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<ul class="summary-list"><li>Democrats are warning the US and Colombian governments about how they've conducted their decades-long wars on drugs and crime.</li><li>Two amendments to the annual US defense-spending bill rein in the use of <keyword id="9654049" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="aerial-fumigation">aerial fumigation</keyword> to eradicate <keyword id="14727" type="ENTERTAINMENT" weightage="60" keywordseo="cocaine">cocaine</keyword> and require reporting on allegations of abuses by <keyword id="15385" type="COUNTRY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Colombia">Colombia</keyword>'s military.</li></ul><p>The $740 billion National Defense Authorization Act passed by the US House of Representatives last week includes a warning from progressive Democrats to the US and Colombia over the decades-long fight against drugs and crime.</p><p>Amendments from Reps. <keyword id="203608" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Jim-McGovern">Jim McGovern</keyword> and <keyword id="7018494" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Alexandria-Ocasio-Cortez">Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez</keyword> require reporting on the use of US military assistance to commit abuses and restrict funding for aerial fumigation to eradicate coca crops. Senate and House versions of the NDAA still have to reconciled before the bill can go the White House.</p><p>"Over the last 20 years, we have seen reports that illegal surveillance against human-rights defenders and journalists and judicial authorities and the political opposition have become commonplace," McGovern told Insider on Thursday.</p><p>"The point of this amendment is to make it very clear to the Colombian government that people are fed up," McGovern said. "None of us want to be supporting institutions that do this kind of stuff. So this is a warning signal."</p><h2>'A first step'</h2><p><div type="image" title="US troops Colombia explosive ordnance disposal" height="933" width="1400" msid="77208663" hostid="261"></div></p><p>The latest scandal for Colombia's military — which has received billions in aid and decades of training from the US — stems from <a href="https://www.semana.com/nacion/articulo/espionaje-del-ejercito-nacional-las-carpetas-secretas-investigacion-semana/667616" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a May 1 report</a> that army intelligence units <a href="https://www.wola.org/analysis/scandal-colombia-military-intelligence-spying/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">were compiling dossiers</a> on possible whistleblowers, politicians, judges, activists, and <a href="https://cpj.org/2019/05/colombia-nytimes-journalist-nicholas-casey-harassed-uribe-senators/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">journalists</a>, including US citizens.</p><p>Such allegations led Colombia to disband its intelligence agency, known as DAS, in 2011. By then, at least 20 current and former DAS officials <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-15533091" target="_blank" rel="noopener">had been jailed</a>.</p><p>"At some point, you can't buy the ... excuse that this is just a few bad apples," Robert Karl, a historian of conflict in Colombia, said in an interview earlier this year. "These kinds of abuses are systematic. They're tied into other patterns of illegality and violence within the military."</p><p>McGovern's <a href="https://amendments-rules.house.gov/amendments/MCGOVE_048_xml_IntelCol_V3716201810401040.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">amendment</a> states that no military or intelligence aid provided through US security assistance programs should be used for "unlawful surveillance or intelligence gathering" against civilians and that the US "should consistently and at all times promote the protection of internationally-recognized human rights in Colombia."</p><p>It also directs the State Department and other agencies to submit a report within four months of the NDAA's passage that details whether and how US assistance was used in illegal activity.</p><p><div type="image" title="Joseph Dunford Colombia" height="1585" width="2500" msid="77208665" hostid="261"></div></p><p>"This is probably one of the most comprehensive requests of a report on Colombia that I can ever remember," McGovern said. "This report is a first step. We need to see what happened, and we need to figure out what to do in response, but clearly there's something wrong here."</p><p>The report will also detail what the US and Colombian governments have done in response to that misconduct.</p><p>"If it was up to me, I would end security assistance to Colombia right now," McGovern said. "Those who are responsible for illegal acts ought to be held accountable ... Clearly that doesn't happen in Colombia."</p><p>"When you surveil human-rights defenders, for example, or journalists, they're doing it not just to monitor and find out information," McGovern added. "We know that those very journalists and those very human-rights defenders become targets."</p><p>Killings of social leaders and former rebels have intensified since a 2016 peace deal between the government and the left-wing FARC rebel group. More than 100 social leaders and activists <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2020/06/lideres-sociales-nos-siguen-matando-durante-cuarentena/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">have been killed</a> so far this year.</p><p>"Neither our judicial authorities, the military, or any government has a good track record when it comes to holding our men in uniform accountable," said Sergio Guzmán, director of advisory firm Colombia Risk Analysis. "So I think [more scrutiny is] welcome, but its success is seen with skepticism."</p><h2>'A destructive tactic'</h2><p><div type="image" title="Colombia glyphosate aerial fumigation spraying cocaine coca" height="925" width="1400" msid="77208668" hostid="261"></div></p><p>Ocasio-Cortez's <a href="https://amendments-rules.house.gov/amendments/OCASNY_085_Final71720172808288.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">amendment</a> prohibits use of NDAA funds for aerial fumigation in Colombia without "demonstrated actions by the Government of Colombia to adhere to national and local laws and regulations."</p><p>Colombia halted US-backed aerial fumigation to eradicate coca, cocaine's base ingredient, in 2015 over <a href="https://www.wola.org/2020/03/usa-colombia-anti-drug-plan-failed-aerial-fumigation/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">public-health concerns</a>.</p><p>Colombian President Ivan Duque, at <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/us-officials-missing-most-of-the-picture-over-cocaine-in-colombia-2017-9" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Trump's urging</a>, seeks to restart fumigation and is <a href="https://www.wola.org/analysis/restarting-aerial-fumigation-of-drug-crops-in-colombia-is-a-mistake/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">navigating</a> court-imposed restrictions, including consultations with communities living where it wants to spray, to do so.</p><p>"Aerial fumigation was a destructive tactic of the US's failed drug war. It negatively impacted the yield of many farmers and the public health of many Colombians," and Ocasio-Cortez was "pleased that the amendment was passed by a voice vote," a spokesperson said.</p><p>The measure seems welcomed by Colombians who've long opposed fumigation, Guzmán said, noting that consultations will be hindered by the coronavirus and that Trump's threats to <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/4-reasons-trump-could-decertify-colombia-over-coca-cocaine-production-2019-7" target="_blank" rel="noopener">decertify Colombia as counter-drug partner</a> puts more pressure on Duque.</p><p>Karl said continued emphasis on aerial fumigation reflects a lack of commitment to the 2016 peace accord, and McGovern said that instead of <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/us-army-security-force-assistance-brigades-deploying-to-colombia-2020-5" target="_blank" rel="noopener">more counter-drug training for Colombia's military</a>, he'd prefer US actions "supporting the implementation of the peace process."</p><p>"We finally have a peace agreement that has a lot of good things in it — that, if in fact the agreement were implemented, would provide Colombians a better future," McGovern said. "I think our focus ought to be on that."</p>

In latest $740 billion defense bill, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and a progressive ally send a warning to one of the US's closest allies

