Over the past three weeks, the debate surrounding the strategy to fight the "war on drugs" in Mexico has resurfaced, leading President Felipe Calderón to admit that the current militarized approach used by his administration must be coupled with social initiatives to be successful. This change in attitude came after 16 teenagers were killed by a group of masked gunman in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico's most violent city located on the U.S.-Mexico border. According to witness' reports, seven SUVs carrying masked gunmen drove up to the house where the teens were celebrating their friend's birthday and stormed the house without warning, shooting at everyone they encountered.

This change of attitude also coincided with news that the conservative National Action Party (PAN) of President Calderón was considering an alliance with the leftist Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) in an attempt to defeat the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in this summer's upcoming gubernatorial races. Therefore, the decision to implement new social initiatives in the fight against narcotrafficking could be interpreted as the PAN's attempt to extend an olive branch to the more left-leaning PRI.

The recent attack hit a sore spot for many Mexicans, especially residents of Ciudad Juárez. Since President Calderon deployed the army throughout Mexico to combat narcotrafficking in late 2006, more than 17,000 people have been killed by drug-related violence. The Mexican government often explains the high murder and crime rates in cities such as Ciudad Juárez as the result of gang-on-gang violence, resulting in the criminalization of the victims of the fight against drugs in Mexico. The teens killed on January 31st have not been linked to organized crime or the drug trade, resulting in a highly publicized event that demonstrates the impact of the city's violence on innocent citizens and the failure of the militarized approach to organized crime and drug violence.

After the shooting, the families of the slain teens immediately demanded justice and blamed President Calderón for failing to prevent the mass murder. Mexico's Congress, dominated by the PRI opposition party, echoed their demands and the country's senators called for government officials in charge of security policy to both explain how this multiple murder could take place with over 5,500 soldiers deployed to the city and rewrite Mexico's counternarcotics strategy. Ciudad Juárez's mayor, José Reyes Ferriz, joined residents in a call for a social initiatives targeting the root of the problem, described by the mayor as "social decomposition" caused by "broken homes" which leaves teens "vulnerable to a gang's plea for membership."

In the face of increasing criticism, President Calderón admitted that "the deployment and presence of the Army and Federal Police is not enough" to stop the violence in Ciudad Juárez, and he promised to launch new social initiatives aimed to lower crime through "an integral strategy of social recomposition, prevention and treatment for addictions, a search for opportunities for employment and recreation and education for youth."

Last Thursday, President Calderón visited Ciudad Juárez to meet with some of the slain teens' families and face the criticisms that have resulted from the recent events. In the presence of angry protesters holding signs demanding his resignation, Calderón again admitted that the strategy must change, again promised new social initiatives for the city, and recognized a need for better coordination between the different levels and institutions of the government. "If those deaths... mean anything it is that we need to change after that absurd sacrifice," Calderón told Ciudad Juárez residents.

The new social initiatives, however, will not replace the military strategy. President Calderón insisted that "The violence (in Ciudad Juarez) is not due to the presence of federal forces.... The presence of the federal forces is due to the violence that was and still is there."

Over the weekend, 2,000 federal police were deployed to Ciudad Juárez to strengthen the soldiers already in the city and 500 additional agents will soon be deployed to focus on improving intelligence and dismantling the financial structures used by the cartels.

The social part of the new initiative, revealed yesterday with the name "Todos Somos Juárez, Reconstruyamos Nuestra Ciudad" ("We are all Juárez, We will rebuild our city"), includes an initial investment of $600 million pesos (about $46.5 million U.S. dollars) intended to "restore the social fabric" of the city. According to Mexico's El Universal, plans include allocating around $280 million pesos ($21.7 million USD) to education programs and the construction of new parks and schools, and around $360 million pesos ($28.9 million USD) for the renovation of hospitals and the construction of drug rehabilitation centers, anti-drug centers aimed at youth, and psychological help centers for residents experiencing trauma as a result of the violence in the city.

Some analysts claim the new plan is too little too late, comparing the announced initiatives to a doctor telling a lung cancer patient that he should stop smoking. Others say the social initiatives are misguided: that Ciudad Juárez does not need health and education programs, but instead needs to tackle deeper social problems such as hunger, victims of violence, and the city's growing population of orphans.

January 2010 has already been cited as one of Mexico's most violent months in recent years, with 933 organized crime-related deaths. When the United States implemented the Mérida Initiative in 2008 to help Mexico fight organized crime and narcotrafficking, groups including CIP, Amnesty International, LAWG and WOLA, warned that a militarized approach would not solve Mexico's problems, nor would it stop drugs from entering the United States. Instead, strengthening Mexico's police force and judicial system, addressing the military's human rights violations, and focusing on social initiatives were offered as viable programs.

The Calderón administration appears finally to be admitting that the militarized approach on its own has not worked. The recent events in Mexico can be viewed as an opportunity to reevaluate the war on drugs not only in Mexico, but throughout Latin America and the Caribbean.

The Obama administration's Fiscal Year 2011 foreign aid request, submitted to Congress earlier this week, includes a new counternarcotics and security initiative: the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative (CBSI).

Here is what we know about the CBSI so far:

• It is a "multiyear, multifaceted effort by the U.S. Government and Caribbean partners to develop a joint regional citizen safety strategy to tackle the full range of security and criminal threats to the Caribbean Basin," according to the Obama administration's FY2011 foreign aid request. The International Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement (INL) Program and Budget Guide for FY2010 says the initiative will be a 5-year program. (Download the Program and Budget Guide here)
• Developing the CBSI "became a priority as the Mérida Initiative began yielding positive results in Mexico and Central America, making the Caribbean an increasingly attractive transit zone for transnational organized criminals, terrorists and illicit traffickers."
• The CBSI was first announced by President Obama at the Summit of the Americas in April 2009.
• Fifteen countries of the Caribbean Basin are included in the CBSI: Antigua and Barbuda, The Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, St. Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago.
• Funding for the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative will come out of the Development Assistance, Economic Support Fund, International Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement, and Foreign Military Financing accounts. So far, the CBSI budget for FY2010 and FY2011 looks like this:
• In the FY2010 Foreign Operations Appropriations bill, Congress appropriated "not less than $37 million" for the initiative "to provide equipment and training to combat drug trafficking and related violence and organized crime, and for judicial reform, institution building, education, anti-corruption, rule of law activities, and maritime security." Congress specifies that at least $21.1 million of that amount should be used for social justice and education programs.
• For FY2010, the INL Program and Budget Guide allocates $6,365,000 for the initiative, which comes from the International Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement accounts. The FY2010 allocation is described as "an investment" in anticipation of the program's official launch in FY2011. This INL funding is broken down into $715,000 for "Caribbean Training and Logistical Team Support," $2,325,000 for combating money laundering, and $3,325,000 for legislative function and process programs. (More details about the program from the Program and Budget Guide can be found here.)
• The Obama administration's FY2011 foreign aid request allocates just under $73 million in both military and economic aid to the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative: $37,463,000 for INL, $18,160,000 for Foreign Military Financing, and $17,000,000 for the Economic Support Fund.
• The FY2010 Foreign Operations Appropriations bill requires the Secretary of State to submit a spending plan for the initiative to the Committees on Appropriations by January 29, 2010. The report includes a "detailed plan for funds appropriated or otherwise made available for the countries of the Caribbean Basin by this Act, with concrete goals, actions to be taken, budget proposals, and anticipated results."
• The CBSI will eventually include a U.S. vessel, with an international crew, deployed to the region. The INL Program and Budget Guide reads:
  

  Caribbean Training and Logistical Support Teams will provide a platform for leading U.S. engagement and support for maritime interdiction in the Caribbean. Teams will deploy to the region to provide training, logistical and maintenance support. The primary goal for these teams is to provide onsite support until a U.S. vessel, with an international crew, can be deployed to provide those services. That vessel will foster international cooperation by offering the opportunity for a diverse, international and joint/interagency crew to work together and support all of the cooperating countries in the Caribbean. The Caribbean support vessel will deliver a total support package including a mobile professional training program and maintenance team with potential for shops, tools, technicians, and limited onboard classroom/berthing/messing for students. Additionally, it may provide a centralized supply source for standard spare parts, turn-in items, etc., and will have the capability to deliver cargo.

• The U.S. House Committee on Foreign Affairs held a hearing on the CBSI in early December 2009. The transcript of the hearing can be downloaded as a PDF here. Written testimonies by each of the witnesses and a webcast are also available online.

  During his opening remarks, Congressman Eliot Engel (D-NY) said:

  I also believe that we need to take a holistic view of the entire region when we begin implementing CBSI. I am very concerned that if we do not act quickly to bolster our friends in the Caribbean, the positive impact of the Merida Initiative in Mexico and Central America will push the drug trade further into the Caribbean and increase the already alarming rates of violence.
  ...
  CBSI was announced at the Summit last April, there have been three meetings held on this initiative. Initial U.S.-Caribbean meetings were held in Suriname, Barbados, and the Dominican Republic in 2009, and a ministerial meeting is expected to take place in Washington in early 2010 at which a political declaration, action plan, and framework for the CBSI will be adopted.

Every year, the U.S. Department of State submits a report to Congress with its detailed budget request for International Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement (INCLE) assistance. This program is the largest source of military and police assistance to Latin America and the Caribbean, and during the past decade has funded programs like Plan Colombia, the Andean Counterdrug Initiative, the Mérida Initiative for both Mexico and Central America, and the recently approved Caribbean Basin Security Initiative, which is an extension of the Mérida Initiative programs in the Caribbean region.

This report, known as the "Program and Budget Guide," is usually made public around September. It provides Congress with more detail about its INCLE budget request for the next fiscal year, and gives detail about how the assistance was spent during the past two years. It was only recently uploaded to the State Department website. (Download the FY2010 Program and Budget Guide)

Information from the FY2010 INCLE Program and Budget Guide relevant to Latin America is now on the Just the Facts database (see country totals here, click on a country for more details on how the assistance was allocated) and a few trends are worth noting, especially with regard to Colombia. As seen in the graph below, INCLE military and police assistance to Colombia has decreased significantly since 2007, when assistance reached almost $400 million, to $209 million budgeted for Fiscal Year 2010, of which Congress approved just under $200 million when it passed the foreign aid budget bill last month.

The decline in INCLE military assistance to Colombia owes mainly to the Democratic Party's takeover of the majority in Congress after the November 2006 legislative elections. Beginning in early 2007, as it considered the 2008 budget, the new leadership sought to reduce the overwhelmingly military emphasis of the program in Colombia, which relied heavily on forced aerial eradication of coca, and to place a greater priority on economic development, humanitarian aid and judicial reform.

The decline in INCLE military aid to Colombia can especially be seen in the decline in funding for both coca eradication and aviation support. INCLE's aviation support for the Colombian Army and National Police includes aviation maintenance and logistics support for the dozens of helicopters and planes used by the Colombian Army and Police. In 2005, INCLE allocated over $195 million to the Colombian Army and National Police for aviation support, while in 2010 the amount budgeted for both programs is $91 million, of which Congress approved $85 million.

Similarly, the funding for coca eradication for the Colombian National Police in 2005 was $82.5 million, compared to $60 million requested for 2010, of which Congress approved $53 million.

In 2007, President George W. Bush announced the Mérida Initiative, a 3-year, $1.4 billion program, most of it military and police assistance, to help Mexico and Central America fight organized crime and narcotrafficking. Congress first appropriated funds to the Mérida Initiative in the Fiscal Year 2008 supplemental appropriations bill, and have since appropriated nearly $1.3 billion for the initiative.

The U.S. Government Accountability Office, a branch of the U.S. Congress that audits and evaluates government policies, released a report (pdf) Thursday finding that as of September 30, 2009, only 2% of funds ($26 million) allocated to the Mérida Initiative since 2008 had been actually delivered. The report attributes the delay to three factors: "(1) statutory conditions on the funds, (2) challenges in fulfilling administrative procedures, and (3) the need to enhance institutional capacity on the part of both recipient countries and the United States to implement the assistance."

