Drug Trafficking in Peru

Drug Trafficking in Peru
The scenario for 1998
Ricardo Soberón Garrido
Peru Solidarity Forum Bulletin 21, March 1998

From the Field to the Cooking Pot

In recent months, the drug trafficking panorama has demonstrated swift and sudden changes in response to different policies and initiatives on the part of President Alberto Fujimori's government, in the area of interdiction, alternative development and other fronts.

In the face of the ongoing PBC price crisis, the coca-cocaine agroindustry has undergone a true reconversion. For example, in recent months there has been a progressive abandonment of coca growers who previously supplied Colombian traffickers. The only growers who remain are those who are able to economically maintain their parcels or have contacts to deliver their basic base and sell it to local traffickers. In fact, those who have remained have been forced to give their production greater aggregate value. They are no longer producing just coca, or even basic cocaine paste, but rather processed paste or even cocaine itself.

And the routes?.... very well thank you

The establishment of the air curtain in the Peruvian jungle on the part of the Air Force raised the operative costs of Colombian groups who had to pay higher salaries to pilots who risked their lives, greater fuel costs to avoid obstacles put in place by the Air Force and even the cost of the eventual loss of a small plane or drug shipment (an average metric ton per trip).

With the air route cut off and with coca crops left to their luck, alternative trafficking routes began to appear and were consolidated. These include the river corridor made up of the Maranon and Ucayali rivers which communicate the high jungle with Brazil and Colombia. The first from the Yurimaguas port in the Lower Huallaga and the second from Pucallpa close to the Ucayali River. For months, small ships carried cocaine paste close by Iquitos en route to the Amazon Trapezoid and the Putumayo River in Colombian territory.

The response on the part of traffickers forced the government to consolidate the V Police Region in 1997 and to equip river ships to intercept traffickers and other river pirates. A second route was created in the heart of the central jungle, between Ucayali, Nohaya and Brazilian territory. Here small planes change license numbers when they cross the border, in over to avoid interception from either country.

Finally, we have observed the formation of a new geographical detour which takes drugs to the Peruvian coast, over different highland corridors.The use of the Pita, Salaverry, Callao and Pisco Ports demonstrate a new impulse on the part of local traffickers to export drugs to border countries or
even to Mexico and the United States via the Peruvian coast.

Moreover, there is a trend to replace huge Colombian trafficking organizations for smaller groups of Peruvians who export at the "client's request".

Where can this lead? Coca crops in Peru could effectively be reduced to somewhere between 40,000 and 45,000 hectares, sufficient to satisfy the local cocaine market (in crescendo) and these local organizations (in the style of Lopez Paredes, Cachique Rivera and, most recently, Cristal).

And anti-drug policies?

In terms of actions implemented by the Fujimori government, in particular as of July 1995, (second administration), policies are apparently conditioned on two factors: the induced coca crisis itself and the absolute harmony between the US President Bill Clinton government and the Alberto Fujimori
administration. This honeymoon is clearly related to factors such as reduced coca crops, the successful release of hostages from the Embassy, positive negotiations with Ecuador, etc.

Never before, since the beginning of the war on drugs, around 1978, have bilateral relations between so positive. Even within the Peruvian Armed Forces, the predominant perception is that it was a good idea to abandon the monopoly of the anti-drug battle (1992-1996), and turn it over to the National Police.

As a result, problems of corruption and human rights violations ostensibly decreased in these zones. On the other hand, there is greater institutional and social understanding about the work carried out by DINANDRO, the Customs Brigade and even the Police Force's Financial Investigation
Unit.

However, in the analysis carried out both within Peruvian Intelligence Services and in the US State Department, three factors have not been taken into account that could alter this harmonious panorama in the near future: the ongoing profound crisis in new coca basins identified by CONTRA DROGAS and a lack of solutions on the part of the Peruvian State or private investment, problems in the justice administration and the battle against drugs, and new trends in the drug phenomena in Peru.

