GOVT TO CRACK DOWN ON HARD DRUGS AT BORDERS

Border protection is being beefed up amid a warning that overseas-based
transnational crime groups have been targeting New Zealand.

Customs Minister Rick Barker today announced funding for the Custom
Service's illicit drugs enforcement unit, previously at $2.5 million, had
been boosted by $1.9 million.

He said the extra money would help drug teams in Auckland, Wellington and
Christchurch to be proactive - take action based on intelligence rather
than reacting to events.

It would allow for 12 more specialist investigators and four intelligence
analysts to be employed.

"The use of illicit drugs worldwide is a mounting problem and New Zealand
is no exception," Mr Barker said.

"We have an increasing hard drug problem here, fuelled from both domestic
and imported supply, and Customs needs to be better equipped to meet this
problem."

He said the problem confronting Customs officers was made more difficult by
the increase in travellers, mail and imported goods.

Customs national investigations manager Matt Roseingrave said a significant
trend was the way overseas crime groups were focusing on New Zealand.

"Traditionally our risk has been our domestic residents, but this has
switched in the last two to three years," he said.

"Our biggest concern is not only with the level and type of drugs being
imported, but these groups don't have a commodity restriction. They are
quite capable of changing the drug type.".

The announcement of increased funding coincided with the release of Project
Horizon, a document that looked at the New Zealand drug scene and at
Customs' enforcement strategies.

The report found use of amphetamine-type substances (ATS) in New Zealand
was surging, methamphetamine (speed) in particular.

"The availability of methamphetamine is becoming comparable to the sharp
increase in the supply of heroin in New Zealand in the late 1970s through
the activities of the Mr Asia syndicate," it said.

"The availability at an affordable price is placing methamphetamine within
the reach of drug users in all strata of society."

It said the ATS market was largely controlled by bikie and ethnic gangs,
and their involvement in ATS manufacture meant Customs had to be alert to
the importation of "precursors".

These were chemicals that might have legitimate uses, but were also
employed for producing illicit drugs.

One example was pseudoephedrine, commonly found in cold and cough
medicines, but also used for making the likes of P, or Pure.

The report described Ecstasy as the other fast-emerging drug of abuse in
New Zealand, with most of it being imported.

Current annual Ecstasy use in New Zealand was estimated at one million
tablets. Customs seized 255,000 Ecstasy tablets or their powdered
equivalent during 2002, mostly from Europe, in particular Amsterdam. The
figure was up 3000 percent on two years ago.

The report said the need to be proactive was demonstrated by the fact that
26 of the 36 biggest drug seizures in New Zealand's history were the result
of proactivity.

However, intelligence, profiling and technology fundamental to enforcement
had been restricted by lack of resources.

Customs began a review of its drug strategies in 2001 in preparation for
this year's review of the Government's National Drug Policy.