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24 March 2004

U.S. Seizes $264 Million Worth of Cocaine off Latin America's Coast

Cocaine seized near Galapagos Islands, Acapulco, Mexico

By Eric Green
Washington File Staff Writer

Washington -- The U.S. Coast Guard has seized about 12,000 kilograms (29,000 pounds) of cocaine worth an estimated street value of more than $264 million from fishing boats off the coast of Latin America.

The Coast Guard said in a March 23 statement that it seized the cocaine from fishing boats off the coast of the Galapagos Islands, which are owned by Ecuador, and from a boat off the coast of Acapulco, Mexico. The Coast Guard said 24 suspected drug smugglers had been arrested in the operation.

The 12,000 kilograms of cocaine were seized by the Coast Guard cutter (vessel) Midgett while on patrol in the waters of the eastern Pacific Ocean off Latin America. The Coast Guard said it was the most cocaine ever seized by one of its cutters on a single patrol.

The Coast Guard said the Midgett has a crew of 167 that performs homeland security, law enforcement, search and rescue, and national defense missions to protect U.S. interests at sea.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) says Colombian drug-trafficking organizations increasingly have relied upon the eastern Pacific Ocean as a trafficking route to move cocaine to the United States.

The DEA said law enforcement and intelligence community sources estimate that 65 percent of the cocaine shipped to the United States moves through the Central America-Mexico corridor, primarily by vessels operating in the eastern Pacific. Colombian traffickers use fishing vessels to transport bulk shipments of cocaine from Colombia to the west coast of Mexico and, to a lesser extent, to Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, the DEA said.

The U.S. State Department said in its International Narcotics Control Strategy Report for 2003 that drug traffickers transport most cocaine to Mexico by sea for smuggling over land to the United States. Ocean-going vessels plying routes in the Gulf of California reportedly move large quantities close to the U.S. border, while "go-fast" vessels in the eastern Pacific deliver 1-2 metric tons loads of illegal drugs to coastal areas between Guatemala and the Mexican state of Guerrero on the Pacific Coast, the State Department said in its report, issued March 1.

(The Washington File is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)

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