LOOSE CANADIAN LAWS AGAINST POT UNDER FIRE

Marijuana Coming South, U.S. Drug Czar Says

WASHINGTON-Relatively lax Canadian laws against marijuana may be
responsible for a surge in seizures of the drug at the northern
border, the Bush administration's top illegal drug enforcer said.

Asa Hutchinson, administrator of the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration, said he has expressed frustration to Canadian
officials about that country's loosening of marijuana
restrictions

"You have very definitely a trend toward Canadian marijuana coming
across the border to the market here," Mr. Hutchinson said in an
interview with Washington reporters.

Figures from the U.S. Border Patrol indicate a brisk cross border
market for marijuana since late last year.

From last October to March, the Border Patrol seized 2,489 pounds of
marijuana between Ogdensburg and Burke, compared to 409 pounds in the
same period a year earlier. The number of seizures soared from 11 to
58, said Border Patrol spokesman Chuck Foss.

And those were only the seizures outside of ports of entry. The
Customs Service, which handles ports on entry, did not immediately
have figures available for all north county locations.

Border Patrol seizures from Ogdensburg west to Buffalo fell, the
agency reported. But the U.S. Customs Service discovered a 1,200
pound shipment hidden in peat moss at Alexandria Bay in March.

Generally, authorities have discovered more marijuana at the northern
border since tightening security last September, Mr. Hutchinson said.

He said the increased seizures are partly an unintended benefit of
tightened security and partly a result of agents looking specifically
for drugs.

An increase in the number of agents in Northern New York may also have
led to more discoveries, Mr. Foss said, The Border Patrol moved
agents from the Southwest border to the Canadian border.

Law enforcement officials said the marijuana is mostly hydroponically
grown, perhaps mainly in Quebec. Northern New York may be closest to
the source, the said, but dealers may have decided that the relatively
isolated region is simply the easiest route into the United States.

In an hour long interview, Mr. Hutchinson focused on marijuana and
methamphetamine, touching on the two illegal drug issues that most
concern the northern border.

Methamphetamine, also known as speed, contains pseudoephedring, which
can legally be sold in large quantities in Canada but not in the U.S.,
so illegal drug lab in the Western U.S. often smuggle it from the north.

But he said his interest in the subject does not mean the DEA is
concentrating anew on marijuana, which anti-drug groups say is a
gateway to more dangerous substances but which other groups say is
harmless enough to be make legal.

Marijuana is illegal to grow in Canada as well as in the U.S., but the
Canadian government started issuing permits last year to grow
marijuana for medical use, said Sgt. Paul A. Marsh, a spokesman for
the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

Canadian Finance Minister Martin Couchon said Tuesday that Ottawa may
consider making possession of small amounts of marijuana merely a
ticketed offense, following similar action by Britain last week.

Mr. Hutchinson said Canadian officials have been cooperative about
enforcing laws already on the books, but he acknowledged that the
Canadian government does not seem eager to enact new restrictions or
tougher penalties on marijuana or pseudoephedrine.

"That outcome in unclear," Mr. Hutchinson said.

He also said that the administration opposes the relaxation of
marijuana penalties in Great Britain but that the decision would not
affect the drug market here.

Mr. Hutchinson, a former congressman from Arkansas, has been in charge
of the DEA for about a year and said the agency continues making
progress against illegal drugs. Polls consistently show that the
American public wants the government to maintain a tough policy
against marijuana, he said, despite what he called "misleading
campaigns" to make it legal.

States that have experimented with legalization later regretted it
when drug use climbed among youths, Mr. Hutchinson said. "How many
young people did we send the wrong message to in the meantime? Let's
not do this back and forth."

But Mr. Hutchinson also acknowledged that illegal drug use in the U.S.
has hardly declined since 1992. Most of the steep declines in drug
use came between 1985 and 1992, DEA figures show.

Mr. Hutchinson said President Bill Clinton cut the DEA budget in 1993,
his first year in office. The war on terrorism has also moved federal
resources away from drug enforcement, he said.