Agenda Combating narcoterrorism the financial support to terrorist organizations

Transcription

1 Agenda Combating narcoterrorism the financial support to terrorist organizations Table of Contents 1. Definition Introduction Drug Producing Regions and Trafficking Routes Violent Non-State Actors (VNSAs) Relationship between narcotics trade and VNSAs Case Studies...39 A. Situation in Colombia...39 B. IRA & Narcoterrorism C. PKK & Narcoterrorism D. Situation in Afghanistan Problems with current US policies DTO VEO Population Relationship Policy Solutions...48 A. Defining Narcoterrorism...48 B. Financial Assets...49 C. Supply & Demand...50 D. Foreign Aid Conclusion Major Countries Involved UN Treaties Questions A Resolution Must Answer

2 1. Definition A. What do the terms drug and narcotic drug mean? As stated by the UNODC: In medicine, it refers to any substance with the potential to prevent or cure disease or enhance physical or mental welfare; in pharmacology it means any chemical agent that alters the biochemical or physiological processes of tissues or organisms. In the context of international drug control, drug means any of the substances in Schedule I and II of the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs of 1961, whether natural or synthetic. In medicine, a narcotic drug is a chemical agent that induces stupor, coma, or insensibility to pain (also called narcotic analgesic). In the context of international drug control, narcotic drug means any drug defined as such under the 1961 Convention. B. What is meant by the term terrorism? The UN Member States still have no agreed-upon definition of terrorism, and this fact has been a major obstacle to meaningful international countermeasures against terrorism. The UN General Assembly Resolution 49/60 (adopted on December 9, 1994), titled "Measures to Eliminate International Terrorism," contains a provision describing terrorism: Criminal acts intended or calculated to provoke a state of terror in the general public, a group of persons or particular persons for political purposes are in any circumstance unjustifiable, whatever the considerations of a political, philosophical, ideological, racial, ethnic, religious or any other nature that may be invoked to justify them. UN Security Council Resolution 1566 (2004) gives a definition: criminal acts, including against civilians, committed with the intent to cause death or serious bodily injury, or taking of hostages, with the purpose to provoke a state of terror in the general public or in a group of persons or particular persons, intimidate a population or compel a government or an international organization to do or to abstain from doing any act. 32

3 C. So what does Narcoterrorism mean? The UN Member States have no common definition of the word narcoterrorism ; it was used first by former President Fernando Belaúnde Terry of Peru in 1983, to describe the terrorist-like attacks against the Peruvian police. Narcoterrorism, according to the US Drug Enforcement Agency, refers to the participation of groups or associated individuals in taxing, providing security for, otherwise aiding or abetting drug trafficking endeavors in an effort to further, or fund, terrorist activities. It is best understood as the organized employment of violence against the local populace, the security forces, and the government to intimidate anyone contemplating resistance to drug trafficking. 2. Introduction While first recognized as a threat in Latin America, narcoterrorism has wreaked havoc across the world. From the FARC in Colombia, the PKK in Turkey, to al Qaeda in Afghanistan, and the Hezbollah in Lebanon, the methods of narcoterrorism are employed by various terrorist organizations and drug cartels. As globalization has allowed for the interconnectivity of world markets it has also allowed for global trade in the illicit market. As a result, ties have been forged between various criminal groups in which drug trafficking is increasingly used to fund the operations of terrorist organizations and crime groups. Drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) and violent extremist organizations (VEOs), grasped this opportunity to develop cooperation and share competences at the international level, in order to promote and secure their agenda. The five major benefits of drug trafficking to terrorism may be listed as- 1. Funds for terrorism, 2. Chaos where drugs are present, sometime fostered by DTOs and VEOs to create a favorable environment for them, 3. Corruptions of public institutions with probably the intention to initiate support for terrorist organization, 4. Logistical support for DTOs and VEOs, 33

4 5. Challenges law enforcement and intelligence agency. It is estimated that almost a quarter of a billion people between the ages of 15 and 64 years used an illicit drug in The gross profits out of only cocaine sales (totaling US$85 billion) were estimated at US$84 billion for the year 2009, compared with about US$1 billion earned by the farmers in the Andean region. Most of the gross profits (retail and wholesale) were generated in North America (US$35 billion) and in West and Central Europe (US$26 billion). With drug use on the rise in many developed as well as developing economies, one can only make conjectures as to the total amount of money generated via sale of illicit drugs. The United States is the largest market for illegal drug consumption, resulting in violence and mayhem. To the Mexican drug cartels, this country by its drug consumption finances their drug empires. Once a less violent activity of Mexico s society, trafficking marijuana has in the last thirty years become a violent war resulting in the loss of thousands of innocent lives. Activities with the mass slaughter of women, children, and government officials have raised the violence to a level of terrorism. Because narcotics are the central reason for the fighting, and massive corruption, the label of narcoterrorism fits. Terrorist groups, criminal organizations, and states that sponsor terrorism are aware of this and are taking advantage of this problem. 3. Drug Producing Regions and Trafficking Routes 34

5 The regions in which the cultivation and manufacture of drugs take place have not changed. Herbal cannabis production occurs in most countries worldwide, while the production of cannabis resin remains confined to a few countries in North Africa, the Middle East and South-West Asia. In South America, three Andean countries continue to account for virtually all global cultivation of coca bush, while the vast majority of illicit opium poppy cultivation worldwide remains concentrated in two countries in Asia. Cannabis continues to be the most-used drug worldwide. Coca bush cultivation continued to decline in 2013, reaching its lowest level since estimates from the mid-1980s. The decline in 2013 was driven mainly by an 18 per cent decrease in coca bush cultivation in Peru (from 60,400 ha in 2012 to 49,800 ha) and by a 9 per cent decrease in the Plurinational State of Bolivia (from 25,300 ha to 23,000 ha). Coca bush cultivation in Colombia, on the other hand, remained stable in 2013, although it remained at historically low levels. Available information for Colombia on the presence of coca bush cultivation shows that prior to eradication 89,215 ha were under cultivation at some point in South America remains the main departure hub for cocaine to the rest of the world. The cocaine-producing countries, Bolivia (Plurinational State of), Colombia and Peru, serve as departure (and transit) countries for the export of cocaine to the rest of the region. A number of other countries may serve as transit points for trafficking cocaine from Latin America to the major consumer markets in North America and Western and Central Europe, but Brazil (particularly since 2010) and Argentina are the cocaine transit countries most frequently mentioned in major individual drug seizures. The Netherlands, Morocco and Spain have been mentioned in individual drug seizures as the main departure or transit countries for cannabis over the past decade as a whole and continue to be so when considering more recent trends during the period Albania and Argentina have emerged respectively as cannabis departure or transit countries in the past five years, confirming that cannabis cultivation and production are dynamic and widespread, and that trafficking routes may be in constant change. 35

6 Heroin is produced in three different regions, but while there is information from reports of individual seizures on the trafficking routes for heroin from Afghanistan, available data does not currently allow for the identification of the transit countries used in the trafficking of heroin from Colombia and Mexico or from the Lao People s Democratic Republic and Myanmar. Pakistan is mentioned in individual drug seizure reports more frequently than other countries as a transit country for heroin seized elsewhere. This confirms that Afghan heroin is smuggled southwards from Afghanistan through Pakistan, but it may also suggest that this trafficking route is more successfully targeted by law enforcement in destination countries and/or that data reporting on the last departure country of the shipment seized is comparatively better for this route than for others. Although opium poppy is cultivated in South-East Asia, individual drug seizures indicate that neither of the opium cultivating countries in the region, the Lao People s Democratic Republic and Myanmar, appears to be an important heroin trafficking departure hub. This may be due to the fact that Afghan heroin dominates the global market, but it may also reflect the fact that countries that report individual seizures are not markets for heroin produced in South-East Asia. Despite a temporary reduction from 2011 to 2013, the fact that heroin seizures in Afghanistan itself have increased in the past decade may show that an increasing amount of opiates are being intercepted before reaching markets outside 36

7 Afghanistan. On the other hand, several countries reported increasing seizures of heroin trafficked via the southern route (on which heroin is trafficked to Asia and Europe often via African countries) as well as maritime routes, which is consistent with reports of an expansion of trafficking along the southern route. In Pakistan, opium seizures increased for the third consecutive year to reach 34 tons in The strengthening of controls between Afghanistan and Iran (Islamic Republic of) and between Iran (Islamic Republic of) and Turkey may have forced traffickers to move southwards towards the coasts of Iran (Islamic Republic of) and Pakistan. The increasing importance of Africa as a transit region for Afghan heroin bound for Europe and other regions has been reflected in increasing seizures of heroin being reported in recent years by some African countries, particularly in East Africa, and in seizures in Europe of African provenance. Since 2010, heroin seizures associated with the southern route have been reported in a number of European countries, including Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Portugal, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine and the United Kingdom. 4. Violent Non-State Actors (VNSAs) Although violent non-state actors (VNSAs) have exerted a perceptible influence on the international system for centuries, it was only after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 that they began to receive significant attention in the international community. Most of the groups examined in this study have been designated foreign terrorist organizations by the U.S. Department of State. However, due to lack of a commonly accepted and comprehensive definition of the word terrorism (one State s terrorists are another s freedom fighters, as it is colloquially said), there has been a lack of effective countermeasures to the rise of VNSAs. Some examples of VNSAs include Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan, the Hamas and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in the Middle East, al Shabab and Boko Haram in Africa, Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) in Colombia, Shining Path in Peru. Through both the General Assembly as well as the more elite Security Council, the UN has attempted to use the powerful international means at its disposal to confront the threats posed by VNSAs; however, these attempts have consistently failed to restrain the 37