<p class="source"><span>REUTERS/Henry Romero</span></p><p class="caption">A soldier walks among poppy plants before a poppy field is destroyed during a military operation in the Guerrero state municipality of Coyuca de Catalan, Mexico.</p>At the beginning of April, the Mexican army took US military officials, UN personnel, and officials from the US embassy <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-exclusive-mexico-opens-up-its-heroin-fight-to-us-un-observers-2017-4" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">on a tour</a> of a half-dozen sites in the Golden Triangle - the heart of Mexico's heroin country - to witness the destruction of opium poppies.<p>The trip marked <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-exclusive-mexico-opens-up-its-heroin-fight-to-us-un-observers-2017-4" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">the first time</a> in at least 10 years that the Mexican army had allowed US and UN officials to observe poppy eradication, and, according to Reuters, more trips were being arranged.</p><p>The visit could put Mexico on the same footing as anti-drug operations in places like Colombia and Afghanistan.</p><p>It also coincides with US President Donald Trump's efforts to address a withering opioid epidemic that has claimed tens of thousands of lives in the US.</p><p>But if the US and Mexico are about to make the opium-poppy eradication a joint effort, they may find their progress stymied by conditions on the ground and the nature of their foe.</p><p>A US official told Reuters that the area of poppies under cultivation in 2016 was estimated at <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mexico-drugs-exclusive-idUSKBN17N2EU" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">32,000 hectares</a> in 2016. In 2015, US data showed there were <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-exclusive-mexico-opens-up-its-heroin-fight-to-us-un-observers-2017-4" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">28,000 hectares</a> estimated to be under cultivation - triple the area under cultivation recorded in 2012.</p><p>Last year, Mexico for the first time released its own data on cultivation, reporting an average of 24,800 hectares under cultivation between July 2014 and June 2015. The Mexican defense secretariat also <a href="http://www.gob.mx/sedena/acciones-y-programas/operaciones-contra-el-narcotrafico-12830" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">said it destroyed</a> 22,235 hectares of opium poppies in 2016 and 26,249 hectares in 2015. (Through the end of April 2017, the Mexican government says it eradicated 15,179 hectares of poppies.)</p><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/Henry Romero</span></p><p class="caption">A soldier stands guard beside poppy plants before a poppy field is destroyed during a military operation in the municipality of Coyuca de Catalan in Guerrero state in southwest Mexico.</p><p>What effect this eradication has on the overall crop level is not clear. Data on production and eradication is varied and, in some places, incomplete. Estimates of cultivation in Mexico are also based on <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-exclusive-mexico-opens-up-its-heroin-fight-to-us-un-observers-2017-4" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">satellite imagery</a>, not like census-based programs that more confidently measure cultivation and eradication.</p><p>"We don't know with any level of precision how heroin production has evolved in recent years," Mexican security analyst Alejandro Hope wrote in February 2016.</p><p>Moreover, according to Mike Vigil, former chief of international operations for the US Drug Enforcement Administration, it can be hard to accurately gauge how many plants exist and are destroyed, especially when relying on aerial observation and fumigation.</p><p>"People automatically do a formula that there's so many plants per meter and therefore they destroyed so many plants that would have produced a certain tonnage of opium, for example, and that is not correct either, because a lot of times they spray fields where the plant density is just very loose," Vigil, who, as a DEA official, worked in Mexico in the 1990s, told Business Insider.</p><p>"We're not talking about plants that are densely concentrated per square meter. You could have one plant per square meter. So they destroy 10 hectares and probably destroyed very few plants," Vigil said.</p><p class="source"><span>UNODC/Mexican government</span></p><p class="caption">Areas of opium poppy cultivation in Mexico, where redder areas indicating more hectares destroyed.</p><p>Manuel eradication has been common in Mexico's war on drugs. Military units have been stationed in areas of high cultivation like Sinaloa (which is also <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/mexico-el-chapo-guzman-sinaloa-cartel-arrests-pressure-2017-5" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">a hub of organized-crime activity</a>) and Guerrero states, and they are frequently pictured crawling poppy-covered hillsides rooting out the pink-tipped bulbs that would eventually yield opium.</p><p>But aerial fumigation <a href="http://www.milenio.com/policia/En_2_anos_Sedena_detecta_10_veces_mas_plantios_de_amapola-Sedena_plantios_de_amapola_0_826117397.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">has also been used</a> in places with a high incidence of cultivation, like the states Chihuahua, Durango, Sinaloa, and Guerrero, at times of elevated cultivation activity.</p><p>Fumigation squadrons are <a href="http://www.milenio.com/policia/En_2_anos_Sedena_detecta_10_veces_mas_plantios_de_amapola-Sedena_plantios_de_amapola_0_826117397.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">deployed</a> in MD-530F helicopters and Cessna 182SL planes. Bell 407 and Bell 206 helicopters are also used when aerial-fumigation teams need to access remote or hard-to-reach spots.</p><p>In Guerrero, where poppy cultivation - and <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/mexico-drug-cartel-violence-in-guerrero-2016-11" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">criminal activity related to it</a> - has grown precipitously in recent years, manual eradication has been replaced in some cases by fumigation. One official told <a href="http://www.excelsior.com.mx/nacional/2017/01/12/1139466" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Excelsior</a> the chemical used was only harmful to poppy plants, not to other crops or underground water systems. (The Mexican defense secretariat has in the past <a href="http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/09/13/index.php?section=politica&amp;article=022n1pol" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">classified</a> the exact chemicals used in aerial fumigation, calling it a matter of national security.)</p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"></span></p><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/Henry Romero</span></p><p class="caption">Soldiers destroy poppies during a military operation in the municipality of Coyuca de Catatlan in Guerrero state in southwest, Mexico.</p><p><span>According to Vigil, Mexican authorities tasked with aerial fumigation in the past have tried to mask the true amount of poppies destroyed, often to bolster their totals.</span></p><p><span>"The estimates are nothing more than estimates," Vigil, author of "<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Metal-Coffins-Alliance-Cartel-Miguel/dp/0991582195?tag=bisafetynet-20" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Metal Coffins: The Blood Alliance Cartel</a>," told Business Insider. </span></p><p><span>"And it is very, very difficult to come up with an accurate figure, simply because many times the Mexican government over exaggerates how many hectares they have sprayed in the eradication program," he added. "And many times they purposely skew those numbers by, for example, spraying the same field twice and counting it as two separate fields."</span></p><p><span>If observers are deployed on eradication missions in the future, Mexican forces may also find ways to deceive them, Vigil said.</span></p><p>"It would be very difficult for them to verify [eradication totals] because they're not going to be out there on every spray mission, and even if they were, they really don't know how many fields they're going to spray. They could take them to the same field the following day and spray that same field that they observed 24 hours previously," leading observers to think a different field had been sprayed, Vigil added.</p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"></span></p><p class="source"><span>DEA 2016 NDTA</span></p><p class="caption">The origins of heroin seized by the DEA in the US over the last 40 years.</p><p><span>As much as <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-03-03/america-s-heroin-epidemic-starts-in-mexico" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">94% of the heroin</a> that enters the US comes from Mexico, US assistant secretary for state for narcotics William Brownfield said earlier this year. (Mexico has also become a transit point for potent synthetic opioids like fentanyl, which are sometimes added to heroin and can be fatal even in small doses.)</span></p><p><span>Mexican-made heroin, and the Mexican criminal groups pushing it, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/mexican-control-us-heroin-market-2016-12" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">has largely replaced heroin produced in Afghanistan and Colombia</a>. According to estimates by the DEA, close to 80% of the heroin found in wholesale-level seizures was sourced to Mexico.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">The most recent US efforts to support Mexican eradication are <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-exclusive-mexico-opens-up-its-heroin-fight-to-us-un-observers-2017-4" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">at least a year old</a>, dating to when Brownfield told Congress more work needed to be done to destroy poppies. Since then, despite turmoil introduced to the relationship by Donald Trump rise to the presidency, bilateral anti-drug efforts have gone smoothly.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Brownfield said the US has also offered to fund the eradication efforts, "should we reach a basic agreement in terms of how they would do more and better eradication in the future."</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"></span></p><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/Henry Romero</span></p><p class="caption">Troops in a poppy field in the municipality of Coyuca de Catalan, in southwest Mexico's Guerrero state.</p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"That is on the table, but I don't want you to conclude that it's a done deal, because we still have to work through the details," <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mexico-drugs-exclusive-idUSKBN17N2EU" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">he told Reuters</a>. </span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">He did not specify an amount of money the US could provide.</span></p><p>This summer, the Mexican army is reportedly <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-exclusive-mexico-opens-up-its-heroin-fight-to-us-un-observers-2017-4" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">set to roll out</a> hardware and software developed by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime that would permit troops to send information on destroyed fields in real time.</p><p>And, Brownfield said, the US could offer more vehicles or fund helicopter flights to reach the remote parts of the country - typically mountain highlands - where poppies are grown.</p><p><span>"Our cooperation with the Mexican government on the heroin challenge is in fact good, and it is better than it has ever been in the past," Brownfield <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mexico-drugs-exclusive-idUSKBN17N2EU" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">said</a>.</span></p><h3>More from Christopher Woody:</h3><ul><li><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-spanish-police-seize-more-than-two-tons-of-cocaine-from-ship-2017-5" rel="nofollow">Spanish police seize more than 2 tons of cocaine from ship in the middle of the Atlantic</a></li><li><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ap-spain-ecuador-net-55-metric-tons-of-cocaine-in-pacific-2017-5" rel="nofollow">Police busted 5.5 metric tons of cocaine - the latest shipment from a growing South American drug hotspot</a></li><li><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/air-force-cadet-bullet-stopping-goo-for-body-armor-2017-5" rel="nofollow">An Air Force Academy cadet created a bullet-stopping goo to use for body armor</a></li><li><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/lithuania-wants-a-permanent-us-troop-presence-to-counter-russia-2017-5" rel="nofollow">Lithuania wants a permanent US troop presence as 'a game changer' to counter Russia</a></li><li><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-rap-song-video-opposing-thaad-in-south-korea-2017-5" rel="nofollow">China is now fighting against the US's advanced missile system with a rap battle</a></li></ul>            <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/president-trump-drugs-cheaper-candy-bars-heroin-opiod-opiate-2017-2">Public policy expert: Trump's claim that drugs are cheaper than candy bars isn't 'entirely untrue'</a></h3>                                    Please enable Javascript to watch this video

 The US and Mexico may be teaming up to fight heroin, but the enemy is tougher than it appears 

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Cultivation of coca - the base ingredient of cocaine - surged 39% in Colombia in 2014, which was followed by <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/colombia-top-cocaine-producing-countries-record-production-2017-3" target="_blank">a 42% increase</a> the next year.</p><p>In 2016, that production saw another significant increase, rising a little over 13%, from 392,897.5 acres to about 444,800 acres, or about 695 square miles, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/coca-growing-soars-anew-in-colombia-as-u-s-stops-fumigation-program-1489320025" target="_blank">according</a> to a report from The Wall Street Journal.</p><p>The latest cultivation estimate is derived from satellite imagery gathered by the US and indicates that farmers around the country have been growing more of the plant.</p><p>"If that's accurate, it's 180,000 hectares of coca, up from 159,000 in 2015," Adam Isacson, senior associate for <keyword id="6354810" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="100" keywordseo="Defense">defense</keyword> oversight at the Washington Office on Latin America, <a href="https://twitter.com/adam_wola/status/841338869773684736" target="_blank">wrote on Twitter</a> on Monday. "A 13% increase is less than I expected: it rose 42% from 2014-15."</p><p>The 2016 figure would, however, indicate more than <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/coca-growing-soars-anew-in-colombia-as-u-s-stops-fumigation-program-1489320025" target="_blank">double the acreage</a> planted at its lowest point in 2012, when cultivation covered 301 square miles, down from 656 square miles in 2001.</p><p>On the ground in Colombia, coca cultivation has been facilitated by reduced eradication efforts and driven by producers and traffickers who see an opportunity amid the government's peace-deal talks with left-wing rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), which concluded in November and is now in the process of being implemented.</p><p>Several indicators suggest demand for cocaine in the US is also up.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>"There are troubling early signs that cocaine use and availability is on the rise in the United States for the first time in nearly a decade," <span>the US State Department <a href="https://www.state.gov/documents/organization/268025.pdf" target="_blank">wrote this month</a> in its annual International Narcotics Control Strategy Report.</span></p><p>"According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, there was an increase in cocaine seizures nationwide between 2014 and 2015, and the number of overdose deaths within the United States involving cocaine in 2015 was the highest since 2007," the report said.</p><p>In this instance however, it may be a matter of the product chasing the consumer.</p><p><span>"Cocaine use here is up, but not up anywhere near as much as Andean supplies. There's a glut of coca in Colombia right now," Isacson told Business Insider, citing reports that growers in northeast Colombia were <a href="http://www.semana.com/nacion/articulo/experto-en-narcotrafico-daniel-rico-critica-politica-de-cultivos/517393" target="_blank">burying coca paste</a> because they have no one to sell it to.</span><span></span></p><p><span>"As a result, traffickers are most probably trying to find new markets for their product," he said.</span></p><p><span>Isacson identified several factors that have made the situation in Colombia more amenable to increased cultivation.</span></p><p><span><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div></span></p><p><span>Colombia, with significant US aid, mounted aerial-fumigation campaigns to destroy coca crops over the last 16 years. </span><span>But fumigation was sharply reduced and then scrapped in 2016. </span></p><p><span>Colombian officials <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/coca-growing-soars-anew-in-colombia-as-u-s-stops-fumigation-program-1489320025" target="_blank">justified</a> the reductions by citing health concerns and the resentment that spraying stirred up among poor, rural communities - a constituency the Colombian government did not want to alienate during the FARC peace talks, which started in 2012.</span></p><p><span><span>"People are planting as much as they can; people want to make money," </span><span>Ramon Angarita, </span><span>50, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/coca-growing-soars-anew-in-colombia-as-u-s-stops-fumigation-program-1489320025" target="_blank">told The Journal</a>, standing amid a field of coca. "If they fumigate coca, will you plant it? No. You have to plant what they won't fumigate."</span></span></p><p><span>Coca production was also facilitated by the reduction of manual eradication by the government and by more successful efforts of coca growers <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/colombia-top-cocaine-producing-countries-record-production-2017-3" target="_blank">to block and hinder</a> eradication teams. Farmers blocked access to their fields, relocated crops to remote areas, and, in some cases, obstructed government personnel with <a href="http://noticias.caracoltv.com/colombia/violentos-disturbios-entre-cultivadores-de-coca-y-esmad-por-erradicacion-de-cultivos-ilicitos" target="_blank">violent confrontations</a>, which the government sought to avoid during peace talks.</span></p><p><span>Moreover, Isacson noted, the price of gold fell while the value of the dollar strengthened, making mining less appealing and crop prices appear higher when measured in Colombian pesos.</span></p><p><span><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div></span></p><p><span>Finally, both a lack of alternatives presented by the government and encouragement by the FARC gave farmers little reason to switch to licit crops. </span></p><p><span>"<span>Word spread about the benefits coca-growers could obtain in the 2014 FARC accord, incentivizing more people to become coca growers," Isacson told Business Insider. (Reports have surfaced of more than <a href="http://pacifista.co/cincuenta-hectareas-de-coca-tienen-enredada-una-de-las-zonas-veredales-donde-se-concentraran-las-farc" target="_blank">100 acres of coca-leaf cultivation</a> in some areas set aside for FARC demobilization activities in northeastern Colombia.)</span></span></p><p><span><span>The Colombian government and FARC rebels have agreed to work together to eradicate coca crops, and under the current plan, farmers will voluntarily <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/coca-growing-soars-anew-in-colombia-as-u-s-stops-fumigation-program-1489320025" target="_blank">destroy 193 square</a> miles in exchange for aid to grow legal crops. <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/farc-cocaine-production-in-colombia-coca-paste-2016-7" target="_blank">Crop-substitution plans</a> have been in the offing for some time, but their appeal is hindered by logistical and market factors.</span></span></p><p><span><span><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div></span></span></p><p><span><span>For some remote areas, the costs of getting legitimate goods like coffee or fruit to market is prohibitive, and those crops could spoil during the trip. </span></span></p><p><span><span>"It's the only plant that makes it here," Jesus Oscuro, who has fields in northeastern Colombia, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/coca-growing-soars-anew-in-colombia-as-u-s-stops-fumigation-program-1489320025" target="_blank">told The Journal</a>. "We don't have anything else."</span></span></p><p>In some parts of Colombia, where people depend on coca to get by, eradication efforts are an affront.</p><p><span><span><span>"We will confront anyone who touches our plants," Fernando Zapata, </span><span>the communal president of a village in northwest Colombia, <a href="http://bigstory.ap.org/article/17eaf5ed582847f6aec56353f18a2d28/ap-photos-route-coca-paste-production-colombia" target="_blank">told the AP</a> in summer 2016</span><span>. "They want to do away with the livelihood of our families and the entire region."</span></span></span></p><p><span><span><span>That said, some growers are opening to leaving coca behind, but not without something in return.</span></span></span></p><p><span><span><span><span>"A subsidy, anything, it's all welcome," Lucenit Figueroa, a farmer who makes coca paste in northeast Colombia, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/coca-growing-soars-anew-in-colombia-as-u-s-stops-fumigation-program-1489320025" target="_blank">told The Journal</a>. "But we need the government to deliver - because if you tear it out and they don't deliver, then what are you left with?"</span></span></span></span></p><p>Colombia's faltering efforts to eliminate coca cultivation may have repercussions beyond the fields and mountains of the Colombian countryside.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Days after the State Department published its report about increased coca production in Colombia, newspaper <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/colombia-top-cocaine-producing-countries-record-production-2017-3" target="_blank">El Tiempo reported</a> that sources in the US were suggesting Colombia may have seen more than 200,000 hectares of production in 2016, slightly more than what The Journal reported.</p><p>The increase has created a situation that, if it does not soon improve, analysts say, "could bring a 'renarcotization' of the agenda with Washington," <a href="http://www.eltiempo.com/archivo/documento/CMS-16834488" target="_blank">El Tiempo reported</a>.</p><p>The US response this year, Isacson said, "I think it will be measured and rational."</p><p>"There will be noise, especially in Congress, but moderates who want to give Colombia a chance to implement its new counter-drug plan will win the day," he said. "Even if the Trump administration wanted to confront Colombia, it can't because it doesn't have officials in place yet. And with big foreign aid cuts looming, it has less resources with which to force a different strategy on Colombia."</p><p>"Next year, though, the US response could be harsher if Colombia registers another increase," he told Business Insider.</p><p>"The Trump administration will have its spots filled, and Colombia will be in the middle of a [presidential] campaign probably with a strong right-wing candidate. I'd expect a continued coca increase to harm relations in 2018, but not now."</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/why-cocaine-prices-barely-moved-america-2016-12">Why the price of cocaine in America has barely moved in decades</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="c2dzByNTE6gAAJt4WayDn8L0dE9S14MR" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

In the world's biggest cocaine producer, cultivation reportedly surged again in 2016

<p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div><ul><li><strong>Coca cultivation in Colombia rose again in 2017, though the increase was lower than past years.</strong></li><li><strong>The US government also connected increased production to increased cocaine use in the US.</strong></li><li><strong>Colombia's president-elect is expected to pursue more aggressive security and counter-drug policies.</strong></li></ul><p>The consistent increase in coca cultivation that Colombia has seen in recent years continued in 2017, although at a slightly slower pace, the US Office of National Drug Control Policy said on June 25.</p><p>Cultivation of coca, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/how-cocaine-is-made-2017-10" target="_blank" rel="noopener">cocaine's base ingredient</a>, went up 11% in 2017, rising from 188,000 hectares, or 464,558 acres, in 2016 to 209,000 hectares, or 516,450 acres, last year - "reaching an all-time high," the ONDCP said in a release.</p><p>Colombia's potential pure cocaine production also went up 19%, from 772 metric tons to 921 metric tons last year, though other estimates put the potential production <a href="https://www.insightcrime.org/news/brief/colombia-coca-production-hits-new-record-high-us-figures-say/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">much higher</a>.</p><p>The area under cultivation has steadily risen. The 42% spike between 2014 and 2015 was the largest single-year increase on record, but the growth as slowed over the past two years. The area under cultivation grew 18% between 2015 and 2016 and just 11% between 2016 and 2017. (Though the ONDCP has in the past <a href="https://twitter.com/SanhoTree/status/1011348973129555968" target="_blank" rel="noopener">discouraged</a> year-to-year to comparisons, as its methodology can change.)</p><p>"There's no sugarcoating things here," said Jim Carroll, deputy director of the ONDCP. "This is just not where we want cocaine production to be."</p><p>"Even though Colombian eradication efforts improved in 2017, they were outstripped by the acceleration in production. The Government of Colombia must do more to address this increase. The steep upward trajectory is unacceptable," Carroll said in the release, adding that the US would continue working with Colombia to reduce coca cultivation and cocaine production.</p><p>The ONDCP also connected rising cocaine production in Colombia to increased cocaine use and drug-related violence in the US, though analysts have <a href="https://www.insightcrime.org/news/analysis/cocaine-consumption-rise-think-again/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">disputed that link</a>.</p><p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div><p>"The number of new cocaine users in the United States has increased by 81% since 2013 and overdose deaths involving cocaine have more than doubled during that same timeframe," the release said. "When cocaine was used in some combination with opioids, overdose deaths increased 110%."</p><p>While the area under cultivation hit a new level, eradication was also at one of the highest levels on record, according to Adam Isacson, director of <keyword id="6354810" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="defense">defense</keyword> oversight at the Washington Office on Latin America.</p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"Fifty-three thousand hectares is what they forcibly manually eradicated last year, not even counting the feeble substitution programs, and that's the fourth-most in a year that you've ever had for manual eradication," Isacson said on Monday.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"If it continued that level or greater of manual eradication, and if they can really step up the crop substitution, then I think they can start getting some reductions pretty soon."</span></p><h2>'The Trump people will be delighted'</h2><p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div><p>The US has long supported the Colombian governments' fight against the drug trade, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-colombia-to-use-drones-to-fumigate-coca-leaf-with-herbicide-2018-6" target="_blank" rel="noopener">providing</a> some $10 billion for military and social programs between 2000 and 2015. That aid has fallen to about $400 million annually, and in recent years US officials have been dismayed by coca's rebound from a low point in 2012.</p><p>In 2013, the US government began <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/coca-cultivation-in-colombia-reaches-new-high-1529954782?mod=e2twp" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reducing</a> the aerial spraying used to eradicate coca crops, and the Colombian government suspended the practice <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-colombia-govt-confirms-suspension-of-aerial-coca-spraying-2015-5" target="_blank" rel="noopener">in mid-2015</a>, due to health concerns about the herbicides that were used.</p><p>President Juan Manuel Santos, who will leave office on August 7, has also been criticized for a peace accord signed with left-wing rebel group the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia in late 2016.</p><p>Officials in the US and Colombia say the deal doesn't do enough to confront the drug trade, while others on the ground in Colombia say the government has been <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/farmers-in-colombia-relying-on-economic-benefits-of-cocaine-production-2018-3" target="_blank" rel="noopener">slow to fulfill its obligations</a>, allowing other criminal groups to pick up FARC's slack and leaving civilians in the lurch.</p><p>Over the past year and a half, the Trump administration has <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/us-officials-missing-most-of-the-picture-over-cocaine-in-colombia-2017-9" target="_blank" rel="noopener">pressured Bogota to do more to fight coca production</a> - threatening to decertify Colombia as a partner in the war on drugs in 2017 - while also <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/coca-cultivation-in-colombia-reaches-new-high-1529954782?mod=e2twp" target="_blank" rel="noopener">courting</a> the Colombian government to support the effort to confront the Venezuelan government.</p><p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div><p>Ivan Duque, a right-winger who won a June 16 presidential run-off, is seen as a hardliner likely to adopt more aggressive security and anti-drug policies.</p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"I think he wants to go back to the future," Isacson said of Duque's approach to counter-drug efforts. "The Trump people will be delighted." </span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Duque "has spoken openly about the need to not cut deals with coca growers" and has referred to the section of the accord regarding crop substitution as "that disastrous chapter," Isacson said on Monday, adding that Duque wanted to increase eradication and was likely to use drones to do it.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Santos has already decided to reintroduce aerial spraying, however, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-colombia-to-use-drones-to-fumigate-coca-leaf-with-herbicide-2018-6" target="_blank" rel="noopener">authorizing</a> on Tuesday the use of drones to carry out low-altitude fumigation using the herbicide glyphosate.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Santos said the drones' low altitude would simulate ground eradication and limit the dangers of glyphosate, which has been linked to cancer. And while others are concerned that Duque's <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ap-santos-sees-colombia-peace-deal-safe-under-hawkish-successor-2018-6" target="_blank" rel="noopener">harsh criticism</a> of the peace accord means its future is in peril, Santos said the deal is safe.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><span>"The accord is bulletproofed," Santos <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ap-santos-sees-colombia-peace-deal-safe-under-hawkish-successor-2018-6" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told</a> the Associated Press. A constitutional court ruled the deal was binding on the next three governments, he said, adding that political and legal hurdles that leave little room to change the deal.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><span>"This accord wasn't made for the FARC," Santos said. "It was made for the local communities."</span></span></p><div></div>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/us-coast-guard-bust-1-billion-worth-cocaine-2017-3">Here's what $1 billion worth of cocaine looks like</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div></hr>

In the world's biggest cocaine producer, cultivation has hit an 'all time high' and the new president is vowing harsh measures that will please Trump

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/Fredy Builes</span></p><p class="caption">A solider and a policeman patrol near a wreckage of a passenger bus, which, according to local authorities, was burned by "Los Urabenos" gang members, in Belen neighborhood, Medellin, Colombia, April 1, 2016.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>In June, the Colombian government reached a deal with the left-wing Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/colombia-and-farc-rebels-reach-ceasefire-deal-2016-6" target="_blank">to end the 52-year war</a> the latter group had waged against the Colombian state.</p><p>Myriad political and logistical challenges <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/colombia-and-farc-rebels-reach-ceasefire-deal-2016-6" target="_blank">remain</a> for that peace deal, but even as the FARC has agreed to lay down its arms, another threat to the country's stability looks set to endure: cocaine, and the people who produce and traffic it.</p><p>FARC rebels, based around the country during their campaign against the state, have long funded their operations through <a href="http://bigstory.ap.org/article/98dea2d6b485415bb2a5f37f1c0e2685/cocas-comeback-forces-colombia-rethink-drug-war" target="_blank">taxes on coca</a>, the base product for cocaine, that were produced and shipped through their territory.</p><p>The group <a href="http://www.insightcrime.org/news-analysis/bacrim-winner-or-loser-in-colombia-peace-deal" target="_blank">controls 70%</a> of the coca-growing area in Colombia, and its involvement in the trade is thought to have earned it anything from <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/news/archive/2016/07/farc-cocaine-colombia/489551/?utm_source=atltw" target="_blank">$200 million to $3.5 billion</a> a year.</p><p>FARC leaders already agreed to abandon the trade as a condition of the peace talks and have started a <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/farc-cocaine-production-in-colombia-coca-paste-2016-7" target="_blank">joint crop-replacement program</a> with the government. But the production of the drug has not slacked; in fact, it has increased.</p><p>A <a href="http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/frontpage/2016/July/coca-crop-in-colombia-increases-almost-40-per-cent-over-one-year_-new-unodc-report.html?ref=fs1" target="_blank">July report</a> from the UN Office on Drugs and Crime found that coca production in Colombia increased 40% between 2014 and 2015, growing from about 170,500 acres to about 237,200 last year. The total acreage under cultivation in 2015 was also double the amount found in 2013. (The US government estimated <a href="http://bigstory.ap.org/article/98dea2d6b485415bb2a5f37f1c0e2685/cocas-comeback-forces-colombia-rethink-drug-war" target="_blank">a 42% increase in 2015</a>, to 393,000 acres.)</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd</span></p><p class="caption">In this January 6, 2016, photo, Edgar mulches coca leaves with a weed eater as the first step in making coca paste at a small makeshift lab in the mountain region of Antioquia, Colombia.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>The UN estimated potential cocaine production for 2015 at 646 metric tons, an increase of 46% over 2014.</p><p>The UN report also found that <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/farc-cocaine-production-in-colombia-coca-paste-2016-7" target="_blank">81% of cultivation was concentrated</a> in five of Colombia's 23 departments: Cauca, Nariño, Putumayo, Caquetá and Norte de Santander, which are in areas of high FARC activity.</p><p>The significant spike in coca production has raised criticism of the Colombian government from several sources.</p><p>"There are domestic critics that think that Santos' administration has been giving concessions to the FARC in terms of taking it easy or loosening on its antinarcotics efforts," Anna Szterenfeld, the Economist Intelligence Unit's senior analyst for Colombia, told Business Insider.</p><p>"We know that the FARC has been big in coca cultivation for all these years to finance itself. We know that the FARC demanded a cessation of aerial fumigation of coca crops, and last year the Santos [administration] halted aerial fumigation but gave as its rationale the fact that the chemical being used is carcinogenic," Szterenfeld told Business Insider. "But there's skepticism and people think that was sort of a bone that they threw to the FARC. That's reasonable, I think."</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Reuters</span></p><p class="caption">FARC factions exist throughout Colombia, but clashes between rebel groups and the government have decreased in recent years.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Criticism on this point is not limited to Colombians. The US government, on which the Colombian government relies for considerable aid and support, has noted the increase in coca cultivation, attributing it to decreased eradication efforts.</p><p>"We have to acknowledge that as the peace process and the negotiations have developed for the last four years, one of the elements of the Colombian government policy that has not been maintained at its previous levels is counternarcotic and eradication efforts," William Brownfield, a former ambassador to Colombia and the US State Department's top antidrug official, <a href="http://bigstory.ap.org/article/ba0fc038e9bc4a76a5a26b5ab2765caf/us-sees-colombian-resolve-drug-war-waning-peace-looms" target="_blank">told</a> the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in June.</p><p>Brownfield <a href="http://bigstory.ap.org/article/ba0fc038e9bc4a76a5a26b5ab2765caf/us-sees-colombian-resolve-drug-war-waning-peace-looms" target="_blank">said</a> he backed Colombia's peace efforts, but other elements of the US government will likely take issue with the increased cultivation.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/Fredy Builes</span></p><p class="caption">An antidrug policeman escorts workers during an eradication operation at a coca-leaf plantation near San Miguel, southern Putumayo province, August 15 2012.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>"Remember that Colombia has to be on good terms with the United States," Szterenfeld told Business Insider.</p><p>With the Obama administration requesting $450 million to support post-conflict programs in Colombia, it's likely that the "US Congress, and Republicans in particular, are going to say, 'OK, but if we're going to give Colombia more money, we want to see some more efforts on their part to combat this increase in coca crops, etc.'" Szterenfeld added.</p><p>"So it creates yet one more challenge for the government of Colombia to deal with."</p><h2>Ongoing security challenges</h2><p>Even if the FARC were to totally extricate itself from the coca and cocaine trade (<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/colombias-army-is-stepping-up-its-fight-against-dissident-farc-rebels-across-the-nation-2016-7" target="_blank">one notorious faction</a> has already said it won't lay down its arms, and <a href="http://colombiareports.com/farc-fronts-refuse-disarm-demobilize/" target="_blank">others may follow suit</a>), other groups are likely to continue, if not intensify, their production of the drug.</p><p>Colombia's current criminal groups (bandas criminales, or BACRIM, as they're known in Spanish) are already involved in the cocaine trade, shipping millions of dollars in product through the country and on to points abroad. With the FARC pulling out of the cocaine racket in some parts of the country, it's likely this group will compete with each other and the authorities to fill the void.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/John Vizcaino</span></p><p class="caption">Counternarcotics police guard an under-construction drug-smuggling sub that was seized from the Los Urabenos cartel, in Puerto Escondido, Monteria province, Colombia, October 18, 2011.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>According to studies and field research by Insight Crime, BACRIM are <a href="http://www.insightcrime.org/news-analysis/bacrim-winner-or-loser-in-colombia-peace-deal" target="_blank">already looking</a> to move into areas vacated by the FARC.</p><p>Chief among those groups is <a href="http://www.insightcrime.org/colombia-organized-crime-news/urabenos-profile" target="_blank">Los Urabeños</a>, which was formed by leaders of demobilized right-wing paramilitary members and is now considered the only BACRIM with a national reach, often working with Mexican traffickers to move immense amounts of cocaine north from Colombia.</p><p>Moreover, some BACRIM elements have mounted <a href="http://www.insightcrime.org/news-analysis/bacrim-winner-or-loser-in-colombia-peace-deal" target="_blank">attacks against civil-society programs</a> in an attempt to slow or scuttle the ongoing demobilization, as the end of the FARC would mean more law-enforcement focus on the BACRIM, in addition to the <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/colombian-cocaine-seizures-dangerous-shift-2016-6" target="_blank">heavy security pressure they already face</a>.</p><p>"As the FARC move out of some of the areas of the country where they've been dominant ... there is a risk that these existing ... criminal groups do move in," Szterenfeld told Business Insider.</p><p>"So it means that for the government, there's still going to be a tremendous need to have a strong security presence in these areas of the country."</p><h2>'We'll fight whoever comes and touches our plants'</h2><p>Alongside challenges from recalcitrant FARC units and ambitious criminal groups, the Colombian government will have to contend with farmers and coca growers who are sure to resist switching to legitimate crops.</p><p>Some farmers who have gone through with crop-replacement schemes have found that some legitimate crops bring in <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/in-a-blow-to-us-policy-colombia-is-again-the-worlds-top-producer-of-coca/2015/11/10/316d2f66-7bf0-11e5-bfb6-65300a5ff562_story.html" target="_blank">less than one-third</a> of what coca crops did - an amount below the country's minimum wage.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd</span></p><p class="caption">In this January 7, 2016, photo, a farmer, wearing a mask to ward off noxious fumes, mixes liquid coca paste at a small makeshift lab in the mountain region of Antioquia, Colombia.