War and Drugs in Colombia

This report is also available in Spanish.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Drugs finance the left-wing insurgent Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the far-right United Self-Defence Forces of Colombia (AUC) to a large degree, and thus are an integral part of Colombia's conflict. But while the state must confront drug trafficking forcefully, President Alvaro Uribe's claim that the conflict pits a democracy against merely "narco-terrorists" who must be met by all-out war does not do justice to the complexity of the decades-old struggle. Fighting drugs and drug trafficking is a necessary but not sufficient condition for moving Colombia toward peace. The view that anti-drug and anti-insurgency policies are indistinguishable reduces the chances either will succeed and hinders the search for a sustainable peace.

More crops have been sprayed under President Uribe than ever before in Colombia, effectively reducing coca cultivation from more than 100,000 hectares in late 2002 to some 86,000 hectares at the end of 2003. Hundreds of small basic coca processing facilities as well as more sophisticated cocaine laboratories have been destroyed by the police and army. However, cocaine street prices in the U.S. have not increased and consumption remains high despite a 17 per cent increase in cocaine seizures in Europe and a substantial increase in cocaine consumption in new markets like Brazil.

Aerial spraying is not likely to keep pace with the geographic mobility and increasing productivity of illicit crops. The interdiction of drug and chemical precursor shipments is very difficult, not least because of the porosity of Colombia's borders, and alternative development programs have been insufficient. The finances of the armed groups do not appear to have been hit hard, and everything indicates that they can keep the war going for years.

While fighting drugs is clearly crucial, peace must remain Colombia's policy priority. The paramilitary AUC evolved from serving the drug barons of the 1980s and early 1990s as hired guns into a national federation of war lords in charge of an ever larger chunk of the drug business. Fighting the rebel National Liberation Army (ELN) and FARC in part linked with state agents, the AUC committed atrocious crimes against civilians they stigmatised as guerrilla supporters. At the beginning of 2005 and after eighteen months of negotiations, the Uribe administration has demobilised some 3,000 paramilitary fighters, including the notorious AUC chief Salavtore Mancuso, who is wanted, along with a number of other paramilitary leaders, in the U.S. on drug trafficking charges.

Nevertheless, the paramilitary drug networks appear to remain in place, with the bulk of their illegal assets, particularly in rural Colombia, unaffected. The government has failed to establish promising peace talks with the ELN, the insurgent group with the most tenuous drug links. Nor has it significantly weakened the FARC -- whose ties to drugs are deep -- despite much intensified security efforts and a major military offensive (Plan Patriota) begun in 2003. The FARC retains a strong presence in most coca and poppy growing regions and participates actively, along with the AUC and the new generation of "baby drug cartels", in the narcotics business.

The Colombian government needs to review the relationship between its counter-drug and security policies and design and implement a broad rural development strategy that includes much larger alternative development programs. Voluntary crop eradication should be the rule and forced eradication, particularly aerial spraying, the exception restricted to large holdings where small farmers are unlikely to be affected. The government should also renew offers for ceasefires with the insurgents aimed at their demobilisation and political integration, locally and regionally.

The prospect for bringing an end to Colombia's armed conflict would also be much increased if demand for drugs could be reduced in the large U.S. and European consumption centres, since this would cut the profit margin of the armed groups as well as international drug trafficking organisations. To achieve this, governments in the U.S. and Europe ought to strengthen interdiction, arrest and prosecution of drug traffickers and money launderers. They should also examine urgently whether harm reduction measures have the potential to reduce demand in the criminal cocaine and heroin markets and if studies indicate this is the case, implement such measures.

RECOMMENDATIONS

To the Government of Colombia:

1.  Increase efforts at interdiction of drug and chemical precursor shipments and legal prosecution of drug traffickers through vigorous asset forfeiture and anti-money laundering measures.

2.  Design and implement a broad rural development strategy, including alternative development programs in coca and poppy growing regions, encompassing alternative livelihoods and community infrastructure; when replacement economies are not viable, offer resettlement of communities and alternative development programs on state-acquired land -- ideally land confiscated from drug lords.

3.  Implement manual eradication more widely -- voluntary where possible as part of alternative livelihoods agreements, and mandatory after genuine options have been refused, making aerial spraying the exception and only on large tracts; carry out long-term studies of the environmental, social, and economic impacts of such spraying and of the effect on health of women and children and their food security, and end spraying if negative consequences are shown.

4.  Build political alliances with other source countries and consuming countries in Europe and North America about the importance of harm reduction measures as an integral component of drug policy, defend this position in relevant international forums, in particular the UN General Assembly, and encourage serious analysis of the relationship of such measures to demand reduction.

5.  Ensure that demobilisation of the paramilitary forces is conducted under appropriate conditions respecting rule of law and accompanied by full and verified disengagement from drug trafficking.

6.  Acknowledge that the left-wing insurgencies, FARC and ELN, are not simply "narco-terrorists" but are motivated in part by political ideology, and combat them accordingly, complementing military and prosecutorial programs with social programs that come to grips with some of the roots of the armed conflict, such as land rights questions.

7.  Use the paramilitary demobilisation process as an opportunity to move toward negotiations aiming at demobilisation of the FARC and ELN and their integration as political organisations at the local and regional level, with the same conditions previously recommended for the paramilitaries:

(a)  investigation of and punishment for atrocities;

(b)  confiscation of illegal assets; and

(c)  full disclosure and severing of links to drug trafficking.

To the Government of the United States:

8.  Continue supporting Colombia's efforts to establish rule of law and state presence across the national territory, including by providing appropriate military and police assistance, and improved logistical and technical aid in the interdiction of drug shipments, and by prosecuting drug traffickers and money launderers in the U.S.

9.  Alter the balance so there is an even division between security assistance on the one hand and rural economic assistance, governance help and social funding on the other, including by increasing substantially aid for alternative and rural development programs.

10.  Encourage the National Academy of Science, the Institute of Health and the National Research Council to join in a comprehensive study of the range, benefits, implications and consequences of harm reduction measures in tackling drug demand in the U.S., including abstinence-oriented medically administered drug consumption experiments that have been conducted in Europe or elsewhere.

11.  Consult widely on possible implications for cutting demand of harm reduction measures and mechanisms for incorporating them in both source and consumption countries; if a consensus is reached that they would indeed reduce demand and so cut into profit margins that affect both supply and armed conflicts, work to amend the international drug policy framework in UN conventions accordingly.

To the European Union and its Member States:

12.  Increase assistance to Colombia for alternative development programs with a view to reducing aerial spraying to a minimum and contribute through the technical cooperation agencies to the elaboration and implementation of a broad rural development strategy.

13.  Increase scientific study of harm reduction measures, including medically administered drug consumption programs, and partial liberalisation experiments where they exist, seek consensus on a European drug policy based on the results of such studies, and amendment of the UN drug conventions consistent with that policy.

14.  Provide more logistical and technical assistance to Colombia for interdiction of drug and chemical precursor shipments and, when jurisdiction exists, prosecute Colombian and European traffickers and money launderers.

To the Governments of Brazil, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela:

15.  Expand efforts and cooperation with Colombia regarding interdiction of drug and chemical precursor shipments and legal prosecution of drug traffickers and vigorously apply anti-money laundering measures.

16.  Increase drug demand reduction efforts, including by exploring the utility of introducing abstinence-oriented harm reduction measures in national drug policies, and give support in the UN General Assembly to relevant amendment of the UN drug conventions.

To the United Nations General Assembly:

17.  Consider seriously first steps toward introducing harm reduction measures in source and consumption countries into the international drug policy framework before the 2008 UNGASS evaluation deadline, including by integrating the concept into the Guiding Principles of Drug Demand Reduction

To the International Financial Institutions (IFIs):

18.  Assist Colombia to design and implement a broad rural development strategy, including alternative development programs in coca and poppy growing regions, and resettlement of populations where necessary.

Bogotá/Brussels, 27 January 2005