8 destructive force of VNSAs. The Security Council, as the nonpareil body of states charged with primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security, passed Resolutions 1540 and 1673 in order to prohibit states from assisting non-state actors in the acquisition of weapons of mass destruction. However, the Resolutions, while ambitious, were wholly ineffective due to their complete lack of any international enforcement provisions. Similarly, the Terrorist Bombing and Terrorist Financing Conventions, passed by the General Assembly in the late 1990s as states began to comprehend the severity of the threats posed by VNSAs, both left enforcement of their provisions entirely up to the individual signatory states rather than the Security Council. This rendered the Conventions devoid of any meaningful effect because many of the states in which violent non-state actors operate are either unable to effectively project force into the peripheral areas in which terrorist groups tend to locate and operate or are otherwise complicit in the activities of the violent non-state actors within their territories. 5. Relationship between narcotics trade and VNSAs As a result of the significant decline in funding of guerrilla and terrorist groups by ideologically motivated state sponsors since the end of the Cold War, these groups have become increasingly reliant on drug trafficking as a funding source. Many terrorist and insurgents groups also in fact exploit a variety of illicit economies, including drugs. Depending on the locale and time period, other illegal or semi-legal commodities include conflict diamonds, special minerals, human beings, weapons, and illicit activities such as extortion, kidnapping, illegal logging, money laundering, and the illicit manufacture of passports. Such illicit economies exist in some form virtually everywhere, both within and outside the locales of military conflict. In most cases, the relationship between insurgent groups and drug-trafficking organizations or cartels is a mutually beneficial one that allows exchanges of drugs for weapons, use of the same smuggling routes, use of similar methods to conceal profits and fund-raising, e.g., informal transfer systems such as the hawala and the Black Market Peso Exchange (BMPE), use of the same resources for laundering money, use of the same corrupt government officials, and so forth. However, the cartels and the drug trafficking terrorist and extremist groups have different goals: the former are primarily motivated by financial enrichment and 38

9 do not seek attention, whereas the latter, because of their political goals or, in the case of the Islamic groups, both religious and political objectives are more likely to receive close attention by the public and by law enforcement authorities. As a result, the insurgent groups and the drug cartels have a pragmatic, arm s-length relationship. Not only does it provide funds, it also furthers the strategic objectives of the terrorists. Some terrorist groups believe that they can weaken their enemies by flooding their societies with addictive drugs. 6. Case Studies A. Situation in Colombia The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia People's Army (FARC EP and FARC) is a guerrilla movement involved in the continuing Colombian armed conflict since FARC started their foray into the drug world by taxing local coca growers in southern towns. This tax was basically extortion disguised as a fee for providing security to the farmers from the Colombian government and paramilitaries. In order to push their leftist agenda, FARC was using the drug trade to fund the attacks against the Colombian government and even innocent civilians; Their strategies and tactics involved many acts of terrorism in that they kill peasants suspected of colluding with the paramilitaries and they kidnap for ransom, preying on anyone suspected of possessing wealth beyond that prescribed by their communist dogma. They also use traditional military strategies and tactics and target the police and other symbols of government presence. Colombia launched an aggressive approach against FARC known as Plan Colombia that was supported by the United States. Billions of dollars were used by the U.S. government to strengthen and train the Colombian troops in an effort to eradicate coca crops and weaken guerrilla groups. However, they quickly found safe havens in neighboring countries such as Venezuela and Ecuador, from where they continued their cocaine operations used to fund their attacks against the Colombian government, albeit in a reduced capacity owing to the losses they sustained as a result of Plan Colombia. While Plan Colombia was successful in defeating much of the FARC, it struggled in many other areas. Much of the United States attention in Plan Colombia was focused on counter- insurgency, especially after 9/11, and preventing the flow of illegal drugs into the United 39

10 States. The economic development of Colombia has been held back by its reliance on the illegal drug trade. Many of the poor rural farmers have no other option but to grow coca and pay the tax enforced by FARC. New conflicts over land have increased once again and displacement of populations from land persists at very high levels. Homicides and kidnapping murders are up in Bogotá and Medellín, once hailed as a model success. The government s provision of security in many areas remains sporadic and spotty. The situation in Mexico clearly shows how narcoterrorism can destabilize a country. The symptoms were known, increasing drug production along and widespread abused of it, drug related crime, threats to public safety and health, corruption along with money laundering and the infiltration of the government and economy. The Sinalao Drug Cartel, one of the most powerful drug cartels in the world, has the logistic capabilities to smuggle anything into the US and is present in West Africa, Eastern and Western Europe, conducting its affairs with the Mara Salvaltrucha, commonly known as MS13, a transnational criminal organization. To recruit, they have a very advantageous welcoming package including wellpaid jobs and health care while funding local government and political parties. Many hence believe that Mexico has become a narco-state. Additionally, there is proof today of al-qaeda links with Latin America s VEOs but no evidence of ties with DTOs in Central and South America has been shown. B. IRA & Narcoterrorism FARC is not the only terrorist organization that has funded their attacks with the drug trade. The IRA terrorized Northern Ireland for decades with mortar attacks and car bombs. The IRA was founded in 1969 by Sinn Fein, as the legal political entity dedicated to removing British forces from Northern Ireland. The IRA has engaged in assassinations and other forms of attacks in Northern Ireland and England since being founded. The IRA has justified the use of terrorist tactics to fight what they view as the unfair treatment of Catholics by Protestants in Northern Ireland. They have had several notable attacks that claimed many lives such as the Bloody Friday attack in which 22 bombs were used. The IRA has been notorious for their utilization of narcoterrorism to pursue their agenda in Ireland. While the IRA has been very vigilant in fighting the use of drugs within Ireland, it has not stopped them from selling drugs internationally to raise money for their 40

