in America to send proceeds
back to finance terrorists.

Hatch also said he worries about increased opium production in Afghanistan,
despite the United States' defeat of the Taliban there.

"We have not succeeded in stabilizing Afghanistan," he said. "Our policy is
to support President Karzai, but his Tajik-dominated government has
alienated the majority of the Pashtun population, who live in most of the
opium producing areas of Afghanistan," which he said fueled resistance by
al Qaida and "an increase in opium."