Caribbean Initiative Has Its Limits

In recent years, U.S.-supported anti-drug efforts in Colombia have forced traffickers to find new routes for cocaine shipments, which has meant an exponential increase in cocaine passing through the Dutch Antilles. Authorities estimate that every day in 2003, an astonishing number of 80 to 100 passengers flying from the Dutch Antilles to Europe attempted to smuggle cocaine. While authorities managed to reduce that number to 10 a month by October 2005, they know that as long as European consumption continues they will never be able to declare complete victory.

Illegal drugs have brought an increased number of firearms from the U.S. to the region, increasing the availability of weapons for criminals.

Perhaps it should be no surprise that since 2002, Trinidad and Tobago's murder rate has doubled, and Jamaica now has one of the highest murder rates in the world.

The World Bank is right when it concludes that "preventing the illicit trafficking in light arms is a responsibility to be shared among the producing, selling, and destination states." The same could be said about illicit drugs that currently diverts scarce Caribbean resources from other important functions, such as crime prevention. For the time being, it seems, Caribbean nations shoulder more responsibility than they can bear.