By Tracey Khan – Drakes
[www.inewsguyana.com] – Guyana’s Foreign Affairs Minister Carolyn Rodriques – Birkett says the demand for drugs in the United States seems to be escalating, which she noted is proving to be an encouragement for many Guyanese to supply this illegal substance.
This is the Minister’s rationalization of the issue, when asked at her end of the year press conference today about government’s concerns about cocaine being smuggled out of Guyana in various Guyanese food products and the fact that nationals could be stigmatized.
“If the demand in the US decreases and the price becomes so low that it is not profitable for the drug traffickers, we would have less of a problem here but we have to deal also with the demand and this is why we have to be cooperating.”
She admitted that the issue is one that is rather worrisome, but explained that the small quantities of local produce used to ship the drugs does not have a huge impact on the larger shipments.
“However, when we export, we must be on the alert and this is why we are working with several Governments including the United States Government, the UK and Canadian on security issues because it is something that we have to address; drug trafficking we have to address together,” the Foreign Affairs Minister told the news conference.
She credited the cooperation between various countries for the many drug busts that have been made recently.
Guyanese have been nabbed for trying to ship cocaine concealed in achar, awara, mangoes, corilla, timber, fish and a number of other locally produced food items and more recently, curry powder.
