NARCOTERRORISM

noun Also written narco-terrorism (Drugs) (People and Society) Violent crime and acts of terrorism carried out as a by-product of the illicit manufacture, trafficking, or sale of drugs, especially against any individual or institution attempting to enforce anti-drugs laws. Etymology: Formed by adding narco- (the combining form of narcotic) to terrorism. History and Usage: Narcoterrorism came into the news in the mid eighties, when it became clear that, in a number of countries where dangerous but highly profitable drugs such as cocaine are produced, the influential producers or 'drug barons' were in alliance with guerrilla and terrorist organizations to defeat any attempts to enforce anti-drugs laws. Alleging government collusion with narcoterrorism in a number of Central and South American countries, some US authorities favoured intervention in the affairs of foreign countries to stop the flow of drugs into their own country; in view of the serious and rapidly growing problems of drug abuse and drug-related crime within the US in the second half of the eighties, some argued that to manufacture drugs at all was itself a narcoterrorist act. In the late eighties reports of the activities of the narcoterrorists centred on the plight of Colombia, where a government determined to stop the drug traffic was the target of repeated attacks in 1989-90. Mr. Belaunde Terry said the victims [of a raid on an anti-drug team in Peru] were 'heroes' and the killers were 'narco-terrorists'. New York Times 19 Nov. 1984, section A, p. 14 Calling cocaine manufacture 'narco-terrorism', as White House spokesman Edward Djerejian did in defense of the raid, the State Department merges its all purpose justification for intervention with the politics of drug warfare. Nation 2 Aug. 1986, p. 68 It is the consensus among anti-drug officials here [in Colombia] that those two men are the masterminds of a 'narcoterrorist' campaign that has driven this nation of 32 million people into a state of widespread anguish and fear. Los Angeles Times 13 Dec. 1989, section A, p. 6