11 terrorist aspirations. For example, in the 1980 s IRA was caught smuggling over a ton of marijuana into the United States. The profits from the drug sale were to fund the purchase of arms. Shortly before 9/11 Colombian officials arrested three Irish citizens who were traveling in Colombia. It turned out that the citizens were explosive experts with the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and had been training FARC on the creation and execution of mortar attacks. FARC paid upwards of $2 million for the training provided by the IRA. In 2002, the FARC would use this training to launch a mortar attack on the presidential inauguration of President Uribe. With the money acquired from FARC for the explosives training the IRA was able to pay for a shipment of 20 highly efficient Russian AN-94 assault rifles that Russian intelligence reported going to the IRA in Additionally, the IRA used narcotics acquired from the FARC to pay Croatian arm smugglers. As recently as March 2009, there have been terrorist attacks by a group affiliated with the IRA. The group known as the Real IRA killed two British soldiers and two civilians. The attack happened as peace talks had progressed between the IRA and Britain. U.S. Congressional testimony revealed some of the criminal and terrorism links of the Real IRA. The report provided evidence that the Real IRA is involved with the illicit drug sale in the Middle East. Additionally, the seizure of drugs flowing into and out of Northern Ireland has increased in recent years. C. PKK & Narcoterrorism Located in Turkey, but with members in Iraq and Iran, the PKK is the Kurdistan Worker s Party. Founded in the 1970 s they are a militant organization that pursues the same leftist ideology that FARC has fought for in Colombia. Classified as a terrorist group by the United States, the PKK has long fought the Turkish government. Because the PKK have dealt extensively with criminal organizations in trafficking both arms and narcotics, they have been considered an important nexus of criminal activities with terrorism. 41

12 In the 1990 s the PKK moved to a more urban attack approach and over the course of the decade it claimed the lives of over 30,000 people. After their leader, Abdullah Ocalan was arrested, peace prospered for several years. However in recent years, there has been a spike in violence as the militant wing of PKK rose to power. Terrorist attacks have been made against tourist attractions and hotels in the area. Evidence indicates that a large amount of the funding used for these PKK attacks is raised through the illicit drug business. In fact, the PKK makes around $10 million a year from drug running and extortion. Reports indicate that since 1984 there has been a convergence between organized crime groups and the PKK. However, as the PKK realized the profitability of the drug business they used their ties in the region to sell drugs to finance their operations. This evolution of shifting from a simple tax of the drug producers and traffickers to producing and delivering the drugs themselves is very similar to what FARC did. Unlike many nations, such as the United States, Turkey has done a much better job at linking organized crime, the drug trade, and terrorist organizations together. Understanding the role of the drug trade in the financing of PKK and their terrorist attacks has been a key tenet of the Turkish counter-terrorism strategy. D. Situation in Afghanistan Two decades of war created much hardship for the people of Afghanistan. The country s infrastructure was destroyed, its human resource base depleted and its social capital eroded. The majority of the population was left extremely poor, lacking food, clothing, housing and medical care. State institutions were dysfunctional and the economy and society fragmented. A number of state institutions central bank, treasury, tax collection system, customs, police, and judiciary were either extremely weak, politically corrupted, or simply missing. Taxing opium income of farmers and traders was often the only reliable source of income for which ever authority prevailed. With an estimated poverty rate of 60% and a per capita income of only $300, poverty is the primary reason many farmers rely on the illicit economy for survival. 42

13 For the estimated 2.9 million Afghani farmers involved in the drug trade, they receive less than 20% of the revenue. The landowners, warlords, traffickers, public officials, and terrorist organizations, such as the Taliban, receive the majority of the profit.55 In addition to receiving the lion s share of the revenue, these same criminals levy taxes as well as impose exploitative sharecropping and land tenure agreements upon the already impoverished poppy farmers. To continue to earn a living under these conditions, farmers are forced to borrow money from landholders using the expected crop yields as collateral. When the farmers are unable to repay the loans due to drought or a poor harvest, they become trapped in an endless cycle of debt and repayment. While the commercial production of opium continues to be the only means of survival for many Afghan farmers, the desire to realize the full potential of the market by traffickers has led to the exploitation of ungoverned and unprotected land suitable for harvesting poppy. As a result, the illicit drug trade is more confined in Afghanistan to those regions that are more remote and hostile, thus limiting counter-narcotics efforts due increased protection by terrorist organizations, such as the Taliban. To protect their illicit drug market from law enforcement, traffickers provide weapons, funding, and personnel to the Taliban in exchange for the protection of drug trade routes, poppy fields, and their organizations. From an economic standpoint, unless poppy farmers are afforded the opportunity to earn a living growing alternative crops, eradication simply puts more of a drain on the economy. The drug market provides the only access to land, credit, water, and employment for many 43

14 farmers, especially those in remote and less governed regions of the country. Until additional investment is made in providing more security to lawless regions, alternative economic opportunities are simply unrealistic. Furthermore, eradication efforts have served to bolster legitimacy for terrorist organizations with the local populace due to their support of the opium farmers. Other negative consequences of the eradication approach have included increased attacks on law enforcement officials attempting to eliminate opium crops. Additionally, opium farmers who have become unemployed as a result of the destruction of their drug fields have been easily recruited by the terrorists. Without providing an alternative means to earn a living, the eradication policy also seriously damages the legitimacy of the government. So, while there has been some success with eradication and alternative development, ultimately the responsibility rests with Afghanistan s government and its ability to build a viable and cohesive central government. Furthermore, impoverished Afghanis must view the government as legitimate and feel economically and personally secure under the watchful eye of the administration. Until this occurs, narco-terrorists will continue to exploit Afghan farmers, and the lawlessness and violence will continue to plague the country. With the continued violence and lawlessness associated with the illicit drug trade threatening to destroy the country, it is clear Afghanistan s current policies and efforts in counter-narcotics and counter-terrorism are failing. Until Afghanistan establishes itself as a legitimate government with the capacity to enforce the rule of law, realizing any long-term success for the country will remain unrealistic. 7. Problems with current US policies It is widely recognized that access by VNSAs to the gains from drug production and trafficking contributes to the intensity and prolongation of military conflict. Also, that such groups terrorists, insurgents, or warlords grow stronger when they successfully exploit the drug trade. The United States response its antinarcotics policy emphasizes crop eradication. This strategy is too simplistic and, ultimately, ineffective. The view prevailing in the U.S. government assumes that belligerents simply gain financial resources from their access to the illicit economy, which they can convert into greater military capabilities and 44

15 use to expand the conflict. Consequently, the logic goes, if the government eradicates the illicit drug economy, the VNSAs will be significantly weakened if not altogether defeated. This narcoterrorism/narcoguerrilla thesis ignores not only the extreme difficulties in successfully eradicating the illicit drug economy in a particular country, but also the highly unpredictable effects of eradication on the profits of the belligerents. Crucially, it also ignores the important side-effect of strengthening the bond between these groups and the local population. Many terrorist and insurgents groups do in fact exploit a variety of illicit economies, including drugs. Depending on the locale and time period, other illegal or semi-legal commodities include conflict diamonds, special minerals, human beings, weapons, and illicit activities such as extortion, kidnapping, illegal logging, money laundering, and the illicit manufacture of passports. Such illicit economies exist in some form virtually everywhere, both within and outside the locales of military conflict. Territory-based organizations such as the Taliban can control and tax the cultivation and processing of illicit crops, for example. But it is extraordinarily hard for a loose network without a substantial territorial base such as al Qaeda today to profit from cultivation and processing. It is much more likely that groups like al Qaeda will attempt to control some part of the international smuggling routes or some aspect of money laundering. In fact, most of the tangential evidence publicly available regarding al Qaeda and drugs indicates that it could have penetrated the international traffic with drugs beyond the border of Afghanistan. If al Qaeda is in fact profiting from en route trafficking, then eradication is a distinctly ineffective solution. Even if all drugs in Afghanistan were eradicated, in the absence of a large-scale reduction of worldwide demand for opiates, opium poppy cultivation would simply shift into another territory the so-called balloon effect. The likely candidates for picking up production slack from Afghanistan would be Myanmar, Pakistan, and the former Soviet Republics in Central Asia. In all three cases, al Qaeda would probably be able to maintain control of a part of the international traffic, and if cultivation relocated into Pakistan and Central Asia, might well be able to tax some cultivation as well. Paradoxically, successful eradication in Afghanistan a pipe dream, currently might well enable al Qaeda to obtain far greater benefits from the drug trade. 45

