An outraged President takes on the drug traffickers
It was an unconditional declaration of war that Colombian President Belisario Betancur Cuartes issued from the pulpit of the cathedral in Neiva earlier this month. He had walked to the cathedral behind the flag-draped coffin of his slain Justice Minister, Rodrigo Lara Bonilla, 37. "There will be no truce for the narcotics traffickers," Betancur vowed, his voice trembling with emotion. "There will be punishment without mercy." The mourners broke into applause when the President declared, "The international drug criminals will see us standing proudly before a homeland that stands united in repudiation!"
Lara was murdered with a submachine gun on April 30 by two men riding on a motorcycle. One of them was killed when the machine crashed. The survivor confessed that he had been paid $21,000 to carry out the killing. Lara, a vigorous opponent of narcotics traffickers, became the first Cabinet official to die at the hands of the Colombian mafia. Within hours of his death, Colombian police, army and security forces launched the most extensive crackdown on the narcotics trade in the country's history, one that promises to help the U.S. in its uphill struggle to stem the ever rising tide of Colombian cocaine and marijuana. The U.S. has backed the Colombian government's antinarcotics efforts with $7 million in aid since 1983, and the State Department has requested an additional $10.3 million for next year.
The war is being waged not only in the countryside, where marijuana and cocaine are grown and processed, but also inside Colombia's corrupt bureaucracy. After Lara's funeral, Betancur declared a nationwide state of emergency, giving the army a free hand to arrest suspects without a warrant and try them in military courts. Hundreds of people have been detained so far. About 400 judges accused of handling narcotics cases improperly will be removed, as well as 280 members of the national police force who have allegedly accepted bribes from the Colombian mafia.
The authorities have expropriated about 150,000 acres of land belonging to the cocaine mafia. A March 10 raid uncovered one of the largest cocaine-processing operations in the world: a modern complex 430 miles southeast of Bogotá that boasted 19 laboratories, where a thousand workers produced an estimated 25 tons of cocaine a month. The plant's 13.8 tons of cocaine represented roughly one-fifth of U.S. yearly consumption (estimated street price: $1.2 billion). When the police dumped it into the nearby Yari River, the waters ran white with foam.
The military has also confiscated tons of weapons, along with private yachts and aircraft, and destroyed more than 200 other clandestine airstrips. A veteran pilot described the country's underworld air traffic as resembling "a swarm of bees combing the jungle for their honey."
Betancur has agreed to a U.S. request for extradition of 23 narcotics suspects, many of them sought by authorities in Miami, which is becoming one of the world's major cocaine capitals. Most wanted by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is Carlos Lehder, 33, who has been indicted in Florida for cocaine importation and distribution. He is rumored to be in Peru.