Understanding the nature of drug trafficking threats to Regional Security in West Africa
Introduction
In less
than one and a half decades West Africa has become a major transit and repackaging
hub for cocaine and heroin flowing from the Latin American and Asian producing areas
to European markets. Drug trafficking is not new to the region; the phenomenon
rapidly expanded in the mid-2000s as a result of a
strategic shift of Latin American drug syndicates towards the rapidly growing
European market, leading UNODC to state in 2008 that ‘…the crisis of drug
trafficking … is gaining attention. Alarm bells are ringing …West Africa has
become a hub for cocaine trafficking. This is more than a drugs problem. It is
a serious security threat.
West
Africa presents an ideal choice as a logistical transit center for drug
traffickers: its geography makes detection difficult and facilitates transit;
the region boasts well-established networks of West African smugglers and crime
syndicates; and a vulnerable political environment creates opportunities for
operation. In some countries, civil wars, insurgency operations, and coups have
led to diminishing human capital, social infrastructure and productive national
development assets. They have also generated instability, with an increase in
the number of armed groups operating in the region and an increase in flows of
small arms and light weapons (SALW). Instability in the Middle East has also
seen flows of heavier weapons entering through the Sahel region. As in the case
of Mali, drug traffickers have often availed of this instability to further
their own interests. While violence on the scale of Latin American drug
trafficking is yet to manifest itself, the
potential for the drug trade to become a source of violent political
competition in some countries nonetheless exists.
More
recently and as reports on drug use in the region increase, experts have highlighted
the human security threats posed by drug trafficking, for which institutions
and policy makers are particularly ill prepared to respond to. One of the main
challenges lies in the fact that the predominant approach to drug trafficking
in the region to date has been based on the international narcotics control
regime which is centered on stemming the supply of drugs through law
enforcement efforts. Limited focus has been placed on the health and
developmental aspects of the spillover affects of drug trafficking, which over
time could constitute a greater security threat to West Africa than currently
acknowledged.
This
background paper examines the impact of drug trafficking on national and
regional security in West Africa. The first sections provide an overview of the
main security threats that drug trafficking is perceived to pose to states and
the sub-region, including the links between drug trafficking and terrorism.
Subsequently, the paper provides an overview of how the incidence of drug
trafficking and perceived threats are being articulated in policy circles; and the
nature of UN, AU and ECOWAS policy responses to drug trafficking and the
security threats it poses. In the final section, the paper identifies knowledge
gaps in the existing literature on drug trafficking in West Africa.
---
Over the past few
years, the UN Security Council has been periodically appraised of the growing
threat posed by drug trafficking in Africa and more recently, West Africa and
the Sahel Region. The latter has led to the adoption of several important UN
Security Council Presidential Statements (PRSTs) in which the UN
Secretary-General was urged to consider mainstreaming the issue of drug
trafficking as a factor in conflict prevention strategies, conflict analysis,
integrated missions’ assessment and planning and peacebuilding support. In
February 2012, the president of the Council issued a statement expressing
concern that transnational organized crime, including illicit weapons and drug
trafficking, piracy and armed robbery at sea, as well as terrorism and its
increasing links, in some cases, with transnational organized crime and drug
trafficking, pose a direct security threat to peace and stability in the
region. More recently, the Secretary-General’s July 2012 report on UNOWA
activity stated that the region continues to be a transit point for cocaine and
heroin and countries in the region are not prepared to deal with the related
rising consumption rates. The existence of trafficking routes through the Sahel
has also generated concern, because it remains outside the control of most
government forces, elevating the fear that insurgent and terrorist groups reap
the rewards of trafficking there.
Security threats posed by increased drug
consumption
The West African sub-region is no longer just a transit
route for hard drugs but also a final destination.[4]
The 2012 World Drug Report (WDR) highlights the association of drug
users with acquisitive crime as well as behavioral challenges including
aggression or violence. While the above revelations
question the nature, effectiveness and resilience of the existing legal and
institutional framework for responding to drug trafficking in West Africa, the
emerging drug consumption levels in the sub-region suggests the potential impact
of drugs on human security in West Africa.
Moreover,
in West Africa, policies towards drug users are centered predominantly on
punitive measures, with tough sentencing for first-time users. Limited steps
are taken to treat users while in prison, or support reintegration and
rehabilitation efforts upon release. According to the Global Commission on Drug
Policy, evidence has shown that repressive drug law enforcement practices can
drive users from accessing public health services, possibly pushing them into
environments with elevated risk for disease, including HIV. In this regard,
increasing voices are calling for treatment rather than imprisonment for drug
users.[5]
Conversely, treatment
for drug addiction across West Africa is generally under-resourced and
under-funded, with institutions ill prepared to deal with rising levels of
dependency, and potential spillovers such as increases in HIV-AIDS. Health
facilities across the region are either non-existent or under-equipped, and
staff are not trained to deal with the consequences of drug dependency. Indeed,
a dearth of specialized units and medical professionals hinders proper
treatment, and no West African country has apparently implemented systematic
reintegration schemes. Generally, a small number of people are treated
through hospital psychiatric wards or via international and national NGOs. However, human rights organizations
have critiqued many of the existing psychiatric facilities for overcrowding and
unsanitary conditions, and for their inhumane and degrading treatment of
patients. A recent AU Conference of Ministers of Drug Control stressed that
grouping drug users together with people having major psychiatric disorders
runs the risk of turning people off from seeking treatment and obfuscates the
specificity of care that drug addiction requires. In addition, in some
countries human capital is being affected by increasing levels of consumption.
For example, in Ghana, security officials have observed that many of the
locations where illicit drugs are used are either commercial or mining centers
where there is easy access to money either through legitimate work or robbery
to sustain the addiction habit.[6]
Combined, these issues pose a
significant human security threat to the region.
Threats
Posed by Prevalent Norms of Behavior that Facilitate Drug Trafficking in West
Africa
During a briefing to the United Nations Security Council
(UNSC) in July 2012, Mr. Yury Fedotov, Executive Director of the United
Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), expressed
concern about drugs and crime in West Africa. According to Fedetov, some 30
tons of cocaine and almost 400 kg of heroin were trafficked through West Africa
in 2011, and methamphetamine laboratories had been discovered in the
sub-region. The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) for
its part acknowledged that, ‘…drug trafficking is an enemy of the state and the
rule of law, existing as a parallel power that rivals the legal system and we
are compelled to fight it.[7]
Recent
seizures and arrests in several West African countries have shed light on how
the work of trafficking networks is facilitated by a range of actors, including
businessmen, politicians, members of the security forces and the judiciary,
clergymen, traditional leaders and youth.
In addition to the general physical
and social conditions in West Africa such as porous borders, weak institutions,
corruption and political patronage, poverty and ethnic identities, traffickers
easily connect with local leaders and are able to establish and operate
informal social networks, allowing them to avoid detection by the formal security
apparatus.[8] In
some cases, the formal security apparatus also provides cover for traffickers.
For
example, high level elected officials and security personnel were found to be
involved in a range of cocaine and heroin trafficking seizures in the late 2000s,
indicating that both formal and traditional governance and security systems of
many West African countries are at risk from international drug trafficking
cartels.[9]
<INSERT
TABLE – CK>
More
recently, five Ghanaian police officers were arrested in September 2012 for
their role in the transport of 1.5 tons of cannabis (valued at 4.3 million GBP)
to the United Kingdom.[10]
In other cases, drug trafficking incidents has served to bolster the legitimacy
of formal and traditional leaders involved in drug trafficking. The
reinvestment of drug-related proceeds in the community not only provides them
with significant social and political capital, but much needed support and
services in areas where the government has been markedly absent.[11]
The latter can be of particular incidence at the local level, where government
services and resources are limited and citizens seek to sustain themselves
through whatever means possible.
