Global Ganja Report

Medical marijuana advocates are telling President Barack Obama he has the power to reclassify cannabis after he said Jan. 31 it is up to Congress. In an exclusive CNN interview, Obama responded to a question about the federal cannabis classification by saying that, "what is and isn't a Schedule I narcotic is a job for Congress." Responded Steph Sherer, executive director of Americans for Safe Access (ASA): "President Obama just told the nation during his State of the Union address that because Congress has been unable to act, he would take executive action where he could on behalf of helping the American people,. The president has the authority to reclassify marijuana and could exercise that authority at any time."

News accounts revealed this week that the US-funded glyphosate spraying in Colombia has been indefinitely suspended after presumed FARC guerillas shot down two fumigation planes—killing one US pilot. One plane came down Sept. 27, killing the pilot, whose name was not revealed. Reports were unclear where this incident took place. The Los Angeles Times on Dec. 17 named the village of Tarra, which is in Norte de Santander, along the Venezuelan border; Bogotá's El Tiempo implied it was in the southern jungle department of Putumayo. A second crop-duster was brought down Oct. 5, apparently at a location in Caquetá—also in the southern jungle. This prompted the US embassy to halt the spraying, according to anonymous sources. Neither the embassy nor the State Department would confirm the report.

A new riot between rival gangs in the dangerously overcrowded prison at  Altamira, in the Mexican border state Tamaulipas, left seven inmates dead Oct. 26.  State authorities said the prisoners were killed with makeshift knives in a fight in one cellblock at the facility, officially known as the Execution and Sanction Center (CEDES). Thirty-one inmates died in a riot in the same prison early last year, pointing to a crisis rooted in the confluence of teeming lock-ups and the bloody narco wars being waged in Tamaulipas both inside and outside the prisons. The state is currently Mexico's most violent. The CEDES was designed to hold 2,000 inmates, but now has a population of more than 3,000. (AP, Notimex, Oct. 26)

The US Supreme Court on Oct. 7 rejected a challenge to the federal government's classification of cannabis as a Schedule I drug with no legitimate medical use. Challenger Americans for Safe Access contended that more than 200 studies have established that cannabis is safe and effective in relieving pain and nausea, and in relieving the effects of chemotherapy, among other medical uses. But federal courts have let stand the Drug Enforcement Administration's stance that the studies are insufficient.

Opposition legislators in Suriname are calling on President Desi Bouterse to resign following the arrest of his son by DEA agents in Panama Aug. 29. Dino Bouterse was was apparently travelling on a diplomatic passport when he was busted on charges of operating a cocaine trafficking ring. The US federal indictment, filed in Manhattan, also charges him with violating firearms laws by wielding an anti-tank weapon during a drug offense.

Mexico's most notorious kingpin, Rafael Caro Quintero, was released Aug. 9 from Puente Grande federal prison in Jalisco where he had been incarcerated for the past 28 years. He left the facility at dawn, several hours before the release order was made public. The First Appellate Tribunal in Guadalajara found in March that Caro Quintero was improperly tried for the 1985 torture-killing of DEA agent Enrique "Kiki" Camarena, and that charges should have been brought at the state rather than federal level. Federal prosecutors immediately appealed to the Supreme Justice Court of the Nation, which refused to rescind the lower court's decision. The Third Circuit Tribunal, also in Guadalajara, has now followed through by issuing Caro Quintero an amparo—a judicial order barring any federal action against him.

Reuters reports that it has reviewed documents revealing the existence of a DEA Special Operations Division (SOD) that partners with the FBI, CIA, NSA, IRS and Homeland Security to share information. The documents show that agents are trained to "recreate" the investigative trail to cover up where the information originated—a nod to the supposed firewall between national security and law enforcement investigations. The SOD, launched in 1994 to combat Latin American cartels, has grown from several dozen employees to several hundred. (Reuters, Aug. 5)

The number of cannabis plants eradicated by law enforcement has dropped over the past years from a record high of over 10 million plants in 2009 and 2010 to under 4 million in 2012, according to newly released statistics. DEA figures put the 2012 total at 3,933,950. DEA officials attribute the decline in part to the budget cutbacks in California, which resulted in "the decreased availability of local law enforcement personnel to assist in eradication efforts."