“I am very pleased with the success that we have had in collaboration with the international community (but) I still feel we need more support for our drugs fighting efforts” – President Jagdeo

PRESIDENT Bharrat Jagdeo yesterday welcomed the collaboration that led to the recent seizure overseas of more than 500 kilos of cocaine shipped from Guyana but said the United States, Canada and other developed countries have to do more to aid the fight here against drugs traffickers.

“I am very pleased with the success that we have had in collaboration with the international community (but) I still feel we need more support for our drugs fighting efforts”, he said at a press conference at his office in Georgetown.

He said local agencies need more equipment, training and a whole range of assistance from the developed world in the drugs fight, noting that the collaboration has worked well.

A local official yesterday bemoaned the delay in requests for information from American and Canadian agencies in the recent big busts in Canada and the U.S. He said investigators here had to release a suspect because they had not received information requested on the man from the Canadian and American agencies.

Mr. Jagdeo said the policy of the developed countries is counter-productive, especially in deporting convicted drugs offenders to places like Guyana.

He said the developed world wants countries like Guyana to do more in the battle against drugs trafficking but insists on sending high-profile and other traffickers here and to other countries.

“While we welcome the partnership and continue to work together with our international partners, there are always these dimensions”, he said.

The recent interception by Canadian and American agencies of cocaine shipped from here and the resulting media publicity are apparently fuelling the heat on central local players who still have to pay suppliers for the seized consignments, one source said.

The source said they are tracking a West Demerara businessman who is a known major drugs dealer and has been implicated in the recent shipments.

Some of those under questioning by Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) agents and police are among local buyers of cocaine from suppliers in Colombia and Venezuela, the official said.

Those being questioned include Robin Barakat, a Canadian citizen named as a suspect and who turned himself in to CANU Monday. A source said the 37-year-old gave his name as Salim Paul and was accompanied by attorney Vic Puran when he turned up.

The source said he admitted owning a pawn shop in Georgetown and knowing Indarpaul Moninlall Doodnauth, another suspect is being questioned by investigators but denied involvement in shipping cocaine to Canada.

Barakat’s business partner Keith King also turned himself into CANU, the source said.

An official said police have questioned Barakat about a shipment of cocaine that was intercepted last year in Jamaica.

Doodnauth, also known as Teddy, 48, a businessman of Lusignan West, East Coast Demerara, and brother of the man charged in Canada after the recent big cocaine bust there, turned himself in to officials last week.

Police had issued wanted bulletins for Doodnauth and Amalek Orlando Watson, 31, a self-employed man of Annandale West, East Coast Demerara.

Doodnauth and Watson were allegedly middle men in the shipment of two consignments of cocaine concealed among pepper sauce bottles from Guyana. They allegedly packed the cocaine into the boxes with the bottles of pepper sauce, the source said.

A central suspect, Nymrod Singh, 37, of 123 New Road, Vreed-en-Hoop, West Coast Demerara, was held Saturday by police in Bartica and has been grilled by CANU and police officers.

Singh was wanted in connection with the interception of cocaine hidden in nibbi furniture seized in Miami last week and shipped on behalf of the West Coast Demerara businessman, sources said.

The 373 pounds of cocaine were stashed in the furniture consignment here and shipment was arranged by a customs broker through a ghost firm, a source said.

Police and CANU agents are also looking for Reginald Rodrigues, 55, who owns Rodrigues Tropical Export based at 141 Victoria Street, Albouystown, Georgetown.

He was deported from the U.S. in 2001 after a three-year sentence in jail for conspiracy to import cocaine, the source said.

According to the source, investigators are also looking for his wife Edna, a swimming coach at the Colgrain Pool in Georgetown.

A cocaine shipment seized by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in the U.S. Virgin Islands last week was worth CAN$14.5 million.

Media reports in Canada said the consignment was destined for Caribbean International Food Distributors, the same company run by a Guyanese man charged by Canadian police in the major CAN$40 million drug shipment earlier last week.

Mahendrapaul Doodnauth, 45, of Seguin Court in Toronto, is charged with importing cocaine, conspiracy to import cocaine and possession of cocaine for the purpose of trafficking.

The second container was searched in St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands, on Dec. 24 by DEA agents acting on information received from Canadian investigators, the Toronto Star reported.

Inside the ship, police found 100 kilograms of cocaine hidden inside cardboard dividers in about 140 boxes of food seasoning destined for the Etobicoke-based distribution company run by Doodnauth.

Along with the previous shipment, the amount of cocaine seized totals 376 kilograms, with an estimated street value of CAN$54.5 million.