Another
of the main security threats arising from the growing incidence of drug
trafficking in the West Africa sub-region stems from the ability of criminal
networks and illicit funding to infiltrate security and government agencies,
transform or influence the motivations of its members, reorient objectives
towards the spoils of drug trafficking activity thus influencing questions of
state legitimacy and the legitimacy of democratic processes. The question of
who elected officials are beholden to – governments, electoral constituencies,
criminal organizations or even terrorist groups – is becoming increasingly
important, not least because an important threat posed by drug trafficking is
its ability to reshape relational dynamics between and among political and
security actors, the citizenry, and the business community within and beyond
borders.[12] The
infiltration and potential weakening of military, police, and customs and
border agencies by criminal organizations in countries across West Africa is a
real threat.
Many
of the conditions that facilitate drug trafficking in and through West Africa are
however, a lot more nuanced than habitually described. They tend to be rooted
in the nature of the states located in the region and the characteristics of
sub-state actors.[13]
For example, some accounts suggest that community leaders particularly in the Sahel
region of West Africa participate in the drug trade as a means to sustain their
livelihoods.[14] Other
accounts regarding the involvement of elected officials in Ghana and Sierra
Leone in the drug trade link their participation to development concerns as
well as systemic corruption and patronage systems.[15]
Meanwhile, an earlier profile of drug users in Ghana and (to a lesser extent)
Nigeria has highlighted class undertones.[16]
Other accounts in parts of Nigeria local participation in the drug trade as a
response to the perceived alienation of particular groups from official roles
of the state after the Biafra War of the late 1960s.[17]
The latter coincided with the economic down-turns of the 1980s following the
implementation of the International Monetary Fund (IMF)–sponsored Structural
Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) which ushered in a period of sustained
under-investment in key social and economic sectors, impoverishing individuals
and communities in many parts of Africa.[18] Hence,
for some, turning a blind eye on drugs transiting through Africa to Europe and
North America thus offered opportunities for West Africans to return a version
of hardships on citizens of Western countries (at least before it starting
impacting on African states).[19]
Another historical account proposes a triangular connection among ethnic groups
in West Africa with similar groups in South America from the period of the
slave trade.[20] That
same account links West African drug trafficking networks with other African
Diaspora communities in Europe, North and South America from as early as the
1980s when economic hardships and repressive political conditions in the
sub-region generated an exodus of West Africans to Western countries.
Properly
examined, a deeper understanding of these characteristics could help generate a
better appreciation of some of the reasons why West Africans participate in the
drug trade as a basis for the design of appropriate national, regional and
international policy responses to drug trafficking and drug use in West Africa.
Drug
Trafficking, Violence and Extremism in West Africa
Drug
trafficking in West Africa has not yet spurred significant levels of violence.
Most cases have hinged on corruption and bribery rather than violent coercive
methods. Where violence has existed, it has tended to erupt when government and
military officials are vying for access to drug-trafficking-related rents. For example, in Guinea-Bissau where
there has been a documented relationship between senior government and security
officials and drugs cartels, strong ties between political actors and criminal
groups have allegedly played into political and military upheaval. A series of
assassinations and arrests in 2009 and 2010, involving the army chief of staff
and the president, are believed to have direct links to struggles over control
of trafficking. At the time of the April 2012 coup, claims were made that the
president and vice-president were arrested because of their connections to drug
trafficking. On the other hand, the UN has observed an increase in trafficking
since the coup, suggesting that the situation seems to hinge on control of
trafficking, rather than stopping it.
0ver
the past couple of years, Northern Mali has also experienced drug-related
violence involving different groups operating in the region.[21]
Much of this violence appears to have stemmed from rivalries between different
groups involved in the drug trade, allegedly contributing to the instability
that led to the UN-backed French intervention in January 2013.[22]
There
is also concern that as competition for access to routes, product and profits of
trafficking increase, West Africa might experience an increase in violence
similar to that in the Caribbean and parts of Latin America. Moreover, if
production grows in the region – exhibited by the discovery of methamphetamine,
cocaine, and ecstasy processing equipment[23]--
conflicts may develop over control of this production. Cockayne also predicts
that the local impact of trafficking in the region may include crime and
violence perpetrated by users and armed gangs, including petty crime, violence
against women and children, and “drug money-fuelled” violence.[24]
Therefore, the security threats caused by drug trafficking can impact all
levels of society, from state apparatuses such as the military down to the
family.
