Thread: Napolitano sets plan to curb Mexico border drug smuggling

Napolitano sets plan to curb Mexico border drug smuggling

By Tim Gaynor
NOGALES, Ariz | Thu Jul 7, 2011 6:49pm EDT

NOGALES, Ariz (Reuters) - Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano on Thursday rolled out the Obama administration's 2011 strategy to curb drug smuggling on the Mexico border, pledging to boost intelligence sharing and technology to tighten security.

President Barack Obama has been under intense pressure to beef up security on the porous southwest border to curb immigrant and drug smuggling north from Mexico, and halt the flow of guns and cash proceeds south. The strategy update was the first since 2009.

"Since that time we have been devoting really unprecedented efforts to make sure that the border is safe and secure," Napolitano told a news conference at the Border Patrol station in Nogales, in southern Arizona.

Napolitano, who was accompanied by Gil Kerlikowske, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, and Alan Bersin, U.S. Customs and Border Protection commissioner, presented the report detailing ten strategic objectives.

Among goals going forward was boosting intelligence and information sharing with state, local and tribal law enforcement agencies along the nearly 2,000-mile border, and enhanced liaison with Mexican authorities.

The plan also sought to increase the use of technologies such as X-Ray machines at land border crossings to detect drugs headed north to U.S. markets, and bulk cash proceeds and guns headed south to Mexico to arm the Mexican cartels.

With smuggling by sea on the rise off the coast of southern California, the plan seeks to increase the detection and tracking of small vessels, including submarines -- which have been used by the cartels to run drugs in Pacific coastal waters off Colombia and Central America.

It also set out to increase capacity to detect clandestine tunnels under the border -- usually used to smuggle drugs -- 135 of which have been identified by law enforcement up to March of this year.

Part of the emphasis also focuses on reducing U.S. demand for drugs through education, community development and providing rehabilitation for drug users.

As a metric of the administration's success, Napolitano said gun, drug and bulk cash seizures had increased along the southwest border in the past two years, while the number of illegal immigrants was down "substantially."

"The numbers that need to go up are going up, the numbers that need to go down are really going down, and the president is committed to sustaining that effort," she added.

(Reporting by Tim Gaynor; Editing by Greg McCune)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/ ... M020110707

Obama unveils drug strategy

Plan calls for more coordination with local, state officers at border

By GARY MARTIN
WASHINGTON BUREAU

July 7, 2011, 11:56PM


WASHINGTON — Obama administration officials unveiled an updated Southwest border counternarcotics strategy Thursday that calls for increased coordination between federal, state and local law enforcement agencies to combat smuggling.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano led a delegation of administration officials to the U.S.-Mexico border in Arizona where the update on the strategy, sought by Congress, was released.

"Disrupting the flow of illegal drugs across our borders is critical to our nation's safety and security," Napolitano said.

The strategy, Napolitano said, is designed to "strengthen our coordinating efforts to interdict drug traffickers and disrupt their links to terrorism and organized crime."

Republicans critical

The Obama administration first unveiled the strategy in 2009 through the Department of Homeland Security and the Office of National Drug Control Policy.

Congress in 2006 ordered the executive branch to develop a National Southwest Border Counternarcotics Strategy and update it every two years.

The 2011 update focuses on coordination of efforts by federal, state, local and tribal jurisdictions along the 1,969-mile border, from Brownsville to San Diego, through information and resource sharing.

Republicans were critical of the administration's efforts to secure the border, saying more needs to be done to aid American law enforcement agencies in turning back the tide of smuggling conducted by Mexican drug cartels.

Earlier this year, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, pointed to a Government Accountability Office report that found only 44 percent of the Southwest border is under operational control by U.S. law enforcement.

"Despite the president and Secretary Napolitano's statements about border security, and the number of resources that have been devoted to the border, 44 percent is nothing to celebrate," Cornyn told a Senate hearing.

To boost efforts along the border, the strategy would place coordination of law enforcement efforts under the Office of National Drug Control Policy director, or "drug czar," the U.S. Attorney General and the Department of Homeland Security.

The plan contains no new money or grants, instead relying on existing budget allocations for federal departments to crack down on smuggling routes through Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California. It also coordinates some money appropriated under the $1.4 billion Merida Initiative for Mexico to scan southbound cargo for weapons.

Strategies 'paying off'

Drug czar Gil Kerlikowske said ongoing efforts to "reduce the threat of drug trafficking along the Southwest border are paying off, but we cannot let up."

He said the strategy also calls for joint operations with Mexican military and law enforcement to interdict contraband at the border, as well as reduce consumption of drugs in both the United States and Mexico.

Texas border lawmakers have long pressed the Obama administration to integrate local and state agencies in federal strategies on the border.

"I'm happy they are doing this. It's something they should have been doing a long time ago," said Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, a member of the House Homeland Security Committee.

Cuellar said the administration was responding to congressional requests to emphasize coordination and intelligence sharing. "This is the smart way to reduce smuggling of drugs, cash and weapons."

The updated strategy comes one month after President Barack Obama ordered a three-month extension of 1,200 National Guardsmen for the U.S.-Mexico border.

Only 250 of those troops were deployed in Texas, where Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican eyeing a White House bid, has criticized the president of short-changing Lone Star state on border security.

Perry wants 1,000 National Guard troops for the border in Texas paid for by the federal government.

Congress, meanwhile, approved last year a $600 million build up on the border that includes 1,000 additional Border Patrol agents and 250 new Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/chr ... 44331.html