Interestingly, in 2003, the GAO released a similar report on the status of assistance appropriated to Colombia under Plan Colombia from 2000-2003 (pdf). The report only covered the allocation of assistance appropriated in 2000 to the Colombian Army, much of which had been delivered by June 2003, though it highlights similar financial and management challenges.

The most clear comparison between the two reports is the delay in delivering the helicopters provided under the two U.S.-funded programs. In the report on the Mérida Initiative, the time it takes for administrative procedures to be carried out, especially for the delivery of helicopters, was an important factor in slow delivery of Mérida assistance. The report cites one State Department official, who explains that "it typically takes between 3 to 6 months to negotiate and sign a contract for the provision of aircraft." Once the contract has been signed, it then takes another 12 to 18 months for a helicopter to be built, and 18-24 months for an airplane. Therefore, it would take anywhere from 15-24 months for a helicopter to be delivered. The report does say that the State Department expects five Bell helicopters to be delivered to Mexico sometime this month as a result of an attempt to expedite the process. Though it is noted that "the time lapse between funds being appropriated and a deliverable on the ground will still be about 18 months."

The earlier report on Plan Colombia noted an even longer lag in the delivery of helicopters. President Bill Clinton signed the Plan Colombia appropriation into law in July 2000, yet the first Black Hawk helicopters were delivered between July and December 2001 and not operational until November 2002 "because of a shortage of fully qualified Colombian Army pilots." 25 UH-II helicopters were also to be delivered between November 2001 and June 2002, however, "they were delivered between March and November 2002 instead because the Colombian military was considering whether to use a more powerful engine in the helicopters than the one usually installed." Those helicopters were not operational until June 2003, again due to a lack of qualified pilots. The Colombian Army did not have the operational helicopters promised under Plan Colombia for almost two and a half years - a long delay that makes the 18 month lag in delivering helicopters to Mexico look like an improvement, though the problem with training could arise as it did in Colombia.

Both reports also mentioned human rights conditions and a lack of institutional capacity as factors in the delay of aid delivery under these two prominent counternarcotics initiatives.

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimel recently released its annual reports on Coca Cultivation in the Andean Region - namely in Peru, Colombia, and Bolivia. This year's surveys, which provide data for 2008 levels of coca cultivation, eradication and seizures, show that the number of hectares in cultivation of coca in Colombia decreased by 18% from 2007-2008, while cultivation in Peru increased by 4.5% and cultivation in Bolivia increased by 6%. Colombia's large decrease in coca cultivation in 2008 follows a substantial increase (27%) in production from 2006-2007, while Peru and Bolivia have both been experiencing a slow but steady climb in coca cultivation over the past few years.

UNODC contends that, since many of Colombia’s remaining coca fields are recently planted, its estimate of tons of cocaine produced in Colombia fell even more sharply, from 600 to 430 tons. As a result, Colombia's percentage share of cocaine in the world market decreased from 60% in 2007 to 51% in 2008. Peru's and Bolivia's shares have both increased as a result of Colombia's decline, resulting in Peru contributing to 36% of world production (up from 29% in 2007) and Bolivia contributing to 13% of world production.

Seizures of cocaine in the three countries have also increased significantly since 2007, with Colombia reporting a 57% increase, Peru a 100% increase and Bolivia a 148% increase.

The increases in the number of hectares under cultivation with coca in Peru and Bolivia could be attributed to failed domestic policies (drug-war hardliners have argued that Bolivia's policies on coca cultivation, which allow 12,000 hectares of cultivation – and, in fact, tolerate a bit more – solely for medicinal and local use, are to blame for Bolivia's increase). However, another contributing factor could be the "balloon effect," a theory that argues that as long as demand is strong, coca cultivation will merely be pushed into new areas as it is squeezed out of existing coca cultivating areas. Therefore, as Colombia more aggressively eradicates coca plants and seizes cocaine and coca paste, the production of coca and cocaine will merely be pushed elsewhere in the Andes.

