-Caveat Lector-
------- Forwarded Message Follows -------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date sent: Mon, 3 May 1999 10:24:01 EDT
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Send reply to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: [CIA-DRUGS] KLA Funding Tied to Heroin Profits
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
from:
http://www.aci.net/kalliste/
<A HREF="http://www.aci.net/kalliste/">The Home Page of J. Orlin
Grabbe</A> -----
Der Fuhrer Invades Yugoslavia
KLA Funding Tied to Heroin Profits
Heroin will take care of that school violence. Yeah.
The Kosovo Liberation Army, which the Clinton administration has
embraced and some members of Congress want to arm as part of the
NATO bombing campaign, is a terrorist organization that has financed
much of its war effort with profits from the sale of heroin. Recently obtained
intelligence documents show that drug agents in five countries, including
the United States, believe the KLA has aligned itself with an extensive
organized crime network centered in Albania that smuggles heroin and
some cocaine to buyers throughout Western Europe and, to a lesser
extent, the United States.
The documents tie members of the Albanian Mafia to a drug smuggling
cartel based in Kosovo's provincial capital, Pristina. The cartel is manned
by ethic Albanians who are members of the Kosovo National Front, whose
armed wing is the KLA. The documents show it is one of the most powerful
heroin smuggling organizations in the world, with much of its profits being
diverted to the KLA to buy weapons.
The clandestine movement of drugs over a collection of land and sea
routes from Turkey through Bulgaria, Greece and Yugoslavia to Western
Europe and elsewhere is so frequent and massive that intelligence officials
have dubbed the circuit the "Balkan Route."
Mr. Clinton has committed air power and is considering the use of ground
troops to support the Kosovo rebels against Yugoslav President Slobodan
Milosevic. Last week, Sen. Mitch McConnell, Kentucky Republican, and
Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman, Connecticut Democrat, called on the United
States to arm the KLA so ethnic Albanians in Kosovo could defend
themselves against the Serbs.
Mr. McConnell and Mr. Lieberman introduced a bill that would provide $25
million to equip 10,000 men or 10 battalions with small arms and anti-tank
weapons for up to 18 months.
In 1998, the U.S. State Department listed the KLA -- formally known as the
Ushtria Clirimtare e Kosoves, or UCK -- as an international terrorist
organization, saying it had bankrolled its operations with proceeds from the
international heroin trade and from loans from known terrorists like Osama
bin Laden.
"They were terrorists in 1998 and now, because of politics, they're freedom
fighters," said one top drug official who asked not to be identified.
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, in a recent report, said the
heroin is smuggled along the Balkan Route in cars, trucks and boats
initially to Austria, Germany and Italy, where it is routed to eager buyers in
France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland and
Great Britain. Some of the white powder, the DEA report said, finds its way
to the United States.
The DEA report, prepared for the National Narcotics Intelligence
Consumer's Committee (NNICC), said a majority of the heroin seized in
Europe is transported over the Balkan Route. It said drug smuggling
organizations composed of Kosovo's ethnic Albanians were considered
"second only to Turkish gangs as the predominant heroin smugglers along
the Balkan Route." The NNICC is a coalition of federal agencies involved in
the war on drugs.
"Kosovo traffickers were noted for their use of violence and for their
involvement in international weapons trafficking," the DEA report said.
A separate DEA document, written last month by U.S. drug agents in
Austria, said that while the war in the former Yugoslavia had reduced the
drug flow to Western Europe along the Balkan Route, new land routes have
opened across Romania, Hungary and the Czech Republic. The report
said, however, the diversion appeared to be only temporary.
The DEA estimated that between four and six metric tons of heroin leaves
each month from Turkey bound for Western Europe, the bulk of it traveling
over the Balkan Route.
A second high-ranking U.S. drug official, who also requested anonymity,
said government and police corruption in Kosovo, along with widespread
poverty throughout the region, had contributed to an increase in heroin
trafficking by the KLA and other ethnic Albanians. The official said drug
smuggling is "out of control" and little is being done by neighboring states
to get a handle on it.
"This is the definition of the wild, wild West," said the official. "The bombing
has slowed it down, but has not brought it to a halt. And, eventually, it will
pick up where it left off."
The heroin trade along the Balkan Route has been of concern to several
countries:
* The Greek representative of Interpol reported in 1998 that Kosovo's
ethnic Albanians were "the primary sources of supply for cocaine and
heroin in that country."
* Intelligence officials in France said in a recent report the KLA was among
several organizations in southern Europe that had built a vast drug-
smuggling network. France's Geopolitical Observatory of Drugs said in the
report that the KLA was a key player in the rapidly expanding drugs-for-
arms business and helped transport $2 billion worth of drugs annually into
Western Europe.
* German drug agents have estimated that $1.5 billion in drug profits is
laundered annually by Kosovo smugglers, through as many as 200 private
banks or currency-exchange offices. They noted in a recent report that
ethnic Albanians had established one of the most prominent drug
smuggling organizations in Europe.
* Jane's Intelligence Review estimated in March that drug sales could have
netted the KLA profits in the "high tens of millions of dollars." The highly
regarded British-based journal noted at the time that the KLA had rearmed
itself for a spring offensive with the aid of drug money, along with donations
from Albanians in Western Europe and the United States.
Several leading intelligence officials said the KLA has, in part, financed its
purchase of AK-47s, semiautomatic rifles, shotguns, handguns, grenade
launchers, ammunition, artillery shells, explosives, detonators and anti-
personnel mines through drug profits -- cash laundered through banks in
Italy, Germany and Switzerland. They also said KLA rebels have paid for
weapons using the heroin itself as currency.
The profits, according to the officials, also have been used to purchase anti-
aircraft and anti-armor rockets, along with electronic surveillance
equipment.
The Washington Times, May 3, 1999
----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, Omnia
Bona Bonis, All My Relations. Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End Kris
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Start a new hobby. Meet a new friend. http://www.onelist.com ONElist:
The leading provider of free e-mail list services!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Steve Wingate
California Director
SKYWATCH INTERNATIONAL
ANOMALOUS IMAGES AND UFO FILES
http://www.anomalous-images.com
DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER
==========
CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic
screeds are not allowed. Substance�not soapboxing! These are sordid matters
and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright
frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects
spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL
gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers;
be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credeence to Holocaust denial and
nazi's need not apply.
Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
========================================================================
Archives Available at:
http://home.ease.lsoft.com/archives/CTRL.html
http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
========================================================================
To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Om
