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 News Around the Republic of Mexico | January 2008 
Mexico to Reroute Small Planes in Drug Check
 Catherine Bremer - Reuters
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 |  | The rerouting plan would ensure they undergo the same rigorous checks as commercial flights from Central and South America, which are checked for cocaine and heroin. |  | | | |
Mexico City – Mexico plans to reroute all private flights arriving from Central and South America to three airports where they will be inspected by special drug squads, a Mexican newspaper reported this week.
Under the plan, called “Operation Clean-up,” small planes would have to stop at either Chetumal, Cozumel or Tapachula airports in southern Mexico for inspections by the army and federal police before continuing to their final destination, the daily El Universal said, citing three government sources.
The operation would be a new front in President Felipe Calderón's year-old war on Mexico's powerful drug cartels which provide the bulk of the drugs on U.S. streets and whose violent turf wars left more than 2,500 dead last year.
“Special attention will be given to flights classed as 'high-risk,' which are those coming from Colombia, Venezuela and Panama, which are the areas where most of the drugs seized in the past year originated,” the newspaper quoted an official at the attorney general's office as saying.
Neither the attorney general's office, the transport ministry nor the public security ministry could confirm the plan, which El Universal said could be underway in March and would not affect commercial or cargo aircraft.
Drug planes packed with South American cocaine – often with passenger seats ripped out to make space – land in Mexico where drugs are sent on to the United States by truck or small boat.
Private flights from abroad are supposed to land at one of Mexico's various international airports, where they are subjected to routine searches. However El Universal said small planes can land at private airstrips if they give notice and pay a waiver fee.
The rerouting plan would ensure they undergo the same rigorous checks as commercial flights from Central and South America, which are checked for cocaine and heroin.
“The government's intention is to have more control over this type of flight,” a federal government official was quoted as saying.
In October a private jet with nearly four tons of cocaine aboard crashed in jungle in southern Mexico.
(Editing by Vicki Allen) |
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