Beyond
the Guinea Bissau and northern Mali cases though, in West Africa there is still
limited evidence linking drugs and political violence or drugs and the type of
urban violence experienced in parts of Latin America and the Caribbean. It is however
important to acknowledge that drug trafficking, like other forms of organized
criminal activity, generally only draws attention when connected to overt
violence.[25] The tendency to assess the impact of drug
trafficking by the degree of violence it provokes or its links with terrorist
groups can mean that important structural relationships between drug
traffickers and political and business elites are overlooked – Mali provides an
excellent example of how external actors either “underestimated or ignored the
destabilizing impact of these types of relations.”[26]
As noted by one expert, “[g]overnments that lack the capacity to
counter such penetration, or that acquiesce in it, run the risk of becoming
criminalized or “captured” states over time.” The latter can have a significant
impact on stability and general human security if left unchecked.[27]
The Sahel Region
As
noted above, structural challenges in the sub-region such as porous borders,
weak institutions, corruption and political patronage, poverty and ethnic or
informal social networks are prevailing conditions that run through almost all
existing reports on drug trafficking in the region. Most experts agree that
these conditions are exploited by transnational criminal networks for the
transfer of all kinds of illicit commodities including drugs, cigarettes, fake
medicines, small arms and light weapons, human organs, persons, etc. Territories
with a history of state neglect and different sources of tensions in particular
represent havens for drug traffickers, facilitating these kinds of
transnational activities across national and international borders and at
times, providing havens for radical groups.
Recent incidents in northern Mali for example, highlight the extent to
which drug trafficking, smuggling and other forms of organized criminal activity
can be taken advantage of to finance the activities of some of these groups,
who over time, have come to “wield decisive political and military influence.”[28]
Regarding
drugs, a range of trafficking routes exists across the Sahel: cocaine is
trafficked from the coastal countries into the Sahel and onwards towards Europe
via both land and air transit.[29] Resin from cannabis is trafficked
from Morocco towards Egypt and the Arabian Peninsula via Mauritania, Mali,
Niger, Algeria and Libya.[30] Investigations
into the ‘air cocaine’ case in which a burnt out Boeing 727 was found in the
Malian desert in 2009 alleged to be carrying X tones of cocaine revealed the
level of sophistication of trafficking in the region and the involvement of a
complex and diverse group of actors.[31]
In
2009, UNODC highlighted the shifting priorities in the region, noting that
while coastal countries appeared to be on a more positive trajectory, there was
increasing evidence that the northern part of the region was under increased
pressure from terrorist groups that appeared to be building links with criminal
organizations. Similarly, a Wikileaks cable cited in The Telegraph of 4 February 2011 stated that the United Kingdom
believed narcotics trafficking was the largest threat to stability in West
Africa with specific regard to the possibility of increased terrorist funding
in the Sahel and gang-style activity as was seen in the Caribbean.[32] Indeed, groups such as al Qaeda in
the Islamist Maghreb (AQIM) are alleged to be engaging in criminal activity in
the Sahel, notably kidnapping and drug smuggling, to finance operations. One
analyst estimated that AQIM has accumulated between US$40-65 million since 2008
through kidnapping ransoms, and protecting the smuggling rackets of Tuaregs in
the Sahel enabling it to become a major political and military force in the region.[33] As noted by Lacher, up until the
military coup staged by Mali’s army in 2012, state complicity with organized crime
(particularly kidnapping) was the main factor enabling AQIM’s growth and a
driver of conflict in the north of the country. It allowed AQIM to expand its
spheres of influence and activities beyond the Sahel to the more southern
states of West Africa. The group has supported recruitment, training and
radicalization of other groups,[34] and due
to its decentralized nature, the organization has been able to shift from one
activity to another whenever national and international actors attempt to
disrupt its activities. There is however, limited evidence linking AQIM to drug
trafficking; it is more probable that the group solicits transit fees from
traffickers or provides them protection services.[35]
In 2009,
the US DEA arrested and charged three Malian nationals for allegedly conducting
drug smuggling on behalf of al Qaeda. In Ghana, three nationals were arrested and charged with ‘plotting to
transport cocaine across Africa with the intent to support al Qaeda, [and] its
local affiliate AQIM and [the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia] FARC.[36]
During the same period, alleged AQIM operatives from Mauritania, Niger, Mali
and Ghana, were also arrested, initially on drugs charges, although terrorism
charges were subsequently added. Despite these arrests, many of the alleged
links between AQIM and Al Qaeda to drug trafficking have resulted false or
erroneous.[37]
In 2011,
the UN inter-agency assessment of the impact of the Libyan crisis on the Sahel
region stated that AQIM may be involved in illegal taxation schemes with drug
smugglers in Mali, noting also that since the Libyan crisis, there has been a
growth in the number of terrorist groups operating in the region.[38] The report also noted that the
Nigeria-based Boko Haram has received training from AQIM. More recently, the
2012 US International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (INCSR) stated that
that some actors involved in air and land trafficking in Northern Mali may have
connections to ethnic militias and/or extremist elements operating in the Sahel.
And at a February 2012 Security Council meeting, UN Secretary-General Ban
Ki-moon expressed concern about potential alliances between terrorist groups,
drug traffickers and other criminal groups and their ability to destabilize
conditions further. Donors have been criticized for being blind to collusion
between government officials and organized criminal and extremist groups,
particularly in Mali.
If
reports of increasing interdependence among traffickers and extremist and
radicalized groups are true, these links poses a significant challenge to West
African states.[39] In
reality however, rising insecurity in West Africa and particularly the Sahel,
coupled with the intersection of drugs, extremism and fragile states hinges on
poor political and economic governance, and the use of organized crime as a
political resource, which over time, has allowed political allies to benefit
from criminal activities.[40]
In
this regard, efforts to respond to these challenges need to be located within a
broader political economy framework. Such a framework should allow for a deeper
understanding of the interests of the multiplicity of actors involved in
trafficking, smuggling and extremist activities in the region. It should also
explore the nature of financial networks and fundraising activities that
support such activities, focusing on “how the potentially divergent interests
of the key actors engaged in the raising, distribution, and spending of funds –
and the institutional settings in which decisions about financing are made –
might affect outcomes.”[41]
Current
Policy Responses to the Security Threats Posed by Drug
Trafficking in West Africa
For
more than two decades, governments in the region have been attempting to
respond to the threats posed by drug trafficking and organized crime in the
sub-region. In response to their earlier commitment to the 1988 UN Drug
Convention, the 1971 UN Convention on Psychotropic Substances and the 1961 UN
Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, as amended by the 1972 Protocol, many of
the West African countries already have basic laws - many of which are quite
draconian - that deal with drug trafficking and consumption.[42]
ECOWAS countries are also members of the UN Convention against Corruption and
the UN Convention against Transnational Crime and its three supplementary protocols.
Specifically, many West African states, such as Ghana, Nigeria, Sierra Leone,
Liberia and Gambia have drug law enforcement legislation dating as far back as
the 1930s, dealing mostly with cannabis use and cultivation and more recently, cocaine.[43]
Nigeria, for example, has a National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), while
Ghana has a Narcotics Control Board (NACOB). Liberia and Sierra Leone have similar
agencies, which lead the fight against drug trafficking. However, these interventions
are mainly law enforcement-driven and face challenges as a result of persistent
under-funding, internal corruption and turf battles that undermines the
principles of coordination and cooperation between relevant services such as
the police, immigration, Customs, Excise & Preventive Services (CEPS),
public health authorities, NGOS and other specialized institutions that should
be working together to respond to trafficking and consumption challenges at the
national and regional levels.[44]
In
addition, ECOWAS had championed several strategies in the context of its
commitment to international norms and standards regarding narcotics control. Almost
two decades ago, the 21st Summit of Heads of State and Government in Abuja,
Nigeria 30 – 31 October 1998 issued a declaration entitled ‘Community Flame
Ceremony – the fight against drugs’. Some of the additional earlier steps
included:
• Resolution relating to Prevention and
Control of Drug Abuse in West Africa (ECOWAS 1997);
• Recommendation C/98 on the establishment
of a Regional Fund for Financing of Drug Control Activities in West Africa;
• Decision on the establishment of a
Regional Fund for Financing Drug Control Activities (ECOWAS 1998); and
• Decision on establishing the
Inter-Governmental Action Group against Money Laundering in West Africa (ECOWAS
1999).
With
the exception of activities undertaken by ECOWAS’s Inter-Governmental Action
Group against Money Laundering in West Africa (GIABA) that has been engaged in
combating the activities of money laundering through its capacity-building and
training programmes[45]…limited
progress was made during the early 2000s in stemming the rise in drug
trafficking.[46] This
lack of progress led to the adoption of a sub-regional initiative at an ECOWAS
Ministerial Conference in Praia, Cape Verde, in 2008. The
initiative includes a Political Declaration – the Abuja Declaration[47]-
and a Regional Action Plan[48]
to address the security threats posed by drug trafficking in the sub-region. Building
on these steps and as a means to accompany implementation of the Political
Declaration and Action Plan, in February 2010, ECOWAS adopted the Dakar Initiative signed by seven
countries in the region. A critical aspect of ECOWAS’s approach was to ensure
the responsibility of each individual state in implementing the Action Plan.
Overall, the perception is that the overall impact and effectiveness of the
regional architecture has been low. In addition, the ECOWAS Action Plan ran
until 2011 and it remains unclear whether implementation to date has been
reviewed, and whether the Action Plan and related initiatives will be extended
or revised accordingly.
Additionally, as part of the implementation of
the Declaration, UNODC,
DPKO, DPA, INTERPOL, UNOWA, and ECOWAS facilitated the design and implementation of
the West Africa Coast Initiative (WACI) - a multi-stakeholder initiative aimed
at providing
equipment, technical assistance, and specialized training for law
enforcement officials in selected ECOWAS countries. The first step of the programme was
to establish transnational crime units (TCUs) in four pilot countries – Cote
d’Ivoire, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. Meanwhile, the UNODC-WCO
Container Control Program aims to strengthen container surveillance in Ghana
and Senegal, as well as Ecuador and Pakistan.
UNODC has also developed National Integrated
Programmes (NIPs) for all the ECOWAS countries. However, implementation of the
NIPs remains a challenge with limited progress registered thus far, not least
because funding of the programmes has been difficult to anchor. Other
complementary processes resulting from the international Financial Action Task
Force (FAFT) mechanism are finding expression in the establishment of Financial
Intelligence Centers at the national level to combat financial fraud. Some of
the countries have followed up by establishing financial courts to combat money
laundering and other financial crimes. However, most of the Centers require
substantial improvement in technical capacity. Others require support and cooperation
from the traditional national law enforcement agencies such as the police and
the other investigative and prosecution services.
Countries
across the region have also entered into bilateral agreements with certain
countries such as the United States and the United Kingdom in the areas of
training, logistical support and extradition protocols. Ghana and Nigeria have
such arrangements with the United State and the United Kingdom. In the late
1990s and early 2000s, national level interventions led to several seizures and
arrests particularly in Nigeria and also in Ghana.[49] Counter-narcotic
support from the United States alone totaled approximately US$50 million p.a.
in 2010 and 2011, whereas support in 2009 had been approximately US$7.5
million.[50] This
six-fold increase in annual funding shows a dramatic increase in attention
being paid to West African drug-related issues.
Despite
these developments, in February 2012, the President of the United Nations Security
Council issued a statement expressing concern that “transnational organized
crime, including illicit weapons and drug trafficking, piracy and armed robbery
at sea, as well as terrorism and its increasing links, in some cases, with
transnational organized crime and drug trafficking” pose a direct security
threat to peace and stability in the region.[51] Meanwhile,
UNODC raised the concern that in addition to trafficking, seizures of
processing equipment for cocaine, ecstasy and methamphetamine indicate the
region’s role in production may be growing.[52]
The Secretary-General’s July 2012 report on UNOWA activity stated that the
region continues to be a transit point for cocaine and heroin, and that
countries in the sub-region are ill-equipped to deal with the related rising
consumption rates.[53]
Particularly concern regarding trafficking routes through the Sahel was also
noted in the report.
Finally,
many of the existing initiatives aimed at stemming drug trafficking and its
impacts on the region are aimed at addressing important gaps in response
capacity. However, the paucity of information regarding the real impact of
these efforts coupled with the diversity of threats posed by drug trafficking
outlined earlier point to the need for deeper analysis of the challenges, and
more effective monitoring mechanisms as a means to support more effective and
regionally driven policy interventions.
[1]
. Director,
Faculty of Academic Affairs and Research, Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping
Training Centre (KAIPTC), Accra, Ghana.
[2] . Head, Small Arms
and Light Weapons Program, KAIPTC, Accra, Ghana. We want to thank Camino Kavanagh and Alan
Doss for their intellectual support and guidance in writing this paper. All
oversights and interpretational issues remain the responsibility of the
authours.
[3]
UNODC, 2008:1
[4]
UNSC, (2012).
[6]
Interviews with police officers in Kumasi, capital city of Ashanti in Ghana in
April 2012
[7]
ECOWAS, 2009; UNSC, 2009; UNSC, 2012.
[8]
Lacher, 2012
[9]
Aning, Kwesi (2010).
[10]
www.myjoyonline.com
27 September 2012; Radioxyzonline.com. September 2012
[11]
Forthcoming NYU-CIC report ‘Responding to the Impact of Drug Trafficking on
Governance in Developing Countries’
[12]
Cockayne, James (2012)
[13]
Aning (2011).
[14]
Lacher, 2012).
[15]
Kavanagh et al, forthcoming (2013).
[16]
Beinstein (1999); Famuyiwa et al. 2011)
[17]
Shaw, 2001
[18]
The SAPs were considered as Western-inspired economic interventions that
contributed to the collapse of West African economies triggering hardships and
vulnerabilities for millions of West Africans.
[19]
Shaw, (2001).
[20]Akyeampong,
(2005).
[21]
USAID forthcoming report on Drug Trafficking and Development
[22]
Ibid.
[23] Also, on
15 July 2009, the authorities of Guinea raided a suspected drug processing
facility, seizing equipment and toxic chemical substances. Reports about drug
processing facilities in Guinea had been circulating among the intelligence
community since 2007, as well as rumors about the attempt of introducing opium
poppy cultivation in the highlands of Guinea. A later UNODC- INTERPOL mission
visited the eight seized facilities located in Conakry and in the nearby native
village of former President Lousana Conte, some 100 kilometers north of
Conakry. The UNODC -INTERPOL mission confirmed that the equipment and the
chemical substances seized enabled
(seized chemical substances included ether, sulfuric acid, sassafras
oil, and acetone. Also, traces of cocaine were detected) the
processing of cocaine and heroin and the production of methamphetamine and MDMA
(ecstasy). See Mazzitelli (2009): New Transatlantic Bonanza at: http://www.seguridadcondemocracia.org/administrador_de_carpetas/OCO-IM/pdf/Mazzitelli_New_Transatlantic_Bonanza.pdf
and UNODC,
Regional Programme West Africa 2010-2014.
[24]
Cockayne, James, Drug Trafficking and Criminality in West Africa, CPPF Informal
Meeting Summary, 2009.
[25]
Kavanagh (2013)
[26]
Lacher (2012)
[27]
Gastrow (2012)
[28]
Lacher (2012)
[29]
Wolfram Lacher, “Organized Crime and Conflict in the Sahel-Sahara Region,”
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, September 2012.
[30]
Ibid
[31]
Clingendael (2012). Unpublished policy brief.
[32]
“West Africa: UK Priorities, Counter-Narcotics and Elections,” Wikileaks Cable,
The Telegraph, February 4, 2011.
