U.S. Solvents Helped Fuel Cocaine Trade in Colombia; Firms Assailed

A new federal investigation indicates that nearly all of the Colombian companies that regularly import certain chemical solvents from the United States would allow them to be used in producing cocaine, a top Drug Enforcement Administration official told Congress on Tuesday.

The finding, which caused the agency last week to halt U.S. exports of the chemicals to 13 of the 17 Colombian “regular customers,” provides the most dramatic indication to date that U.S. firms helped to fuel the international drug trade by selling essential solvents to suspect companies.

A videotaped account of a raid on a cocaine-processing laboratory in a Colombian jungle played for senators as part of the DEA testimony Tuesday showed that the cache included thousands of gallons of ether and other solvents, some still in containers bearing the insignia of the Shell Oil Co., the Mobil Corp. and other U.S. manufacturers.

Denouncing the U.S. role as a “national disgrace,” Sen. Richard H. Bryan (D-Nev.) scolded industry representatives for their failure to halt the shipments unilaterally. He admonished them to give up what he called their “head-in-the-sand approach” to the problem.

The DEA’s new power to block questionable exports would help significantly to reduce the U.S. role, said Gene R. Haislip, deputy assistant DEA administrator.

But he warned that chemical manufacturers in West Germany and the Netherlands apparently are already filling the void. He said the agency would need more money if it were to further sever the cocaine-chemical connection.

“We haven’t done most of what we have to do,” Haislip told a panel of the Senate Commerce Committee.

Nevertheless, the new U.S. success in shutting down some of the major conduits for chemical diversion represents a significant step.

The new strategy seeks to attack the narcotics trade by aiming at a supply line that carries an estimated 12,000 metric tons of solvents to traffickers each year. It thus targets the only ingredients in cocaine production over which the United States maintains direct control.

In separate testimony, a representative of the Chemical Manufacturers Assn. emphasized that the U.S. chemical industry has worked with DEA to draft the new law and insisted: “We do not do business with criminals.”

Asked about U.S. estimates that up to 70% of the solvents imported by Andean nations wind up in cocaine labs, the representative, Don Coticchia, said he “would not be surprised” if those chemicals were obtained from countries other than the United States.