Drugs

International Efforts to Attack a Global Problem Gao ID: NSIAD-93-165 June 23, 1993

The major industrialized nations have taken a global approach to combating the production, sale, and use of illicit drugs. Under this approach, counternarcotics programs in drug producing and trafficking countries are funded by either donor countries or international organizations. This report provides a snapshot of international counternarcotics efforts. GAO describes (1) the types of antidrug programs funded and the extent to which they support or complement U.S. counternarcotics strategy objectives, (2) U.S. efforts to increase international support for U.S. counternarcotics objectives, including support in countries where the United States has little political influence; and (3) the mechanisms used to coordinate international counternarcotics programs.

GAO found that: (1) the major industrialized countries support the global effort to control illicit drug production and trafficking; (2) European nations do not support active enforcement-related supply reduction programs outside their borders because they believe that national authorities are responsible for interdiction; (3) European and Asian nations provide the United Nations' International Drug Control Program a larger share of their international counternarcotic budgets than the United States; (4) the United States promotes its policy objectives in international and bilateral summits and through State Department discussions with host country counterparts; (5) U.S. law enforcement personnel are assigned overseas to assist countries with enforcement activities; (6) efforts to coordinate counternarcotic programs have been hampered by differing political policies and regional focuses; (7) international data exchanges critical to controlling trafficking and coordinating assistance are fragmented; (8) existing databases focus on specific aspects of drug control, and planned databases have a regional focus; and (9) bilateral assistance data are nonexistent or incomplete because no database exists for bilateral counternarcotic programs.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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