In support of the "balloon effect" theory, the table above indicates that since 1998, the total coca cultivation in the Andean region has not changed significantly - with 191,000 hectares in cultivation in 1998 compared to 167,600 hectares in 2008, even though cultivation in Colombia has decreased almost 50% since the beginning of Plan Colombia in 1999. Also, the graph below, which shows coca cultivation in the Andean Region since 1988, exemplifies this balloon effect phenomenon. From 1988-1997 Peru was the number one coca cultivator in the region, after which the cultivation of coca moved more prominently into Colombia, leaving this country in the number one spot until today. However, as shown by the graph, Peru is once again starting to catch up with Colombia.

Last week, the Government of El Salvador extended its agreement with the United States to allow U.S. anti-narcotics aircraft to operate out of the Salvadoran Air Force base at Comalapa for five more years. Since March 2000, the United States has used the Comalapa Air Force base as a Forward Operating Location (FOL) - the same arrangement as the Manta Air Base in Ecuador, which U.S. personnel will be vacating by November - to "allow interdiction aircraft to be forward deployed closer to drug routes in the region," according to the U.S. Embassy in El Salvador. The original agreement was set to expire in 2010.

The timing of the renewed agreement coincides with the approaching end of President Tony Saca's term on May 31. Saca, from the center-right ARENA party, is an ardent supporter of U.S.-Salvadoran military collaboration. However, in June of last year, President-elect Mauricio Funes, from the left-of-center FMLN opposition party, announced that he would guarantee the continuation of the Comalapa Forward Operating Location, contradicting the FMLN's traditional stance against the FOL residing on Salvadoran territory.

Despite Funes' previous announcement, the U.S. government likely hoped to extend the agreement before his inauguration just in case his position changes once he and the FMLN assume power in June. Though Funes has pledged to work closely with the United States, his political party began life as an insurgency that, during the 1980s, the U.S. government spent hundreds of millions of dollars arming the Salvadoran military in an effort to defeat. If relations should sour and Funes's position on the Comalapa facility should change, U.S. officials no doubt calculated, they would be left with only one formal Forward Operating Location, in the Netherland Antilles, after Manta closes. Colombia has, however, agreed to accommodate the U.S. planes and crews that will be vacating Manta.

Today, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, the Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy presented its main findings on the limits and unwanted effects of the 'war on drugs' in Latin America over the past 30 years. The Commission was headed by former Presidents Fernando Henrique Cardoso (Brazil), César Gaviria (Colombia), and Ernesto Zedillo (Mexico) and includes 17 independent members.

According to today's declaration, the anti-drug strategy pursued in the region over the past 30 years has failed and the situation is "growing worse by the day." The Commission argues that it is time to move away from the "prohibitionist policies" of the past and the "criminalization of consumption" and move toward "safer, more efficient and humane drug policies."

The proposals presented in the written statement, entitled "Drugs and Democracy: Toward a Paradigm Shift", are based on three main guidelines: treat drug use as a matter of public health; reduce drug consumption through information, education and prevention; and focus repression on organized crime.

In terms of the current U.S. anti-drug strategy in Colombia, the Commission states that it "is a clear example of the shortcomings of the repressive policies promoted at the global level by the United States.... [Therefore,] the traumatic Colombian experience is a useful reference for countries not to make the mistake of adopting the US prohibitionist policies and to move forward in the search for innovative alternatives." As a result, the Commission suggests that Mexico "ask the government and institutions of American society to engage in a dialogue about the policies currently pursued by the US as well as to call upon the countries of the European Union to undertake a greater effort aimed at reducing domestic drug consumption. "

The Commission proposes five initiatives for Latin American countries to adopt in order to reframe the policies for fighting the use of illicit drugs. These include:
1. Changing the status of addicts from drug buyers in the illegal market to patients cared for in the public health system;
2. Evaluate the convenience of decriminalizing the possession of cannabis for personal use;
3. Reduce consumption through information and prevention campaigns, such as those used to reduce tobacco use;
4. Redirect repressive strategies to focus on the fight against organized crime and the harmful effects that come with it such as money laundering, corruption and arms trafficking;
5. Reframe the strategies of repression against the cultivation of illicit drugs, in which eradication should be combined with alternative development programs.

The full declaration made by the Commission today can be found on the Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy website.

Visitors to the site occasionally ask us why the aid numbers presented here - sometimes including old numbers from past years - change from time to time. The changes are usually not drastic, a few million dollars here or there, but can be frustrating for people seeking to cite definitive numbers, for instance for publications.

The answer is simple, though frustrating. The "Just the Facts" website cites only official written sources, but the sources themselves are often inconsistent. This is especially true for the Defense Department's reporting of its own aid programs. Whether because of poor record-keeping or because of confusion about which expenditures constitute "aid" instead of "operational costs," two documents from the same government department can report different amounts of assistance to the same country, in the same program, in the same year.

When this happens, we cite the more recent of the two documents, which we consider to have superseded the first one. However, if the older document describes activities that are not mentioned in the newer document, we include those activities in our new aid estimates as well.

The most recent example is in a report we obtained last week: the Defense Department's first-ever country-by-country report on all of its overseas military assistance. The report (PDF) was required by Section 1209 of the 2008 National Defense Authorization Act. It is a major step forward for transparency over several military aid programs for which it was very difficult to obtain country-by-country data before.

One of those hard-to-track Defense Department programs is the Pentagon's authority to provide counter-drug assistance, known by the user-unfriendly name "Section 1004" after the provision in the 1991 Defense Authorization law that first created it. "Section 1004" is the second-largest source of military and police aid funding for Latin America and the Caribbean, but it has been consistently difficult for us to obtain an annual accounting of aid through this program.

This year, however, is different. We have information about "Section 1004" aid in 2007 from two different Defense Department sources:

(1) an April 2008 response to a Freedom of Information Act request from a U.S. non-governemntal organization, the Fellowship of Reconciliation (this document is not posted to our website); and

(2) The "Section 1209" report (PDF), which was required by Congress in July 2008, dated August 2008, and obtained by us in December 2008.

The two documents' accounting of "Section 1004" aid is very similar. Aid categories are almost identical, though many are cryptic and require a Google search to decipher. (Example: "CNIES" = "Cooperating Nations Information Exchange System.") But the two sources' aid numbers rarely match, and a few categories appear in one but not the other.

Consider this comparison of both sources' accounting of "Section 1004" aid to Colombia in 2007, which is typical:

In the end, the August source yields a total for Colombia that is $2.6 million higher (2 percent) than the April source. If we include aid categories that appear in April but not August in our final estimate, as we do on our page for Section 1004 aid to Colombia in 2007, we get a total of $112,046,000, or $4.7 million higher (4 percent).

Similar discrepancies appear in both reports' estimates of aid to the majority of countries in Latin America and the Caribbean.

This is a common issue. Because it happens frequently, we recommend checking "Just the Facts" when citing aid numbers to ensure that you are using the latest official estimates. And we recommend that the Department of Defense and the congressional oversight committees place a higher priority on reporting. As things stand now, reports give the distinct impression that the federal government does not know quite how much it is spending on overseas military and police aid.

Download:(PDF, 3.78 MB) A Compass for Colombia Policy (PDF, 3.95 MB) Un nuevo rumbo para la política estadounidense hacia Colombia

October 22, 2008

New Report Outlines a Just and Effective Foreign Policy toward Colombia

(English PDF, 3.78 MB) | (PDF en español, 3.95 MB).

During their final presidential debate, Senators Barack Obama and John McCain expressed markedly different opinions on U.S. policy toward Colombia, an important partner in Latin America. Yet the next U.S. president won’t just be debating policy, he will be making it—and in the case of Colombia, he will need more than minor changes along the margins. He will need a new approach.

