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07 April 2005
U.S. Drug Enforcement Official Opens Global Conference in Chile
DEA's Tandy outlines international challenges in combating illicit narcotics
Drug smuggling across international borders is a centuries-old problem, but the scope and interconnectivity of the problem has increased as hardly a country in the world has been left untouched by the drug trade, according to U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) Administrator Karen Tandy.
Tandy outlined emerging international trends in illicit drug trade as well as ongoing efforts to combat these threats in her April 5 opening remarks at the 23rd International Drug Enforcement Conference in Santiago, Chile.
The annual International Drug Enforcement Conference (IDEC) brings together upper-level drug law enforcement officials from South, Central and North America, the Caribbean, Europe and the Far East to share drug-related intelligence and develop operational strategies that can be used against international drug traffickers.
As Tandy explained, the event provides an opportunity to "learn about emerging trends in the various regions represented here and to learn what is coming ahead of us, what is coming down the road, so that we can all get ahead of future threats."
Among the emerging trends Tandy cited are increased Ecstasy (3-4 methylenedioxymethamphetamine or MDMA) seizures in Japan; Colombian traffickers teaming with others to smuggle cocaine into France, Spain and China; and a spike in ketamine conversion labs in the Philippines.
Tandy noted that other trends include the emergence of money-laundering cells in the dollarized economy of El Salvador and the rapid rise of black market peso-exchange activity in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Korea.
As technological advances allow instant transfer of funds and permit traffickers to market their drugs faster and farther than ever before, the interconnectivity of the problem has grown, Tandy said. "There is hardly a country in the world that hasn't been touched by this drug trade," she added.
The DEA administrator pointed out that because 185 million people around the world consume illegal drugs each year, one country cannot succeed in the fight against narcotics alone.
"It is a global sickness that requires a global cure," she observed.
Tandy cited U.S. cooperation with Chile, Argentina, Ecuador, Brazil, Bolivia and Peru via a counterdrug initiative known as "Operation Seis Fronteras," and international collaborative efforts in Afghanistan, among examples of global cooperation to combat illicit narcotics.
"These partnerships and this conference, I am convinced, will open new doors for all of us as we work to achieve an international solution to the scourge of drugs that preys upon all people around this globe," she said.
Following is the text of Tandy's remarks, as prepared for delivery:
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DEA Administrator Karen Tandy
Opening Speech, International Drug Enforcement Conference
April 5, 2005
Santiago, Chile
I want to start by asking all to join in a clapping of hands to thank the people of Chile, my co-chair, and all of the extraordinary leaders of Chile here today for the hard work to bring this about. And let me add my personal welcome to the 23rd international drug enforcement conference and as you can see so many of you are my friends and partners, we were together last year in Lima, and as you can see we have grown exponentially larger this year than even last and have included as a result of that growth a new interpreter in the language of Russian.
I particularly want to thank Minister Insulza, who I had the wonderful opportunity to spend some time with yesterday. Your joining us for this conference, minister, is so important and we thank you for bringing the weight of your office to insure that our cooperative efforts here to fight drug trafficking and drug abuse continue to have the high priority they already have in Chile.
National Prosecutor Piedrabuena, your leadership and very strong support of cooperative drug enforcement are evident and we are so grateful for your friendship. Thank you. Senate President Romero, your continued support of the men and women in the law enforcement community has not gone unnoticed and we are also so grateful for that. President Szczaranski of the State Defense Council is also someone who has had extraordinary foresight to realize that the real key of successful drug enforcement is to follow the money and I obviously would be remiss if I did not especially thank Ambassador Kelly who has been dedicated and supportive of all our law enforcement efforts both from the United States as well as the country of Chile. We are grateful to you, Mr. Ambassador.
And to my friend, the president of IDEC, Director Herrera. I cannot begin to tell you how much everything you've done for the past year leading up to this week has meant to me and to all of the members and our great observers in IDEC. You have accomplished through your warm hospitality and hard work, an unprecedented job of organizing such a large meeting and ensuring that each of the member delegations has a police attaché who is assigned to them to guide them this week. Thank you, Director Herrera.
Finally, for General Godoy, the longstanding relationship between DEA and the Carabineros is very important to the success of drug law enforcement not only in Chile, but in the entire region and I thank you for your support.
This is my first trip to Chile and I am so delighted to be here. Unfortunately, I have been in meetings and haven't gotten out to see this incredible country but I am looking forward to our many side trips that we will have as a part of this conference and getting to see the spectacular Pacific coastline, downtown Santiago and -- not the least of which -- the historic vineyard in the Andean foothill.
Aside from your country's beauty I am pleased to be in a country that is so passionate and dedicated to waging the battle against drug trade, drug abuse, and drug demand. From active coordinated drug prevention programs to wide ranging criminal justice reform, to establishing a financial intelligence unit, the government and the people of Chile are successful in fighting the battle that is our common enemy across the globe.
DEA is not only fortunate and proud to have Chile as a partner, but just over a year ago DEA partnered with Chile, Argentina, Ecuador, Brazil, Bolivia, and Peru to begin phase six of Operation Seis Fronteras to combat the diversion of chemicals for cocaine production and this stage is proceeding extremely well. Our efforts will be greatly strengthened by Chile's recent legislation regarding precursor chemicals.
Today more than 70 countries, gathered here this week to tackle some of our toughest challenges that each of us is facing in our own countries and within the regions that we reside in. I would especially like to welcome France today and Turkey as new members of IDEC. Welcome.
