Bolivian cops battle coca growers, killing 2
LA PAZ, Bolivia
11 policemen briefly seized in outlying region
Police killed two coca farmers and injured a third Friday in Bolivia's first violent confrontation over coca eradication since President Evo Morales, himself a former coca grower, was elected last year.
An estimate 200 coca growers in the Chapare region ambushed a team of police sent to destroy their crop, planted illegally inside the borders of a national park 220 southeast of the capital of La Paz.
The growers took 11 policeman hostage but released them later in the afternoon, many with "multiple contusions to the head," said Col. Rene Salazar, commander of Bolivia's anti-narcotics forces in the Chapare.
However, the coca growers have refused to surrender the kidnapped policemen's guns, officials said.
Two injured policemen and the injured coca farmer were airlifted from the scene in U.S. helicopters to a hospital in the eastern city of Santa Cruz, where they were in stable condition Friday afternoon.
The U.S. Embassy in La Paz dispatched the helicopters upon hearing news of the clash. The U.S. has backed Bolivia's eradication programs with both money and equipment since the 1980s.
Government officials blamed the violence on a "planned and premeditated" attack by drug traffickers.
"The deaths of these two citizens are the product of an ambush by drug traffickers," said Government Minister Alicia Muñoz. "They are victims of the drug trade."
After his inauguration in January, Morales enacted a voluntary eradication program aimed at controlling the plant's production "without one death, without one injury."
Bolivian government officials say past U.S.-sponsored efforts to reduce coca by force have resulted in deaths of some 400 coca farmers over the years.
On Friday, Hilder Sejas, spokesman for the Vice Ministry of Social Defense which is in charge of coca eradication, said the deadly clash was the first since Morales took power.
"And we hope that it will be the last," he said. "The policy of this government is clear: Everything by consensus, and nothing by force."
Coca, the principal ingredient in cocaine, is commonly brewed in tea or chewed as a mild natural stimulant in Bolivia.
Alongside the plant's wide legal use here, Bolivia also is the world's third-largest cocaine producer behind Colombia and Peru, according to U.S. estimates.
Recent U.S. surveys based on satellite images place current production at somewhere near 60,500 acres. Morales' government has so far eradicated some 8,900 acres of illegal coca and is on pace to meet a U.S. requirement to destroy 12,500 acres by year's end, Sejas said.
11 policemen briefly seized in outlying region
Police killed two coca farmers and injured a third Friday in Bolivia's first violent confrontation over coca eradication since President Evo Morales, himself a former coca grower, was elected last year.
An estimate 200 coca growers in the Chapare region ambushed a team of police sent to destroy their crop, planted illegally inside the borders of a national park 220 southeast of the capital of La Paz.
The growers took 11 policeman hostage but released them later in the afternoon, many with "multiple contusions to the head," said Col. Rene Salazar, commander of Bolivia's anti-narcotics forces in the Chapare.
However, the coca growers have refused to surrender the kidnapped policemen's guns, officials said.
Two injured policemen and the injured coca farmer were airlifted from the scene in U.S. helicopters to a hospital in the eastern city of Santa Cruz, where they were in stable condition Friday afternoon.
The U.S. Embassy in La Paz dispatched the helicopters upon hearing news of the clash. The U.S. has backed Bolivia's eradication programs with both money and equipment since the 1980s.
Government officials blamed the violence on a "planned and premeditated" attack by drug traffickers.
"The deaths of these two citizens are the product of an ambush by drug traffickers," said Government Minister Alicia Muñoz. "They are victims of the drug trade."
After his inauguration in January, Morales enacted a voluntary eradication program aimed at controlling the plant's production "without one death, without one injury."
Bolivian government officials say past U.S.-sponsored efforts to reduce coca by force have resulted in deaths of some 400 coca farmers over the years.
On Friday, Hilder Sejas, spokesman for the Vice Ministry of Social Defense which is in charge of coca eradication, said the deadly clash was the first since Morales took power.
"And we hope that it will be the last," he said. "The policy of this government is clear: Everything by consensus, and nothing by force."
Coca, the principal ingredient in cocaine, is commonly brewed in tea or chewed as a mild natural stimulant in Bolivia.
Alongside the plant's wide legal use here, Bolivia also is the world's third-largest cocaine producer behind Colombia and Peru, according to U.S. estimates.
Recent U.S. surveys based on satellite images place current production at somewhere near 60,500 acres. Morales' government has so far eradicated some 8,900 acres of illegal coca and is on pace to meet a U.S. requirement to destroy 12,500 acres by year's end, Sejas said.
posted by Alice at
Saturday, September 30, 2006
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