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Moreover, logistical issues have compelled some farmers to either stick with or switch back to coca plants: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/farc-cocaine-production-in-colombia-coca-paste-2016-7" target="_blank">Some legitimate crops are not viable</a> in parts of Colombia where coca is grown, and some parts of the country are so rugged and remote that bananas or other goods would <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/farc-cocaine-production-in-colombia-coca-paste-2016-7" target="_blank">spoil before they reach the market</a>.</p><p>"But with coca," Jeremy McDermott, codirector of Insight Crime, <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/news/archive/2016/07/farc-cocaine-colombia/489551/?utm_source=atltw" target="_blank">told The Atlantic</a>, "the buyer will come to your house."</p><p>For those farmers, the government's goal of reducing coca crops clashes with their need to provide for themselves.</p><p>"We'll fight whoever comes and touches our plants," Fernando Zapata, a community council leader in a tiny hamlet located in Colombia's north-central Antioquia department, <a href="http://bigstory.ap.org/article/98dea2d6b485415bb2a5f37f1c0e2685/cocas-comeback-forces-colombia-rethink-drug-war" target="_blank">told</a> the Associated Press when <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/farc-cocaine-production-in-colombia-coca-paste-2016-7" target="_blank">it visited the region to document the coca-paste-production process</a>. "We're organized and will fight to the death if necessary. They want to stop us from feeding our families."</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd</span></p><p class="caption">In this January 7, 2016, photo, a farmer stirs a mix of mulched coca leaves and cement with gasoline, as part of the initial process to make coca paste, at a small makeshift lab in Antioquia, Colombia. Apart from gasoline and cement, ammonia, sulphuric acid, sodium permanganate, and caustic soda are some of the chemicals used to produce the paste.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>The spike in cocaine production seen in recent years may be a near-term one, spurred on by Colombia's reduced eradication efforts and by some farmers encouraged by the FARC <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/in-a-blow-to-us-policy-colombia-is-again-the-worlds-top-producer-of-coca/2015/11/10/316d2f66-7bf0-11e5-bfb6-65300a5ff562_story.html" target="_blank">to produce more</a> in order secure more government aid when the conflict finally concludes.</p><p>But the promise of increased market share for Colombia's many criminal groups, as well as the existential imperative some farmers feel to produce and sell coca, indicate that coca, and cocaine, will not soon disappear from a country emerging from a half-century of war.</p><p>"Even if the FARC is demobilized, the problem of violence and crime and drug trafficking in Colombia is not going to go away," Szterenfeld said.</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/three-tons-cocaine-seized-pacific-ocean-ecuador-colombia-galapagos-islands-2015-12">Colombian authorities seized 3 tons of cocaine bound for the US hidden in a 'narco-submarine'</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="A1bGJveTr1cwKHKCq0KhC7yxo-DZ_qrx" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

Colombia is about to end a 52-year war, but a bigger, tougher fight is looming

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/Yuri Gripas</span></p><p class="caption">President Donald Trump welcomes Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos at the White House, May 18, 2017.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>US officials in Congress and the White House over the past week have expressed deep concern about developments in Colombia, where efforts to demobilize the country's oldest rebel group are proceeding alongside a boom in cocaine production.</p><p>On Tuesday, during a Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control <a href="https://www.drugcaucus.senate.gov/content/adapting-us-counternarcotics-efforts-colombia" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">hearing</a>, Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley and Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein pressed an panel of US law-enforcement and military officials over the rise in cocaine production, zeroing in on the role played by Colombia's pursuit of peace with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).</p><p>Grassley said the peace accord has had a "staggering" impact on the country's cocaine trade, and Feinstein criticized the government of President Juan Manuel Santos over its promise not to extradite FARC members, suggesting US aid to Colombia be "conditioned on extradition when the US requests it."</p><p>William Brownfield, the State Department's assistant secretary of international narcotics and law-enforcement affairs, stressed that Colombia's military and national police had been "terrific partners" but echoed the idea the Colombian government had dropped the ball on counternarcotics efforts for the sake of peace negotiations.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>AP Photo/Ricardo Mazalan</span></p><p class="caption">FARC rebels at the inauguration of their 10th conference in Yari Plains, southern Colombia, September 17, 2016.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>"It is my personal belief that the government of Colombia and its president [were] overwhelmingly focused on the peace negotiations and the peace accord. I believe that by so focusing their attention, they by definition focused less on the issue of drugs and drug trafficking," Brownfield said. "I believe in addition they concluded that in order to reach a successful peace accord, they had to cede to the FARC on issues related to drugs."</p><p>Brownfield also criticized the Santos government's efforts to combine manual eradication of coca crops with voluntary crop-substitution program. The <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-colombia-defends-anti-drug-efforts-after-trump-critique-2017-9" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">US has pushed</a> to restart aerial fumigation with glyphosate, which Colombia discontinued in 2015.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/Fredy Builes</span></p><p class="caption">An antidrug policeman with workers during an eradication operation at a coca plantation in southern Putumayo, Colombia, August 15, 2012.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Feinstein also cast doubt on the prospects of the peace process, saying she didn't believe "for one second" that the FARC would become "a peaceful, law-abiding institution."</p><p>Dissident FARC rebels <a href="http://www.insightcrime.org/news-analysis/reports-show-ex-farc-criminal-cells-taking-shape-around-colombia" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">do appear</a> to be asserting themselves in Colombia's criminal underworld, but cocaine boom - production <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/heres-how-drugs-are-getting-smuggled-from-south-america-to-the-us-2017-9" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">rose 134%</a> between 2013 and 2016 - has been <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/colombia-coca-cocaine-production-increase-record-level-amount-2017-3" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">driven by a variety of factors</a>, not all related to the FARC.</p><p>Later on Tuesday, Colombian <keyword id="6354810" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="defense">Defense</keyword> Minister Luis Carlos Villegas said the country had <a href="http://www.eltiempo.com/politica/proceso-de-paz/balance-de-sustitucion-de-cultivos-ilicitos-en-colombia-con-acuerdo-de-paz-129978" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">reached 62%</a> of its goal to eradicate 50,000 hectares of coca crops this year, and the country continues to <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ap-trump-delivers-shock-rebuke-to-colombia-over-cocaine-surge-2017-9" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">work closely</a> with the US to seize cocaine as well.</p><p>While the Santos government has been <a href="http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/eeuu-y-canada/expertos-reaccionan-a-amenazas-de-descertificacion-de-donald-trump-130834" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">criticized</a> for the slow pace with which it is implementing elements of the peace accord, the hardline measures mentioned during the Senate hearing, if adopted, could <a href="http://www.insightcrime.org/news-analysis/us-congress-hearing-underscores-tensions-colombia-peace-deal" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">exacerbate</a> issues like public resistance to Colombia's crop-eradication efforts as well as recidivism among demobilized FARC rebels.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://adamisacson.com/2016-suspect-trafficking-maps/">Adam Isacson/US Southern Command</a></span></p><p class="caption">Suspected trafficking routes leaving Nariño in Colombia and Esmeraldas and Manabi in Ecuador in 2016.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>The hearing made scant mention of Colombian criminal groups other than the FARC, even though Colombia itself <a href="http://www.insightcrime.org/news-analysis/us-congress-hearing-underscores-tensions-colombia-peace-deal" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">considers</a> groups like Los Urabeños the most significant threats to the country. Little was said about drug trafficking in Ecuador, whose proximity to Colombia has made it <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/cocaine-seized-in-florida-from-trafficking-hub-ecuador-2016-3" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">prime territory</a> for traffickers who <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ap-spain-ecuador-net-55-metric-tons-of-cocaine-in-pacific-2017-5" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">take advantage</a> of its long coastline.</p><p><span>"Certainly Ecuador needs more attention to road interdiction and riverine interdiction," Adam Isacson, senior associate for defense oversight at the Washington Office on Latin America, told Business Insider.</span></p><p>Moreover, the tone of the hearing suggested to some that an outdated mindset persisted among US officials.</p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">"The hearing was sort of a frustrating exercise. The Senate narcotics caucus is sort of like going back in a time machine to the 1980s," Isacson told Business Insider. "I thought it was surprising that everybody was talking about the FARC, but only DEA mentioned the Urabeños or any of the armed groups doing things. And that's just disappointing. I think they're missing most of the picture right now."</span></p><h2>'A slap in the face'</h2><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Thomson Reuters</span></p><p class="caption">A woman sells Colombian flags with the image of Pope Francis outside the Cathedral of Bogota, September 2, 2017.</p></div><p></p></div></div></span></p><p>The concerns expressed during hearing on Tuesday may not necessarily become official US policy, but a memo released by the White House on Wednesday signaled the potential for a much more drastic shift in US dealings with Colombia.</p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">The <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/09/13/presidential-memorandum-secretary-state" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">memo</a> was the US president's determination of major drug-producing or transit countries for fiscal year 2018. </span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;">It named numerous countries in Latin America and the Caribbean and again designated Bolivia and Venezuela as "countries that have failed demonstrably" to adhere to obligations under international narcotics agreements. But it went a step further.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><span>"In addition, the United States Government seriously considered designating Colombia as a country that has failed demonstrably to adhere to its obligations under international counternarcotics agreements due to the extraordinary growth of coca cultivation and cocaine production over the past 3 years," the memo said, adding that it refrained from doing so because of the Colombian police and military's close cooperation with the US and because eradication efforts had restarted.</span></span></p><p>The threat to decertify Colombia and put it on the same "blacklist" as Venezuela and Bolivia - which the memo said Trump would keep as "an option" - elicited dismay in the US and Colombia.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/ John Vizcaino</span></p><p class="caption">Colombian police officers examine confiscated packs of cocaine at the police base in Necocli, February 24, 2015.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><span>"Colombia is a major ally of the United States and has done essentially everything the US has asked regarding counterdrug policy in the past two decades other than recently ending the counterproductive aerial spraying," analyst James Bosworth <a href="http://www.bloggingsbyboz.com/2017/09/failed-demonstrably.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">wrote</a> on Thursday. "If the US is going to put Colombia on this list then it might as well decertify every country from Canada to Argentina including itself."</span></span></p><p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><span>"It wouldn't have been controversial if the White House declaration simply expressed a strong concern over the increase in cultivation," Isacson <a href="http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/eeuu-y-canada/expertos-reaccionan-a-amenazas-de-descertificacion-de-donald-trump-130834" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">told</a> Colombian newspaper El Tiempo. "But to say 'we almost decided to put Colombia in the same pot as Venezuela and Bolivia' is a slap in the face.'"</span></span></p><p>Colombia was last on the blacklist in the late 1990s, when then-President Ernesto Samper was threatened with impeachment over <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/cali-cartel-learned-from-escobar-according-to-dea-agent-javier-pena-2017-9" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">campaign contributions from the Cali cartel</a>. Decertifying Colombia now could not only imperil tens of millions of dollars of US aid but also access to aid from international organizations.</p><p><span><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Thomson Reuters</span></p><p class="caption">President Donald Trump with Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, left, at the White House, May 18, 2017.</p></div><p></p></div></div></span></p><p><span>"Colombia is without a doubt the country which most has fought drugs, and which has had the most success on that front," the Santos government said on Thursday. "No one has to threaten us to confront this challenge."</span></p><p><span>"Colombia has been the country that has put the most blood, has made the most sacrifices" in the fight against narcotics, Santos <a href="http://www.elespectador.com/noticias/politica/colombia-es-el-pais-que-mas-sangre-ha-puesto-en-lucha-antidroga-santos-articulo-713168" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">said</a> on Thursday, without specifically mentioning the White House memo.</span></p><p><span>Some have downplayed what the memo augurs for US policy.</span></p><p><span><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/John Vizcaino</span></p><p class="caption">A Colombian official with a confiscated pack of cocaine at the police base in Necocli, northern Colombia, March 11, 2015.</p></div><p></p></div></div></span></p><p><span>Rather than signaling worsening bilateral relations, it indicates "drug production and trafficking will remain a central element, particularly as it relates to the US domestic agenda on border security and <keyword id="6355470" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="law">law</keyword> enforcement," consultancy Control Risk said in a note on Friday, noting that Vice President Mike Pence had affirmed Colombia's centrality to addressing the situation in Venezuela <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/fallout-from-trumps-comments-about-military-action-against-venezuela-2017-8" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">during his August tour of the region</a>.</span></p><p><span>But such comments, which Trump has also made about Mexico, may still pose a risk to Latin America's willingness to trust and work with the US.</span></p><p><span>Penalizing Colombia "could endanger peace, disrupt markets, affect the Colombian peso, and undermine regional confidence (to the extent there is any)," Greg Weeks, a University of North Carolina at Charlotte political-science professor and editor of The Latin Americanist, <a href="http://weeksnotice.blogspot.com/2017/09/trumps-colombia-blunder.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">wrote</a> on Thursday. "Some of these might start happening anyway in anticipation of a possible policy change."</span></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/us-coast-guard-bust-1-billion-worth-cocaine-2017-3">Here's what $1 billion worth of cocaine looks like</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

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