The coca crisis and alternative development

The first factor refers to what has been happening on three different tracks in the Peruvian scene. First of all, the coca crisis has deepened in the high Peruvian jungle since 1991, secondly the particular political perception of Peruvian authorities about the
issue and thirdly, the excessive trust in the conformation of a Donors' Table that Hernando de Soto unsuccessfully attempted to implement several years ago to finance alternative development.

Over the course of the past six years the price of coca has steadily dropped, producers and families continue to abandon the crop and hope to find solid financial support from CONTRA DROGAS and the Ministry of the Presidency.

For their part, Peruvian authorities who have constructed an institutional scheme based on CONTRA DROGAS and a National Alternative Development Plan (1998-2002) have no clear and definitive responses regarding alternative development. Moreover, they are still on the hunt for resources ($1,350 million, of which no more than 400 million is ensured).

The gap between the crude reality,
political side-stepping and the real possibilities for international negotiation, could end up causing repercussions in the delicate public security balance in these regions. The daily violence, organized crime, drug trafficking itself and the vestiges of the Shining Path ranks could become undesired actors in this panorama on the threshold of the XXI Century. The difficult situation in Colombia, should spark reflection among those who promote structural adjustment in the country.

Justice in the drug trafficking arena

A second factor corresponds to the justice administration regarding penal processes linked to drug trafficking crimes. Very curious things have been taking place since the so-called Drug Court was deactivated in early 1997.

The eternal provisional nature of the judges has meant extreme arbitrariness on the part of the Justice Power Executive Commission and, what is worse, the naming of the magistrates to be responsible for these delicate tasks.

Apparently the government itself realized the serious problems that were arising - between 1992 and 1995 - when drug trafficking cases were turned over to military courts, classified as crimes of treason against the homeland (under the charges that money was used to finance the Shining Path).

The scandals it uncovered were greater than what it sought to hide. For example, the Limoniel Chavez Penaherrera, alias "Vaticano", case and his scandalous accusations about money, which according to his statements, he received from the hands of presidential advisor Vladimiro Montesinos.

As a result, it could think of nothing better than to turn over the entire jurisdictional package to civil judges, but these are "hand-picked" and under the absolute dominion of the less visible power spheres, the specialized Supreme Court chamber. Here the aim was to de-legitimize criticism about a military monopoly of the anti-drug battle.

However, we know that the permanent shuffling of magistrates, the limited clarity in terms of access to information in this jurisdictional sub-system augers nothing good, or at least nothing clear. Like a funnel, all cases end up being heard by a chamber where magistrates are not trustworthy.

The US policy toward the Andes

On the other hand, the consistency of the US State Department policy regarding the three Andean countries which produce coca and cocaine is fragile and even contradictory. For example, the highly debated presidential certification, which invokes standards to determine whether or not a country is
certified and whether or not economic aid will be increased.

In the case of Peru and Bolivia, everything seems to indicate that President Clinton will fully certify both nations, as has been happening in recent years. This obeys the fulfillment of annual coca eradication goals on the part of President Banzer (7,000 hectares) and the "successful reduction" of Peruvian crops on the part of President Fujimori.

In the Colombian case, and more precisely the Samper government, despite having continued to arrest key drug traffickers and continued eradication efforts through aerial spraying, Colombia will apparently be decertified for the third consecutive year. The alternative penal legal bill, non retroactive extradition and the ascension of Horacio Serpa as a Liberal Party candidate seems to be factors in this likely decision.

However, when the issue is money, the above does not seem to bear the same weight. Recent information indicates that Peru and Colombia will effectively receive considerable increases of anti-drug assistance while Bolivia will receive less aid. Who understands the logic within the Clinton administration in this area?

Yet, it is definitely not time to cry victory in the nation's upper jungle, or in Lima or Washington. The hope is that authorities from both countries will become aware of this delicate scenario during the extraordinary session period of the UN General Assembly to be held June 8 -9 and which will examine anti-drug policies over the past decade.