Mexican drug cartels thwart ban on methamphetamine ingredients

Published: Saturday, November 27, 2010, 1:19 AM

November 27, 2010, 1:21 AM
The Washington Post
By William Booth and Anne-Marie O'Connor

VERACRUZ, Mexico -- Exploiting loopholes in the global economy, Mexican crime syndicates are importing mass quantities of the cold medicines and common chemicals used to manufacture methamphetamine -- turning Mexico into the No. 1 source for all meth sold in the United States, law enforcement agents say.

Nearly three years ago, the Mexican government appeared on the verge of controlling the sale of chemicals used to make the drugs, but the syndicates have since moved to the top of the drug trade.

Cartels have quickly learned to use dummy corporations, false labeling and lax customs enforcement in China, India and Bangladesh to smuggle tons of the pills into Mexico for conversion into methamphetamine. Ordinary cold, flu and allergy medicine used to make methamphetamine -- pills banned in Mexico and restricted in the United States -- are still widely available in many countries.

In the past 18 months, Mexican armed forces have raided more than 325 sophisticated factories capable of producing a million pounds of potent methamphetamine a year. Seizures of Mexican methamphetamine along the southwest border have doubled.

"As hard as everyone is working to stop it, the stuff is just going to continue to flow in massive quantities," said Michael Braun, the former chief of operations for the Drug Enforcement Administration and now with Spectre Group International, a security firm.

In a typical scenario, U.N. investigators say, a legitimate pharmaceutical company in India exports cold pills to Dubai, where they are falsely labeled as herbal supplements and shipped to Belize and then to Veracruz by cargo container.

"Mexico-based trafficking groups have shown tremendous resilience in getting around the precursor chemical prohibitions and controls," said Special Agent Alex Dominguez in the DEA Office of Diversion Control. "They are currently pursuing very sophisticated smuggling techniques. They are trafficking ephedrine-type medicines, just like you would smuggle any high-value contraband such as cocaine or heroin."



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