16 8. DTO VEO Population Relationship Financial benefits to belligerent groups are frequently in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Their profits grow as they move from simply taxing the producers (peasants) of the illicit substances, to providing protection and safe airstrips to the traffickers, to taxing precursor agents or the final illegal commodities, to controlling parts of international trafficking routes, to getting involved with money exchange and laundering. These profits are used to improve military capabilities by facilitating procurement, to increase the salaries paid to soldiers, and to improve logistics. The facilitation of procurement and logistics allows belligerent groups to optimize their tactics and strategies for achieving their larger goals. These groups no longer need to attack military arsenals for procurement and can concentrate on strategic, and visible targets. A successful sponsorship of the illicit economy thus speeds up the process by which terrorists and insurgents can transform themselves from a ragtag band of insurgents-in-hiding to a formidable belligerent actor. Most important, and neglected by the conventional wisdom on narcoterrorism: belligerents derive significant political gains, particularly political legitimacy, from their involvement with the drug economy. They do so by protecting the local population s reliable, lucrative, and frequently sole source of livelihood from the efforts of the government to repress the illicit economy. They also frequently protect peasants from brutal and unreliable traffickers, by bargaining with traffickers for better prices on behalf on the peasants, by providing otherwise absent social services such as clinics and infrastructure to the local population, and by claiming nationalist credit if a foreign power threatens the local illicit economy. This political legitimacy is frequently very thin, but nonetheless sufficient to motivate the local population to withhold intelligence on the belligerents from the government if the government attempts to suppress the illicit economy. Obtaining this local human intelligence is one of the key and irreplaceable ingredients for victory against terrorists and insurgents. These three components of gain also reveal the very uneasy alliance between narcotraffickers and belligerent groups. The belligerent groups provide the traffickers with protection from the government s repressive policies, with a safer transportation system, and make sure that drug producers (peasants) deliver the promised raw materials for the illicit commodities. In return, the drug dealers provide the belligerents with financial benefits and intelligence on the government s military movements. However, the relationship is inevitably complicated by the fact that the belligerents have multiple 46

17 audiences and interests: they also protect the population from the traffickers and bargain for greater prices on behalf of the population, and they demand great financial payoffs from the traffickers and seek to displace the traffickers from aspects of the illicit economy. Far from having morphed into an identical actor with identical goals, the guerrillas and the traffickers frequently have many competing interests. Accordingly, government policies should be designed to split the tactical and rather fragile alliance between the two actors, bidding them against each other and allowing them to undermine each other. Getting access to drugs vastly increases the staying capacity of belligerents. Yet weaning terrorist groups and insurgents from the drug trade by eradication is extraordinarily difficult. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, eradication may not reduce the financial benefits of the belligerents; rather, it might just as well increase the international market price for the drug to such an extent that the final revenues for the belligerents may be even greater. In fact, it was the desire to boost farmgate prices for opium that motivated the Taliban to undertake extensive (even if temporary) eradication in Moreover, the extent of the financial losses to the terrorists and insurgents also depends on the adaptability of the belligerents, traffickers, and peasants: their ability to store drugs, replant after eradication, increase number of plants per acre, shift production to areas that are not being eradication, use genetically-altered high-yield, high-resistance crops, or switch to other illicit economies. The FARC in Colombia, for example, makes only 50 percent of its income from drugs. The rest comes from extortion, kidnapping, and other activities. In Myanmar, after production of opiates shifted to Afghanistan, many warlords and insurgents changed to the production of synthetic drugs and easily maintained their income. There has not been one case in which eradication bankrupted the belligerent group to such a point that it eliminated it. The desired impact of eradication to decrease the financial resources of the belligerent group is far from certain and is likely to take place only under the most favorable circumstances. Eradication increases the political benefits to belligerent groups. Local populations are all the more likely to support such groups and to deprive governments of intelligence about them. Without viable alternative livelihoods for vulnerable populations, eradication loses hearts and minds and at the same time fails to significantly weaken belligerent groups. 47

18 9. Policy Solutions Effective policy must be implemented to deal with the emerging threat of narcoterrorism. There is not a single policy that will eliminate the threats posed by narcoterrorists. Rather it will take the implementation of several policies that seek to mitigate the influence and effect of narcoterrorism in various areas. These areas include properly defining the threat of narcoterrorism, tracking and freezing financial assets of transnational criminal organizations, handling the supply and demand problem with narcotics, and utilizing foreign aid. A. Defining Narcoterrorism Part of the difficulty in creating a policy that effectively mitigates narcoterrorism is that there are so many different definitions of the term. The definition of narcoterrorism can focus on the FARC s involvement in the drug industry or it can focus on their terrorist actions. Emma Bjornehed believes that there are two different definitions of narcoterrorism; the definition of narcoterrorism is almost dual in character, where the emphasis is placed on the drug aspect or the terrorism aspect may vary considerably. As made evident by FARC and other terrorist organizations, the international drug trade has become the most common and profitable criminal activity. Part of this difficulty in defining narcoterrorism and attempting to identify narcoterrorists is the convergence of crime and terrorism. Tamara Makarenko states that the 1990s can be described as the decade in which the crime terror nexus was consolidated: the rise of transnational organized crime and the changing nature of terrorism mean that two traditionally separate phenomena have begun to reveal many operational and organizational similarities. The following chart exhibits the growing similarity between crime and terrorism. According to Paul Wilkinson, the FARC is a perfect example of a group moving along the continuum; "it is clear that this has made them, both in reality and popular perception, little more than a branch of organized crime, decadent guerrillas rather than genuine 48

