BERNARD SHAW, CNN ANCHOR: Here in Washington, the Clinton administration is asking Congress for more money to help Colombia fight soaring drug production. Our CNN State Department correspondent Andrea Koppel has details.</s>ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN STATE DEPARTMENT CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The United States says cultivation of cocaine in Colombia has increased 140 percent in less than four years. Calling it a drug emergency, the Clinton administration wants to give Colombia $1.6 billion in its war against drug producers. Pressing Congress for quick approval, drug policy chief Barry McCaffrey explained the cocoa-producing regions of southern Colombia have been taken over by Marxist guerrillas known as</s>FARC. BARRY MCCAFFREY, U.S. DRUG POLICY CHIEF: Essentially, a third of the land area is under cocoa cultivation. It is unbelievable, and there is five FARC fronts down there, thousands of them armed to the teeth.</s>KOPPEL: Guerrillas have been fighting for three decades to overthrow the Colombian government, and some critics of the administration's aid package fear President Pastrana might divert U.S. military aid to help the Colombian army in its civil war, a charge denied by Colombia's president. Under Secretary of State Thomas Pickering in Colombia this week insisted the U.S. would not be drawn into another Vietnam-like quagmire and said that most of the U.S. money would go to train Colombia's own anti-drug battalions and to fund military supplies, including 30 state of the art Blackhawk helicopters. House Republicans not only agree, but believe the U.S. should have acted sooner.</s>REP. DAN BURTON (R), INDIANA: The war in Colombia is our war, as well as the Colombians. Every year, 14,000 Americans die from drugs and drug-related violence, and those drugs are coming mainly from Colombia.</s>KOPPEL (on camera): Approval of the aid package seems a given. If that happens, Colombia will become the third-largest recipient of U.S. assistance following Israel and Egypt. Andrea Koppel, CNN, the State Department.
Clinton Administration Asks Congress For Money to Help Colombia Battle Soaring Drug Production