This is a little different IDEC than we have engaged in the past. This year we are focusing, particularly through the established working groups, on spending more time in our working groups to focus more on drug targeting, drug trafficking on the Internet, precursor chemical controls and money laundering.
This is a change that was actually brought about as a result of a meeting in Turkey in September where more than 19 countries gathered from Southwest and Central Asia, Russia, and our partners in Europe and we gathered to focus on these same topics and joint targeting against organizations responsible for the scourge of poppy and heroin out of Afghanistan. It was a very successful meeting and I know as a result of seeing that in action in Turkey with 19 countries we will achieve the same kind of success this week.
But it is also time this week to learn about emerging trends in the various regions represented here and to learn what is coming ahead of us, what is coming down the road, so that we can all get ahead of future threats.
The kinds of trends drug enforcement have seen include increasing ecstasy seizures in Japan. Last year Japan seized almost half a million ecstasy tablets. That is up 500 percent from just four years ago.
Colombian cocaine traffickers are now joining with Moroccans and using their hashish smuggling routes and methods to introduce cocaine into Spain and the northern coast of Africa. Similarly, Colombian traffickers have joined with West African traffickers -- particularly from Togo -- to smuggle cocaine into France. And Colombian traffickers have moved into China as well as I learned from my trip to China, a very successful trip a little over a month ago.
In the Philippines there has been a spike in ketamine conversion labs. Known Chinese and Taiwanese meth manufacturers have ventured into converting liquid ketamine into crystalline form in order to form a more potent drug. And to launder their proceeds we are seeing new money laundering trends including the cunning and crafty use of Euros in drug transactions and the placement of money in cash value cards as means of laundering that drug money.
In El Salvador the recently dollarized economy is attracting money-laundering cells that are operating under the cover of the estimated USD 2.5 billion in cash remittances to El Salvador from the United States every year. Argentine cells are being used to move bulk shipments of cash from Europe and Mexico to Colombia through a series of South American countries. And last year we also saw a rapid rise in the amount of black market peso exchange activity in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Korea.
These are just a few of the challenges and the interconnections that we share in our global battle against drug trafficking. It clearly leads each of us to all four corners of the world because drug trafficking respects no borders and no jurisdictions and certainly no nationalities.
Drug smuggling across international borders is a centuries-old problem. What is new is the scope of that interconnectivity that we now share with this problem. What is new is the incredible speed made possible by high tech communications in the instant transfer of funds and travel that allows traffickers to market their drugs faster and farther than ever before. And there is hardly a country in the world that hasn't been touched by this drug trade. It is something that affects not only each of us here but also many other countries.
The United Nations has estimated that 3 percent of the global population, or about a 185 million people around the world, consume illicit drugs every year. I know and you know, because you are here, one country cannot succeed in this fight alone. It is a global sickness that requires that requires a global cure.
And this week through this conference we take a collective step forward as we build on these partnerships -- so many of our partnerships go back for years -- and we will build and strengthen our great partnerships and then create new ones this week to aid us in this fight. And we have seen through the fruits of your efforts here in IDEC some of the results of these some unprecedented partnerships.
From my own country, the United States, I am so very honored to announce that a little over a month ago when I went to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region we signed a memorandum of intent to expand our partnership and begin a new era of intelligence sharing that will allow us to jointly target, jointly investigate and dismantle the international drug trafficking organizations on that continent.
In Afghanistan, the international law enforcement community has joined forces to reduce heroin production in Afghanistan, which we all know is the world's leading opium producer. While the 2004 illicit poppy crop was the largest in Afghanistan's history, the preliminary crop surveys for 2005 -- this upcoming year -- suggests that this year's crops will be lower. And just a few weeks ago DEA and Afghanistan police raided three drug production labs in the Nangarhar province. That resulted in more than 2,000 kilograms of opium, 15 kilograms of finished heroin, and hundreds of gallons of chemical precursors being seized as a result of that one operation.
And just to enhance and expand the counter narcotics efforts in Afghanistan to improve all of our positions in the fight against heroin, three days ago DEA placed specially trained units in Afghanistan to augment their interdiction and training operations and augment the leading role that the United Kingdom has performed so valiantly, and we are partnering with the Afghan national interdiction unit which has just been trained.
Last week, nine countries -- all former republics of the Soviet Union, from Uzbekistan to Tajikistan, Kurdistan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine, Georgia, Moldavia, and Azerbaijan -- wrapped up a multinational intelligence initiative and the goal was to develop strategic intelligence regarding the emerging drug trafficking routes from Afghanistan into Central Asia and Russia and towards Western Europe.
Drug intelligence sharing had previously been extremely rare among a number of these countries, but through this initiatives we have the opportunity and are seeing changes that reflect that information from hundreds of individual seizures throughout the region are actually being shared among these new re-forged relationships and countries. And in Operation Cold Remedy, Hong Kong, the United States, Mexico, and China joined together in an enforcement tracking operation to monitor pseudo-ephedrine shipments to Mexico for the illicit manufacture of methamphetamine. That outstanding cooperation prevented the diversion of 67 million pseudo-ephedrine tablets that could have produced more than 2 metric tons of methamphetamines to be exported to the United States and elsewhere.
It is this kind of partnership. It is our partnership that will make the difference for each of our countries. For many of us, our partnerships are new. For many of us, they have been unprecedented and for that I thank you for the extraordinary outreach that so many of you have engaged in to allow us to address our collective new challenges. These partnerships and this conference, I am convinced, will open new doors for all of us as we work to achieve an international solution to the scourge of drugs that preys upon all people around this globe.
Thank you very much.
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(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
