unitex@rubbs.fidonet.org (unitex) (09/16/89)
UN DELEGATES APPLAUD EFFORTS OF COLOMBIA IN "WAR" AGAINST DRUG
Posting Date: 09/14/89 Source: UNITEX Network, Hoboken, NJ, USA
TRAFFICKERS
Colombia's battle against drug traffickers has drawn expressions
of support and admiration at a United Nations meeting in Vienna
of the leaders of national agencies responsible for drug law
enforcement. The meeting, the second of its kind organized by
the United Nations Division of Narcotic Drugs and being attended
by senior drug law enforcement officers from about a hundred
countries, observed a moment of silence for all those who had
lost their lives in the fight against drugs.
Margaret Anstee, Director-General of the United Nations Office in
Vienna, said, that, as 50 years ago, the world was again at
war. With recent events in Colombia, the fight against drugs
had taken on such dimensions. The Government of that country
had been faced with a stark choice: to declare war on the
traffickers or, in effect, to surrender. In an act of immense
courage, it had chosen to fight and in so doing had "earned a
place in the history of what has become, for all of us, a world
war against drugs". She reviewed ongoing international efforts
against the drug problem and called for early
implementation of the 1989 United Nations Convention against
Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances.
There must be co-ordination of efforts, she said, to curtail the
consumption of drugs, to help producer- countries stem the
"flood of drugs" towards the largest markets, and to help those
mechanisms set up for regional and international co-operation to
function effectively.
Ms. Anstee noted a suggestion in some quarters for a multilateral
strike force, under the aegis of the United Nations, to combat
illicit trafficking. Such a proposal, she said, raised many
delicate and difficult issues, but it was certain that more
could be done to strengthen the role of the United Nations and
international co-operation in the field of law enforcement and
interdiction.
Francisco Ramos-Galino, Director of the United Nations Division
of Narcotic Drugs, called for more co-operation to help
implement the new United Nations Convention, and to allocate the
necessary financial resources. The Convention would help
alleviate the destabilizing effects of the "drug mafia", he
said, in that it would secure assets derived from illicit
trafficking and would lead to the arrest of traffickers with
extradition to those countries were traffickers were wanted.
Law-enforcement officers from a number of countries joined in
praising the efforts of the Government of Colombia. Peter
Edwards of Britain said recent events in that country, and the
'crack' epidemic which had devastated so many cities in the
United States, showed the gravity of the situation. Javier
Coello Trejo, Deputy Attorney-General of Mexico, said there must
be an historic "turn-about" in the fight against drugs. The
safeguarding of the welfare of mankind required extensive
international efforts.
* Origin: UNITEX --> Toward a United Species (1:107/501)
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Patt Haring | UNITEX : United Nations
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