Anti-drug drive has backfired, says UN

A UN anti-drug drive has backfired by making drug cartels so wealthy they can bribe their way through tracts of west Africa and central America, the UN crime agency chief has said.

The 10-year campaign had cut drug production and the number of users, said Antonio Maria Costa, but drug gangs were using their enormous profits to undermine security and development in nations already plagued by poverty, joblessness and HIV-AIDS.

Drug mobs were “buying officials, elections and parties, in a word — power,” said Costa, director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime.