US-Latin America relations defined by drug war

By Silvia Ayuso Nov 23, 2011, 12:29 GMT

Washington - When the US and Latin America get together, they'd like to talk about something other than drugs.

Since moving into the White House, Barack Obama's government has pledged to move beyond the war on drug traffickers, with a commitment to long-term investment in education, opportunity and infrastructure in the region.

'This region is vital to our interests ... we will rise or fall together in the 21st century because we have so many interests that are at stake,' said US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, speaking in May at the Conference on the Americas.

But despite the successes of free trade agreements with Panama and Colombia and a new agreement on shipping traffic across the US-Mexico border, the conversation continues to be dominated by the raging drug war, which has killed more than 40,000 in Mexico alone since 2006.

And the problem is spreading. Central America - the region south of Mexico - is becoming a drug trafficking center, and a battleground. Drug cartels are expanding into other criminal activities like human trafficking.

No less an authority than William Brownfield, head of the US State Department's bureau of international narcotics and law enforcement, told Congress in October that drug trafficking is tightening its grip on the region.

'In 2007, I would have argued that the most serious security threat to the United States had moved to Mexico ... Today I believe our greatest threat has moved to Central America, where traffickers and criminal gangs now facilitate the flow of up to 95 per cent of all cocaine reaching the US and threaten the very governments themselves.'

In a terrible paradox, US-backed programs to fight the cartels have succeeded in pushing them out of their territory - extending the problem to Central America.

It's happened before: Starting a decade ago, the much-touted Plan Colombia pushed cartels out of Colombia - to Mexico, where the current troubles began.

The Obama administration has adopted the principle of 'shared responsibility:' that the US, as the principal consumer of illegal drugs, must do its part to fight them. That means both helping countries besieged by traffickers, and fighting drug use at home.

Obama has staunchly supported Mexican President Felipe Calderon in his declared 'war' on traffickers, and the Merida Initiative launched in 2008 has expanded to include not only material aid, but military support in the training of Mexican security forces.

The administration has also lent its support to the Central American Regional Security Initiative (CARSI) and an additional programme for the Caribbean. Both are joint regional efforts to combat the region's principal threat to national security.

But while the principle of shared responsibility has been well-received in Latin America, many experts say it's not enough.

US demand for drugs is rising, especially for heroin, marijuana and methamphetamines, according to a Department of Justice report issued in September. In 2009, nearly 9 per cent of Americans used illegal drugs, against 8 per cent the year before, according to the report.

Calls by experts and former regional political leaders - including former US president Jimmy Carter - to fight the violence by legalizing at least soft drugs have so far fallen on deaf ears in Washington, despite a new Gallup poll showing more than half of Americans support marijuana legalization.

And gun control remains taboo for the US government, although the US is the principal supplier of weapons to Mexican drug cartels. Calderon called on the US Congress in May 2010 to renew the ban on assault weapons, but Obama has yet to risk raising the ire of the powerful US gun rights lobby.

Brownfield said recently that the United States won't abandon its drug war-torn neighbors.

'We all got into this mess together and we have to get out of it together as well,' he said.

But, as the death toll rises and the violence spreads, there's still a long way to go.