[33]
Wolfram Lacher, “Organized Crime and Conflict in the Sahel-Sahara Region,”
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, September 2012.
[34] Aning, (2011)The recent August 2011and
2012murder and kidnappings in Northern Nigeria and the assertion by the
kidnapped that they were being held by Boko Haran in conjunction with AQIM
creates a wholly new dimension to terrorism in West Africa.
[35]
Lacher (2012)
[36]
CNN.com, December 2009
[37]
See Lacher 2012: 8
[38]
UN Security Council, Report of the assessment mission on the impact of the
Libyan crisis on the Sahel region, S/2012/42, January 12, 2012
[39]
. See ‘Terrorist drug connection’, This
Week, 9 January 2010, p. 8. Three suspected al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb
(AQIM) members were charged with plotting to traffic cocaine in order to fund
Islamic terrorism. These 3 Malians were arrested in Ghana and extradited to the
US. See also, ‘Freed hostage: captors tried to convert me to Islam’, Khaleej Times, February 20, 2010, p. 24
[40]
Lacher (2012)
[41].
Aning 2012
[42]
(United Nations Treaty Collection website, 2013).
[43]
(Aning, 2008).
[44]
(Aning, 2008).
[45]
The GIABA programmes are aimed at improving the capacity of member states to
respond to the threats of drugs and money laundering,
[46]
In 2007 and 2008, ECOWAS leaders commented strongly on the lack of progress in
stemming the increases in drugs being trafficked across the region. ECOWAS
(2007 and 2008: 2).
[47]
The operative
sections of the Political Declaration, directed ECOWAS Commission to establish:
• A strong coordination mechanism
to forge close links with Member States government and civil institutions and
organizations involved in drug control in order to achieve better coordination
in the control of drug trafficking and abuse in the sub-region, and for that
purpose;
• An ECOWAS Drug Control and Crime
Prevention Division responsible for the
overall coordination of regional initiatives undertaken in the area of drug
abuse and crime prevention, treatment and rehabilitation as well as the
collection and analysis of data on crime and drug phenomenon in the sub-region
• An appropriate structure under
the direct supervision of the President of the ECOWAS Commission, responsible
for overall coordination and monitoring of regional initiatives undertaken in
the area of illicit drug trafficking and drug abuse prevention”;
• The Crime Prevention and Criminal
Justice Centre (ECPCJS) to serve as a focal point for mutual legal assistance
both amongst ECOWAS members and non-members; and
• The Department of Peace and
Security under the Office of the Commissioner for Political Affairs, Peace and
Security (PADS) was tasked with facilitating the formation of the Network of
Drug Law Enforcement Agencies/Units within the framework of the West African Joint
Operations for the coordination of efforts to combat illicit drug trafficking
and related transnational organized crime in the ECOWAS sub-region.
[48]
The Regional Action Plan to fight drug trafficking, organized crime and drug
abuse in West Africa consists of five thematic areas: mobilizing ECOWAS
political leadership and address the need for adequate national budget
allocation by ECOWAS member states for preventing and combating illicit drug
trafficking, related organized crime and drug abuse; effective law enforcement
and national/regional cooperation against the high-level increase in illicit
drug trafficking and organized crime; developing and strengthening appropriate and adequate legal
frameworks for effective criminal justice; confronting emerging threats of
increased drug abuse and associated health and security problems; and, creating
valid and reliable data to assess the magnitude of the drug trafficking and
abuse problems affecting the region on a sustainable basis.
[49]
Aning, (2008)
[50]
Charlie Savage and Thom Shanker, “U.S. Drug War Expands to Africa, a Newer Hub
for Cartels,” New York Times, July
21, 2012.
[51]
UN Security Council, Statement by the President of the Security Council,
S/PRST/2012/2, February 21, 2012.
[52]
UNODC, Regional Programme West Africa 2010-2014.
[53]
UN Security Council, Report of the Secretary-General on the activities of the
United Nations Office for West Africa, S/2012/510, June 29, 2012.
Post Comment
No comments