US officials to fight drug trafficking in Caribbean

(Miami Herald): The US government’s anti-drug smuggling fight on the Mexican border has caused a “balloon effect” that is expected to spur more drug trafficking through the Caribbean, South Florida’s top federal official warned Thursday. Cocaine and other illegal drugs flooding the United States are still flowing mostly through a pipeline from Colombia to Mexico across the Southwest border. But the trend is expected to shift, US Attorney Wifredo Ferrer said. “We’re hitting them hard there,’’ Ferrer told reporters. “It’s only a matter of time before we see an increase here.’’  Ferrer highlighted the menacing trend to announce the “Caribbean Basin Initiative,’’ a plan to add two more federal prosecutors to his narcotics section.

They will work with federal agents to target the anticipated uptick.

The U.S attorney spoke about the development while unveiling an indictment charging 13 men with conspiring to transport hundreds of kilos of Colombian cocaine on U.S.-registered planes. The aircraft allegedly departed from Apure, a state in Venezuela, and dropped the loads into the ocean off the coast of the British Virgin Islands.

The smugglers used “go-fast’’ boats to retrieve the cocaine, which was allegedly destined for the United States, authorities said. But Drug Enforcement Administration agents seized most of it after the pick-ups.

Ferrer spotlighted the Caribbean Basin Initiative six months after announcing what he called a new front in the fight against Colombian traffickers.

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