DRUGS: DUPUIS "COLOMBIA: THE NEW FRONTIER OF THE BIG TALIBAN PINO ARLACCHI"

Declaration by Olivier Dupuis, MEP and Secretary of the Transnational Radical Party.

Rome 22 September, 1998. "Two years after Arlacchi’s nomination – which was characterized by his solemn declaration about the worldwide eradication of all drugs in 10 years – the international situation is absolutely disastrous. The failures of this ‘apprentice wizard’ of international repression haven’t suggested him anything: the formal censorship of the European Parliament on ‘crop substitution programmes’ that, under Arlacchi’s leadership the UNDCP has sponsored in Burma and Afghanistan hasn’t suggested him anything; the tentative to enroll the political controller-producers of drug trafficking, like the Talibans, in the army of the international repression, hasn’t suggested him anything.

"All this hasn’t been enough for Mr. Arlacchi!

"Moreover, today, at his meeting with President Pastrana of Colombia, Mr. Arlacchi has promised him $1 billion in 10 years for new eradication programs of coca leaf. It would be very interesting to know what those who are supposed to finance these initiatives – i. e the Governments of the international community – think about this idea; or it would be very interesting to know the opinion of the citizens of Colombia, literally destroyed in its economical, civil and political aspects by the ‘War on Drugs’, who are crunched by a system that condemns them to export drugs and import prohibitionism at the same time."