The US Drug Enforcement Administration
has grown into a global intelligence organization whose reach extends far
beyond international drug trafficking, The New York Times reported.
Citing documents from the secrets
website WikiLeaks, the newspaper said the DEA's operations had become so
expansive the agency has had to fend off foreign politicians who want to use
it against their political enemies.
One August 2009 cable reported
Panamanian President Ricardo Martinelli as having sent an urgent BlackBerry
message to the US ambassador asking the DEA go after his political enemies.
"I need help with tapping
phones," the paper quoted the president as saying.
A May 2008 cable from the West African
nation of Guinea, reported that the country's biggest narcotics kingpin was
Ousman Conte, the son of the then president, Lansana Conte.
A March 2008 cable from Guinea said
diplomats had discovered that before police there had destroyed a huge
narcotics seizure, the drugs had been replaced by flour.
Army officer Lansana Conte was
arrested in February 2009, two months after a junta led by Captain Moussa
Dadis Camara seized power on the death of his father after 24 years at the
head of the west African nation.
He was released on bail in July this
year after spending more than 16 months in prison for alleged drug
trafficking.
An October 2009 cable from the US
embassy in Mexico, said leaders of the military there had issued private pleas
for closer collaboration with the US drug agency, because they did not trust
their own police force.
The cable said Mexico's Defense
Secretary, Guillermo Galvan "will try to keep military actions in its own
channels rather than working more broadly with Mexico's law enforcement
community."
In Sierra Leone, the attorney
general solicited 2.5 million dollars in bribes from defendants in a major
cocaine-trafficking prosecution, according to a March 2009 cable, quoted by
The Times.
But the country's president Ernest
Koroma, had intervened to scuttle the deal.
Cables from Myanmar describe DEA
informants reporting both on how the military junta enriches itself with drug
money and on the political activities of the junta's opponents, the paper
noted.
US government officials declined to
discuss what they said was information that should never have been made
public, the report said.
FREE THE KNOWLEDGE OF NEWS INFORMATION!
Button
Ads!
Custom Search
