Illegal coca plantations in Colombia last year reached record levels following a 17 percent increase from 2016 to about 171,000 hectares, the UN said on Wednesday.
The UN Office on Crime and Drugs (UNODC) said that translated to a potential 31 percent increase in cocaine production from last year to almost 1,270 tonnes.
Coca leaf is the primary ingredient in the production of cocaine and current plantations generate 33 percent more leaves than they did in 2012.
“I want to express my deep concern about the amount of money that is moving around illicit drugs,” UNODC representative to Colombia Bo Mathiasen told a news conference in Bogota.
Colombia remains way ahead of the rest of the world in terms of illegal coca plantations, while it is also the top producer of cocaine, much of it destined for the US, the biggest consumer of the white powder.
“The report presented today by the UNODC is really very worrying,” Colombian Minister of Justice Gloria Maria Borrero said.
The worst affected region is Narino on the border with Ecuador. On its own, Narino has more farmland dedicated to coca plantations than Peru, the country with the second-largest area of such fields, at almost 44,515 hectares.
Riddled with Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerrillas as well as drug trafficking gangs, Narino is one of the nation’s most dangerous regions.
The UNODC report said that the “potential production of cocaine has a value of [US]$2.7 billion in the local market” and warned that those proceeds “could undermine peacebuilding efforts, weaken the culture of lawfulness, strengthen armed groups and delegitimize democratic institutions through corruption and illicit financial flows.”
Colombia’s border regions with Ecuador to the southwest and Venezuela to the east and north east are the principle theaters of armed conflict between government forces and a combination of drug gangs and Marxist rebels.
Efforts to halt cocaine production are increasing.
Cocaine seizures last year increased by 20 percent to 395 tonnes, while 4,820 laboratories were destroyed, up 12 percent.
However, the UNODC said that those figures remained below the “increase in potential production” of cocaine.
Colombian President Ivan Duque, who was inaugurated on Aug. 7, has vowed to wipe out at least 141,640 hectares of coca plantations during his four-year mandate.
Duque has criticized his predecessor Juan Manuel Santos’ policy of encouraging the voluntary substitution of coca plantations through agreements with local farmers.
Santos’ government blamed the increase in drug culture on compromises made in negotiations with FARC rebels to sign a peace accord in 2016.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in