By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jan 11 1996 (IPS)

The United States has shot down a Third World proposal for a U.N. summit to combat the illicit production and sale of narcotic drugs.

The Bill Clinton administration, which is seeking a moratorium on all U.N. conferences, says a summit meeting on drug trafficking cannot be justified, particularly as the United Nations is facing its worst financial crisis ever. Washington argues that the summit would be a drain on U.N. finances.

“Resources utilised for a major conference means less will be available for programmes at the field level,” Robert Gelbard, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs told U.N. delegates recently. “That money should be spent on fighting the problem, not talking about it.”

The proposed conference, the brainchild of Mexico, was also aimed at fighting narco-terrorism and money laundering. Patricia Espinosa of Mexico told IPS that her country had not given up on the idea, since the proposal is expected to be revived in April at the U.N. Commission on Narcotic Drugs in Vienna.

She said there was an urgent need to give the drug problem the highest political priority.

“We know we can hold a conference at minimum costs with the available facilities and infrastructure in Vienna,” she said.

A declaration adopted last October at a summit of the Non- Aligned Movement in Cartagena, Colombia also expresses support for an international conference to combat drugs.

But the United States says that the biggest challenge is to sustain high-level international commitment mainly to implement U.N. drug conventions.

“The U.N. Drug Control Programme must have the resources to help governments apply the comprehensive anti-drug tools that have been developed,” he said, pointing out that many U.N. states have yet to ratify and implement the most recent treaty — the 1988 U.N. drug convention.

The U.N. General Assembly agreed in a resolution adopted last month to seek advice on the proposed conference from the U.N. Commission on Narcotic Drugs. The proposal was co-sponsored by 60 of the 185 member-states which support the conference. The last International Conference on Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking was held in 1985.

Gelbard argued that even though Washington opposes the summit proposal, the United States had a particular obligation to deal with drug consumption.

In 1994, the United States spent about 12 billion dollars on drug control, of which 91 percent went towards demand reduction, treatment, and rehabilitation programmes.

Not only does the international narcotics trade threaten economic planning and growth, “It is a political threat,” Gelbard said. “Trafficker corruption and intimidation can destroy democratic institutions and their leaders.”

In order to help other states deal with criminal threats, the United States and Hungary have created the International Law Enforcement Academy in Budapest, primarily to train police officers and law enforcement officials from Central Europe and the states of the former Soviet Union.

Excerpt: