VOA News - US Senate Panel Warns of Increasing Drug Trafficking between West Africa and Europe

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US Senate Panel Warns of Increasing Drug Trafficking between West Africa and Europe

A subcommittee of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee heard testimony from experts on Tuesday, detailing the exploding drug trafficking problem in West Africa. According to the panel, West Africa has become a crucial transit point for cocaine from South America headed to customers in Europe, posing a major threat to political stability and security in West Africa and elsewhere. All of the experts testifying at the panel warned of a dangerous convergence in West Africa of South American drug kingpins looking to sell their cocaine, terrorist groups with bases in Africa and European buyers. The experts said cocaine is shipped from South America - often with Venezuela serving as a launching pad - broken down into smaller parcels when it arrives in Africa and transported by African "mules," or individual traffickers by land and air to thriving markets in Europe.

Note EU-Digest: On several occasions EU-Digest reported on this major problem and signaled that EU Governments and the European Parliament needed to take urgent action. So far there seems to have been no significant action on the part of European Governments or the EU-Parliament except for some ineffective general statements.

Washington Post: Guinea narcostate revealed in TV confessions - cocaine sent to Europe in the country's diplomatic pouch - by Rukmini Callimachi

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Guinea narcostate revealed in TV confessions - cocaine sent to Europe in the country's diplomatic pouch - by Rukmini Callimachi

As the people of Guinea sat transfixed before their TV sets, top government officials one after another confessed to their role in a lucrative international cocaine trade. Organized by a military junta that seized power three months ago, the confessions offer unprecedented insight into an exploding drug trade in West Africa, one that connects coca leaves grown in South American fields to cocaine users in European.

A recent United Nations report found that at least 46 tons of cocaine have been seized en route to Europe via West Africa since 2005, bringing profits that sometimes exceed the entire defense budgets of countries it passes through. Before that time, less than a ton a year was seized from the entire continent. "The vast majority of cocaine that is destined for Europe is now going through West Africa," said Michael Braun, who was the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency's operations chief when he retired in October. Note EU-Digest: Although there have been warnings about ongoing large drug shipments from South America via Africa to Europe for many months now, very little seems to be done on the European end of this criminal trade route. It is high time serious attention is given by the European political and judicial establishment to stop this exploding drug trade which has gotten totally out of hand.