The Compass for Colombia Policy, written by some of Washington’s top Colombia experts, offers a better way forward for one of the main foreign policy challenges that the next administration will face. This report makes a detailed, persuasive case for a new U.S. strategy that would achieve our current policy goals while ending impunity and strengthening respect for human rights. Instead of risking all by placing too much faith in a single, charismatic leader, the United States must appeal to the aspirations and needs of all Colombians by strengthening democratic institutions, such as the judiciary. In particular, the United States must stand by and empower the human rights advocates, victims, judges, prosecutors, union leaders, journalists and others who are the driving forces towards a more just and peaceful Colombia.

The Compass details seven sensible steps policymakers can take to create a just and effective Colombia policy.

1. Use U.S. Aid and Leverage for Human Rights and the Rule of Law

To address a human rights crisis that continues unabated and a chronic lack of political will to deal with it, the United States must use tougher diplomacy to encourage the Colombian government to strengthen human rights guarantees, protect human rights defenders, and bolster institutions needed to break with a history of impunity for abuses. Colombia’s judicial system is central to the rule of law and must receive strong support.

2. Actively Support Overtures for Peace

The United States cannot continue to bankroll a war without end and, as the civilian population in the countryside continues to endure immense suffering, should make peace a priority.

3. Support Expansion of the Government’s Civilian Presence in the Countryside

Militarily occupying territory is not the solution to Colombia’s problems. The United States should help Colombia strengthen its civilian government presence in rural zones to address lawlessness, poverty and inequality, the roots of the conflict.

4. Protect the Rights of Internally Displaced Persons and Refugees

The United States can help resolve Colombia’s massive humanitarian crisis by insisting on the dismantlement of paramilitary structures, supporting Colombia’s Constitutional Court rulings on IDPs, and increasing and improving aid to IDPs and refugees.

5. Protect the Rights of Afro-Colombian and Indigenous Communities

The United States must pay special attention to promoting ethnic minorities’ land rights and guarantee that U.S. aid projects are not carried out on land obtained by violence.

6. Ensure that Trade Policy Supports, Not Undermines, Policy Goals towards Colombia

The United States should insist upon labor rights advances, especially in reducing and prosecuting violence against trade unionists, prior to further consideration of the trade agreement. The United States must ensure that any trade agreement will not undermine U.S. policy goals, such as reducing farmers’ dependence on coca and ending the conflict.

7. Get Serious—and Smart—about Drug Policy

The United States is overdue for a major course correction in its drug control strategy, which has failed spectacularly in Colombia and the Andean region. The United States should end the inhumane and counterproductive aerial spraying program and invest seriously in rural development, including alternative development designed with affected communities. Drug enforcement should focus higher up on the distribution chain, disrupt money laundering schemes and apprehend violent traffickers. Access to high-quality drug treatment in the United States, which will cut demand, must be the centerpiece of U.S. drug policy.

“The next administration should use diplomatic pressure to hold Colombia to much higher standards on human rights, labor rights, and protection of the rule of law.”–Lisa Haugaard, Latin America Working Group Education Fund

“The United States must recognize the magnitude of the human rights crisis for Afro-Colombian and indigenous communities in Colombia, in which hundreds of thousands of people have lost their lands and livelihoods to violence.” –Gimena Sánchez-Garzoli, Washington Office on Latin America

“Nine years after the launch of Plan Colombia, the production of cocaine remains virtually unchanged. The United States simply cannot afford to continue to pursue this costly and failed counternarcotics policy. The next President must change course.” –Adam Isacson, Center for International Policy

“In the last decade, Colombia’s conflict has taken 20,000 more lives and displaced more than 2 million citizens. Now is the time to make renewed efforts for peace.” –Kelly Nicholls, U.S. Office on Colombia

For more information:
Lisa Haugaard, Latin America Working Group Education Fund, (202) 546-7010; lisah [at] lawg.org
Gimena Sánchez-Garzoli, Washington Office on Latin America, (202) 797-2171; gsanchez [at] wola.org
Adam Isacson, Center for International Policy, (202) 232-3317; isacson [at] ciponline.org
Kelly Nicholls, US Office on Colombia, (202) 232-8090; kelly [at] usofficeoncolombia.org