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Ecuador Narcotics Control
Cultivation of, and trafficking in, drugs was less of a problem
in Ecuador than in neighboring countries. Coca cultivation, which
began in 1984, had been essentially eliminated by late 1987 as a
result of vigorous government action. With the assistance of the
United States, which lent two helicopters, the Ecuadorian police
detected and uprooted plantings of the crop, grown mostly along the
border with Colombia. The police also interdicted shipments of
cocaine and other coca products across Ecuador's territory to
markets and processing centers elsewhere and suppressed cocaine
refining laboratories within its borders.
In early 1989, however, drug traffickers reportedly moved into
the country from Colombia and Bolivia because of Ecuador's easier
access to the United States market. The United States Drug
Enforcement Administration estimated that thirty to fifty tons a
year of Colombian cocaine were being shipped through Ecuador
destined for the United States, Europe, and Asia. Cocaine had been
found in container shipments of Ecuadorian frozen orange
concentrate and chocolates and in air deliveries of fresh flowers.
Analysts also believed that the Colombian Medellín Cartel had
purchased Ecuadorian companies. Few big drug seizures had been made
because of the limited resources of local authorities, although
coca laboratories continued to be raided and destroyed.
In October 1988, assailants assumed to have been drug dealers
murdered a superior court judge in Quito who had been working on a
number of drug trafficking cases. Other judges had received death
threats. Despite the fact that Ecuador has bank secrecy laws,
United States officials believed that the weakness of the sucre
limited Ecuador's potential to become a major money-laundering
center.
In an effort to assist Ecuadorian drug-control efforts, the
United States supplied a number of powerboats for patrolling rivers
in the north and islands near the port of Guayaquil and supplied
training by the United States Navy. It also furnished sniffer dogs
to detect drugs in export shipments and baggage. In FY 1990
President George Bush requested from Congress US$1.4 million in
drug-control assistance for Ecuador.
Data as of 1989
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