MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Bolivian President Mulls Legalizing Coca

The president of Bolivia is considering a plan to resume cultivation of the raw ingredient in cocaine in a remote jungle basin ? a move the U.S. government fears would undermine what is viewed as its most successful anti-drug program in South America.

President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada is studying a proposal to allow cultivation of coca in the Chapare region of central Bolivia to help calm unrest among growers who have blockaded major highways and put their support behind his political rival.

"We've begun serious dialogues with coca growers with the aim of combating drug trafficking and maintaining social tranquillity," Ernesto Justiniano, the vice minister of social defence, said in an interview with The Associated Press on Friday. Justiniano said the program would hurt drug traffickers by giving the government more control over what is now a clandestine industry in the jungle lowlands.

U.S. officials staunchly oppose the proposal to allow each grower in the area to plant one-fifth of an acre of coca, saying it would undermine the $1.3 billion effort to eradicate coca plantations from the region over the last six years.

"Our policy is very clear and it remains clear," said an official at the U.S. embassy who spoke only on condition his name not be used. "Any proposal that would legitimize or legalize any coca in the Chapare_which is illegal would be a violation of Bolivian law and a violation of international treaties to which Bolivia is a signatory."

U.S. officials have said the proposal could trigger a halt in aid from the United States and international lending agencies such as the International Monetary Fund to South America's poorest nation. It could also be used to exclude Bolivia from inclusion in a proposed hemispheric free-trade zone backed by Washington.

Bolivia's government plans to conduct a six-month study to determine the size of the nation's limited legal coca market, which is now restricted to some 30,000 acres to supply indigenous people who chew the leaves, which act as a stimulant and can stave off hunger.

American officials fear that enlarging the area allowed for legal cultivation would return Bolivia to the ranks of major cocaine producers.

All coca production in the Chapare_a jungle basin the size of New Jersey that supplied half of all cocaine in the world five years ago is illegal. The leaf has been eradicated by U.S.-trained soldiers who often engage in fire fights with coca farmers.

Despite U.S. opposition, analysts say Bolivia's government has little bargaining power with the coca growers, who stage frequent blockades along the nation's largest highway at a time when the Bolivia's government is struggling with an economic crisis that has provoked deadly riots.

A move to aid coca growers, who generally belong to the nation's strongest opposition group, could aid the president on the domestic front.

"Bolivia has suddenly been confronted by a unified burst of anger from movements on all sides," said Jim Shultz, executive director of the Democracy Center in Cochabamba, Bolivia's third largest city. "The president is weak and ready to give away the store."

If Bolivia were to alter its eradication policy, American officials said it would run the risk of losing part of an estimated $150 million annual aid package it receives from the U.S. Congress, and threaten its membership in the planned Free Trade Area of the Americas.

U.S. officials also warn Bolivia could again become a major part of the international drug circuit again. Once the world's largest supplier of the raw ingredient of cocaine, Bolivia is now an insignificant producer behind Colombia and Peru.

U.S. officials are also concerned that allowing more cultivation would encourage Socialist candidate Evo Morales, a former coca grower who narrowly lost last year's presidential election.

"One of the things that destabilized Bolivia in the past was a rampant, unfettered drug trade," the U.S. official said. "It would be a shame to turn around and go backwards."