19 revolutionaries, irredeemably corrupted by their intimate involvement with narcotraffickers and their cynical pursuits of huge profits from kidnapping and from their protection of coca and opium production, processing and shipping facilities." Policies to counter narcoterrorism must view crime and terrorism in the same light. Some nations (Britain, Turkey) are far ahead of other nations in viewing the relationship between crime and terrorism. The progressive nature of the UK s view on terrorism and crime is made evident by examining the measures they have taken to combat the emerging threat. The international community must work together closely to mitigate the effect of narcoterrorism. This can include sharing intelligence, providing military assistance, and legally cooperating. Effective narcoterrorism policy must manage to track and freeze the monetary assets of terrorist organizations and criminal groups. B. Financial Assets The financial profits to narcoterrorists are frequently in the hundreds of millions of dollars. As was the case with FARC, Vanda Felbab-Brown states that "their profits grow as they move from simply taxing the producers of the illicit substances, to providing protection and safe airstrips to the traffickers, to taxing precursor agents or the final illegal commodities, to controlling parts of international trafficking routes, to getting involved with money exchange and laundering. These profits are used to improve military capabilities by facilitating procurement, to increase the salaries paid to soldiers, and to improve logistics." With so much money changing hands, future policies must be created to track the financial resources of the narcoterrorists. To get at insurgent/terrorist financial resources, we should focus on combating international as well as source country money laundering, on interdicting the financial flows to the insurgents, and on beefing up international interdiction capabilities. Tracking money flow of narcoterrorist organizations should be an integral part of any policy. Jane Boulden writes that; The key advantage of targeting financial resources is that it promises to be as global as terrorism. It is a striking coincidence that the aftermath of September 11 also seems to have dealt a temporary blow to the antiglobalization movement. On the one hand, terrorist operations are deemed to be nothing without terrorist financial organizations; on the other hand, state sponsors can be cast as terrorist 49

20 banks as well as donors. Similar to every policy prescription for narcoterrorism, tracking financial resources of these terrorist organizations should be global in scope. Much of the money made by terrorist organizations and criminal groups is either laundered or used to corrupt officials. Similar to every policy prescription for narcoterrorism, tracking financial resources of these terrorist organizations should be global in scope. Much of the money made by terrorist organizations and criminal groups is either laundered or used to corrupt officials. C. Supply & Demand Another difficult issue facing the approach toward narcoterrorism is the view of producer nation vs. consumer nation. The United States is the largest drug consumer in the world but blames the supplying nations for its drug epidemic. Contrarily, the supplying nations blame the United States and claim that the country needs to do more to reduce the demand. Moses Naim claims that this is due to the fact that it is a natural reaction for a government to fight the supply of goods because it is much easier to protect its border than it is to convince its citizenry to stop a certain habit. If the United States is serious about curtailing its drug use and consequently funding narcoterrorism, a new policy approach must be implemented. It must be made clear to the public that the purchase of drugs is funding organized crime and terrorists around the world and the money could be used to fund an attack against the United States. Additionally, to curtail drug abuse in the United States an increased effort to prevent and intervene drug use will be necessary. D. Foreign Aid An alternative policy option would be for the United States to offer a similar assistance package to other nations as it did in Plan Colombia. While Plan Colombia was successful in weakening FARC s presence in Colombia, it struggled in many other areas. FARC simply crossed the porous borders into nations like Ecuador and Venezuela that were not receiving the same support as Colombia. Future policies should account for this and provide aid and assistance to the entire region so that crossing the border is not such an attractive option to FARC. While Venezuela has held harsh views of the United States and much of the Western world, there were signs at the recent Summit of the Americas that they would be willing to work with President Obama. 50

21 10. Conclusion The threat of narcoterrorism is very serious and can be felt across every region of the world. Narcoterrorism poses a threat to more than just the nations in which these groups exist. The globalization of the economy has created a network for terrorist organizations and criminals to coordinate, cooperate, and share resources. Unfortunately, policy has been slow to catch up to the convergence of crime and terrorism. Moving forward it will be vital to the security of the international community for international governments to work together. This can be done by sharing intelligence, financial information, and developing a unified approach to breaking up the ties between crime and terrorism. All of the prescribed policy approaches have one common ingredient; they must be international in scope. If the international community is to work together to defeat transnational criminals and terrorists than international governments must coordinate government. The links forged by narcoterrorists and criminals are too vast for one nation to make a difference. By pulling resources together, the international community can uncover the links between crime and terrorism and consequently the effects and fund raising capabilities of narcoterrorists like FARC will be severely decreased. 11. Major Countries Involved Bolivia: Bolivia is one of the leading producers of Coca paste and therefore, quite obviously, has a massive role to play in the production of narcotics. However Bolivia possesses a neutral stance on this issue and does not want to address this problem. The president of Bolivia, Evo Morales expelled the DEA and the US ambassador saying that the government has been striving to eradicate this problem and will continue to do so, thus protecting his country s national sovereignty. However the US and Bolivia have restored diplomatic ties and the former has collaborated with Brazil to train soldiers on their fight against drugs. Brazil has tightened border controls. Conversely, there have been no policies to address the production of coca paste and the consumption of narcotics, both of which have meteorically risen in the past few decades. 51

22 United States of America: The USA is the single largest market for cocaine produced in the Andean region and therefore has a colossal responsibility as it deals with Mexican drug cartels and an unprecedented increase in the consumption of narcotics. The U.S. Federal Government is an opponent of the illegal drug trade; however, state laws vary greatly and in some cases contradict federal laws. This contradiction arises when non-medical cannabis is illegal according to federal laws, but is not criminalized (up to certain amounts) in states such as Alaska and Colorado. The USA also has several initiatives and programs, collaborating with countries such as Colombia and Mexico, as it provides military and economic aid. Russian Federation: Drug abuse is an extremely serious problem for Russia, which is a big market for both Cocaine and Heroin. It is estimated that injecting drug users number 1.8 million and opiate users number 1.6 million. The numbers of injecting drug users have also resulted in a severe increase of HIV patients with 78% of the 1 million HIV affected people being injecting drug users. Russia s stand on solving this problem is driven mainly by criminalization and prevention. It opposes medically assisted therapies. Mexico: Drug cartels belonging to Mexico control most of the transport of narcotics from the sites of their production to the North American market. Historically, presidents of Mexico have made initiatives to stop this illicit drug trade, with both Vicente Fox and Felipe Calderon sending forces to escalate their anti-drug campaigns. Mexico, a major drug producing and transit country, is the main foreign supplier of cannabis and a major supplier of methamphetamine to the United States. Almost half the cartels' revenue comes from cannabis. Afghanistan: Afghanistan is a major source country for the cultivation, processing, and trafficking of opiates, producing 59 percent of the world's supply of illicit opium in It is the biggest producer of opium and Hashish amongst the nations present in the Golden Crescent. Since the invasion in 2001 and the lifting of the Taliban opium ban, opium production in Afghanistan has increased from 70 percent of the overall global illicit opium production to 92 percent today. This increase has occurred 52

23 in along with the declining security situation precipitated by the 2001 coalition invasion of the country. The loose relationship between terrorist organizations, violence, decentralized governance, and poverty that existed prior to the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT) in Afghanistan, has resulted in a truly narcoterrorism-driven system. Myanmar: Opium poppy cultivation and heroin refining take place in remote, mountainous border regions of Burma. Armed ethnic groups such as, the United Wa State Army (UWSA), the Kokang Chinese, and the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) control the cultivation areas, refine opium into heroin, and also produce methamphetamine. Nepal: Nepal s open border with India and its proximity to Pakistan and Burma make it an attractive alternate transit route for illicit narcotics from the Golden Crescent and Golden Triangle regions to Europe, other points in Asia and the US, as well as escape routes for drug traffickers. Narcotics trafficking have become prevalent due to the close proximity of the Indo-Nepalese borders aligning with the state of Uttar Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir in India, which are the principal opium producing states. Drug money moves easily over the border with India or through Nepal s banks, including international bank branches, gold from Hong Kong, Thailand and Dubai is also smuggled through Nepal, under the control of Indian traffickers. 12. UN Treaties x UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs, 1946, (E/RES/1946/9(I)) x UN Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs of 1961, March 30, 1961 x The Convention on Psychotropic Substances, 1971, (CND Res.6(XXVIII)) x International co-operation in drug abuse control, December 17, 1979, (A/RES/34/177) x The United Nations Convention Against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances, December 19, 1988, (A/RES/43/120) 53

24 x Measures to Enhance International Cooperation to Counter the World Drug Problem, April 17, 1988, (A/S-20/4) x International Cooperation Against the World Drug Problem, December 17, 1999, (A/RES/54/132) x Promoting international cooperation in responding to the challenges posed by new psychoactive substances, March 16, 2012, (CND_Resolution 55/1) x Support for the National Drug Control Strategy of the Government of Afghanistan (E/2006/32) x Technical assistance for implementing the international conventions and protocols related to counterterrorism (E/2011/30) 13. Questions A Resolution Must Answer 1. What would be a proper definition of narcoterrorsim? 2. Should the activities of groups like FARC be considered merely criminal activities, or terrorist activities? 3. What measures can Member States take to stop VNSAs which also operate beyond their boundaries? 4. What are the factors which foster the growth of VNSAs and how can we combat them? 5. Is drug decriminalization a viable method of stopping the illegal drug trade? 6. How can the situation of the farmers who grow opium out of desperation be improved? 54