U.S. RAISES HEAT ON VENEZUELA OVER DRUG TRAFFICKING

BRUSSELS -- Latin American drug cartels are using commercial airports
and ports in Venezuela as a "safe base" to ship increasing quantities
of cocaine to Europe, according to U.S. antidrug czar John Walters.
The comments by Mr. Walters, director of the White House's office of
National Drug Control Policy, added to an escalating war of words
between Venezuela and the U.S. over global narcotics trafficking. Mr.
Walters urged European nations that have better relations with
Venezuela than the U.S. has to persuade President Hugo Chavez to
cooperate more in combating the narcotics trade. Mr. Walters's visit
to Brussels also included talks with European Union officials on drug
eradication in Afghanistan. Mr. Walters said he wasn't accusing Mr.
Chavez or other senior Venezuelan officials of involvement in the trade.

Mr. Walters said the Venezuelan government should be able to control
trafficking at known airports. "The point is that this is not a
matter of 'can't get there' or 'can't find it,' " he said in a
telephone interview. Drug cartels often use clandestine dirt roads or
landing strips cut out of the jungle to move drugs on small aircraft.

Antonio Garcia, a spokesman for the Venezuelan Embassy in Brussels,
described Mr. Walters's comments as "politically contaminated" and
part of a continuing U.S. effort to isolate Venezuela
internationally. "The Venezuelan government reiterates its desire to
cooperate with the international community in the fight against
drugs," Mr. Garcia said. Venezuela ceased cooperation with the U.S.
Drug Enforcement Agency in 2005 as relations between the two
countries deteriorated. On Monday, Venezuelan Justice Minister Pedro
Carreno said that decision was made because the DEA was "moving a
large amount of drugs."

Mr. Walters said Europe makes up 25% of the global market for
cocaine. With consumption and prices falling in the U.S., he said
Europe was an increasingly attractive destination for traffickers. In
response to that shift in the market and to interdiction efforts,
traffickers have moved away from small, fast boats used to shift
drugs into the Caribbean -- the main transshipment point to West
Africa and Europe -- according to Mr. Walters. Instead, drug
traffickers are using larger aircraft and container ships,
increasingly from Venezuela, he said. According to Mr. Walters's
office, the number of suspected drug flights from Venezuela to the
Caribbean almost doubled in 2005 and the upward trend continued last
year. Mr. Walters said DEA investigators have been able to spot the
trend in drug flights from Venezuela because information from drug
busts at airports around the world is shared and the origin of
flights can be tracked.

As evidence, Mr. Walters cited the February seizure at Mexico City's
airport of a metric ton of cocaine packed into at least 20 suitcases
on a commercial airliner that flew in from Caracas. He said so large
a shipment through a commercial airport suggests local corruption. (A
metric ton is about 1.1 U.S. tons.) The U.S. estimates that the flow
of cocaine through Venezuela has risen to more than 200 metric tons a
year. Mr. Walters also said U.S. surveillance suggests that a growing
number of ships seized carrying cocaine had come from Venezuelan
ports. He said the DEA was particularly concerned about container traffic.

The International Narcotics Control Board, a United Nations agency,
said in its March annual report that total cocaine seizures in
Venezuela in 2005 rose 87%, to 58.4 metric tons, with 23 metric tons
seized in the first six months of last year. Most of the seized
cocaine was headed to Spain and the United Kingdom.