CaribWorldNews, WASHINGTON, D.C., Mon. Mar. 3, 2008: Caribbean countries hardly produce illegal drugs yet remain major transit points for drug dealers seeking to get their merchandise to the U.S. and European markets.

That’s the conclusion yet again of the U.S. State Department as it released another International Narcotics Control Strategy Report on Friday in Washington. The islands continue to serve as northbound transshipment points for cocaine and increasing amounts of heroin coming from South America; chiefly Colombia and Venezuela, said officials.


`Go-fast boats are typically used to transport drugs to U.S. territory in the Caribbean, although the use of fishing boats, freighters, and cruise ships is becoming more common,` the U.S. State Department said. Direct transport to Europe, and at times to the U.S., is sometimes carried-out by `mules` or drug couriers using commercial flights. The DEA and local law enforcement saw continued go-fast boat traffic … with some load sizes reduced because of a potential exposure to law enforcement. These shipments were generally en route to Puerto Rico or the U.S. Virgin Islands. In addition to go-fast boat activity and smuggling via commercial airlines, large quantities of narcotics continued to be moved through in cargo containers.

Four Caribbean countries were listed as `major transit` points while others were seen as transit countries but not in a `major` way. The Bahamas was listed as a major transit point for cocaine from South America bound for both the U.S. and Europe, and for marijuana from Jamaica while the Dominican Republic made the list not just for being a major transit point for cocaine but heroin as well. Haiti was dubbed as a major transit country for cocaine and marijuana from South America and the Caribbean as was Jamaica. Jamaica was also described as the Caribbean’s largest producer of marijuana and marijuana derivative products.

Second to Jamaica on the marijuana production scale is reportedly St. Vincent & the Grenadines, U.S. officials said. `St. Vincent and the Grenadines is the largest producer of marijuana in the Eastern Caribbean and the source for much of the marijuana used in that region,` the 2008 report states. The drug is also cultivated in Dominica. It is then shipped along with cocaine, transshipped there from South America, to the U.S. and Europe.

In St. Lucia, St. Vincent’s marijuana is imported while being grown locally, according to the U.S. State Department. Both ganja and cocaine have reportedly been stockpiled there for shipment to the U.S. and Europe, making the largely tourism dependent island `a well-used transshipment site.` In St. Kitts, traffickers have reportedly set up base and are linked directly to South American traffickers, according to U.S. officials. While in Grenada, South American and Caribbean drug traffickers transit through or stop in its coastal waters to transship cocaine and marijuana en route to U.S. and other markets, the State Department said. Barbados is a transit country for both cocaine and marijuana, the report said, while islands of Antigua and Barbuda remain transit points for cocaine moving from South America to the U.S. and European markets. `Narcotics entering Antigua and Barbuda are transferred from go-fast boats, fishing vessels, or yachts to other go-fasts, powerboats or local fishing vessels for further movement,` said the U.S. report. `Secluded beaches and uncontrolled marinas provide opportunities to conduct these drug transfer operations.`

In Trinidad and Tobago, U.S. officials claim there was an increase in illicit drug traffic out of Venezuela but that the quantity of drugs transiting Trinidad and Tobago does not have a significant effect on the U.S. Cannabis is grown in Trinidad and Tobago, but not in significant amounts. Still, it remains a transit country for illegal drugs from South America to the U.S. and Europe.

In Suriname, State Department officials say the inability of government there to control its borders due to inadequate resources, limited law enforcement training, lack of a law enforcement presence in the interior of the country, and lack of aircraft or patrol boats, allow traffickers to move drug shipments via land, sea, river, and air with little resistance.

It is the same story in Guyana, U.S. officials say, where the country’s vast expanse of unpopulated forest and savannahs offers ample cover for drug traffickers and smugglers.

The report’s authors say Guyana’s counternarcotics efforts are undermined by inadequate resources for law enforcement, poor coordination among law enforcement agencies, an inefficient judiciary, and a colonial-era legal system badly in need of modernization, leading to drug dealers using the country as not only a transit country for cocaine but to produce marijuana.

In the French Caribbean, cocaine reportedly moves through French Guiana, Martinique, Guadeloupe, the French side of Saint Martin, and St. Barthelemy to Europe and to a lesser extent, to the United States. While the Dutch Caribbean islands of the Netherlands Antilles, Curacao and Bonaire off Venezuela and Saba, Saint Eustatius, and Sint Maarten east of the U.S. Virgin Islands continue to serve as northbound transshipment points for cocaine and increasing amounts of heroin coming from South America, U.S. officials said.

Cuba`s ports, territorial waters and airspace were listed only as `susceptible to narcotics trafficking from source and transit countries,` with U.S. officials saying while there government there is active in regional drug control advocacy, its interdiction capability is limited by a lack of resources necessary to upgrade its counternarcotic assets and technical equipment.

The 2008 International Narcotics Control Strategy Report is an annual report by the Department of State to Congress that describes the efforts of key countries to attack all aspects of the international drug trade in Calendar Year 2007.

The U.S., which has faced criticism for not doing enough to help its Third Border, insists in the report, it will continue to work closely with regional law enforcement agencies to strengthen their counternarcotics/anticrime capabilities and provide training and operational support to enhance their maritime interdiction capabilities. – CaribWorldNews.com