LatinNews Daily - 19 May 2011

Bolivia: On 12 August a senior US State Department official conceded that Bolivia was meeting US targets for coca eradication.  David Johnson, Assistant Secretary of State heading the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, was broadly complimentary about Bolivia's anti-drug policy after a meeting with President Evo Morales in La Paz. Johnson said that the government was “searching for creative and agreed ways" for coca producers to reduce supplies to drug traffickers. In June coca growers from Morales's base of Chapare, a major coca growing zone, forced USAID to cease operations in Chapare.  Johnson confirmed that Bolivia had met the US targets for coca-eradication, but added that coca acreage was continuing to grow. Interestingly, Johnson used UN Office on Drugs and Crime figures for coca acreage which show Bolivia's coca acreage up by 5% to 28,900 hectares in 2007. Colombia's was up by 27%, according to the same source.