Program description | Budget

Program description:

The 1999 Congressional Presentation for the State Department's International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs Bureau (INL) lists three objectives for narcotics control efforts in Venezuela:

• Improve the Government of Venezuela's (GOV) institutional capabilities to interdict drug shipments transiting Venezuela, reduce money laundering and conduct effective drug investigations;
• Institutionalize the GOV'S ability to identify and destroy illicit coca and poppy cultivation primarily in the Sierra de Perija region near the Colombian border; and
• Encourage the GOV to implement its National Drug Control Plan which includes a comprehensive and integrated framework for Venezuelan law enforcement and military organizations.¹

The small Venezuela INC program trains and equips Venezuelan law-enforcement agencies to improve information sharing and interdiction efforts. The program's activities include "a narcotics crop control project designed to identify and destroy illicit narcotics cultivation and to institutionalize such efforts, and training in forensics and advanced chemical analysis to National Guard (GN) laboratory specialists."² The program also supports the placement of drug detector dogs at ports of entry.

In October 1997, the United States and Venezuela signed and agreement to establish a Joint Information Coordination Center (JICC) to exchange drug-related intelligence between all government agencies working on counternarcotics. "This agreement lays the groundwork for information exchange through secure computer links with DEA's [the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's] El Paso Intelligence Center (EPIC)."³

The INC program is not the largest source of U.S. counternarcotics aid to Venezuela, and provides very little to Venezuela's security forces. More grant assistance has arrived through weapons drawdowns and Defense Department funding authorized by section 1004 of the 1991 defense authorization law.

Budget:

(Thousands of U.S. dollars)

Sources:

¹ United States, Department of State, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, Fiscal Year 1999 Budget Congressional Presentation (Washington: Department of State: March 1998): 61.

² Department of State, Fiscal Year 1999 Budget Congressional Presentation 61-2.

³ United States, Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, Department of State, International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, Washington, March 1998, March 2, 1998 <http://www.state.gov/www/global/narcotics_law/1997_narc_report/index.html>.

⁴ United States, Department of State, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, Fiscal Year 1998 Budget Congressional Presentation (Washington: Department of State: March 1997): 57.

⁵ Department of State, Fiscal Year 1999 Budget Congressional Presentation 64.

⁶ United States, Department of State, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, Fiscal Year 2000 Budget Congressional Presentation (Washington: Department of State: March 1999): 50.

⁷ United States, Department of State, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, Fiscal Year 2001 Budget Congressional Presentation (Washington: Department of State: March 2000): 62.