News

June 8, 1998

REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT TO THE SPECIAL SESSION OF THE UNITED NATIONS GENERAL ASSEMBLY


	     		  


                         THE WHITE HOUSE

                  Office of the Press Secretary
                      (New York, New York)
______________________________________________________________
For Immediate Release                                     June 8, 
1998     

	     
                    REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT
                  TO THE SPECIAL SESSION OF THE
                 UNITED NATIONS GENERAL ASSEMBLY
	     
	     
                         United Nations
                       New York, New York			  
     	       


10:50 A.M. EDT
	     
	     
	     THE PRESIDENT:  Mr. Secretary General, President 
Udovenko, Executive Director Arlacchi, distinguished fellow 
leaders.  Today we join at this Special Session of the U.N. 
General Assembly to make common cause against the common threat 
of worldwide drug trafficking and abuse.
	     
	     Let me begin by thanking my friend, President 
Zedillo, for his vision in making this session possible, and for 
his courageous resolve against drugs.  And I thank all the 
nations represented here who are committed to fight for our 
children's future by fighting drugs together.  
	     
	     Ten years ago, the United Nations adopted a 
path-breaking convention to spur cooperation against drug 
trafficking.  Today, the potential for that kind of cooperation 
has never been greater, or more needed.  As divisive blocks and 
barriers have been dismantled around the world, as technology has 
advanced and democracy has spread, our people benefit more and 
more from nations working and learning together.  Yet the very 
openness that enriches our lives is also exploited by criminals, 
especially drug traffickers.  
	     
	     Today we come here to say no nation is so large and 
powerful that it can conquer drugs alone; none is too small to 
make a difference.  All share a responsibility to take up the 
battle.  Therefore, we will stand as one against this threat to 
our security and our future.
	     
	     The stakes are high, for the drug empires erode the 
foundations of democracies, corrupt the integrity of market 

economies, menace the lives, the hopes, the futures of families 
on every continent.  Let there be no doubt, this is ultimately a 
struggle for human freedom.
	     

	     For the first time in history, more than half the 
world's people live under governments of their own choosing.  In 
virtually every country, we see the expansion of expressions of 
individual liberty.  We cannot see it all squandered for millions 
of people because of a perverse combination of personal weakness 
and national neglect.  We have to prove to the drug traffickers 
that they are wrong.  We are determined and we can make a 
difference.  
	     
	     Nations have shown that with determined and 
relentless efforts, we can turn this evil tide.  In the United 
States, drug use has dropped 49 percent since 1979.  Recent 
studies show that drug use by our young people is stabilizing, 
and in some categories, declining.  Overall, cocaine use has 
dropped 70 percent since 1985.  The crack epidemic has begun to 
recede.  Last year, our Coast Guard seized more than 100,000 
pounds of cocaine.  Today, Americans spend 37 percent less on 
drugs than a decade ago.  That means that over $34 billion 
reinvested in our society, rather than being squandered on drugs.  
	     Many other nations are making great strides.  Mexico 
set records for eradication in 1997.  Peruvian coca cultivation 
has been slashed 42 percent since 1995.  Colombia's growing 
aerial eradication program has destroyed tens of thousands of 
hectares of coca.  Thailand's opium poppy growth is steadily 
decreasing, this year alone down 24 percent.  
	     
	     The United States is also a partner in global law 
enforcement and interdiction efforts, fighting antidrug and -- 
funding antidrug and crime training for more than 82,050* 
officials last year.  In 1997, Latin America and Caribbean 
governments seized some 166 metric tons of cocaine.  Better 
trained police, with improved information sharing, are arresting 
more drug traffickers around the world.  
	     
	     Joint information networks on suspicious financial 
transactions are working in dozens of countries to put the brakes 
on money laundering.  By the end of the year 2000, the United 
States will provide assistance to an additional 20 countries to 
establish and strengthen these financial intelligence units.  We 
must, and we can, deprive drug traffickers of the dirty money 
that fuels their deadly trade.  
	     
	     We are finding strength in numbers, from the 
Anti-Drug Alliance the Western Hemisphere forged at the recent 
Summit of the Americas, to the steps against drugs and crimes the 
G-8 leaders agreed to take last month.  The U.N. International 
Drug Control program, under Executive Director Arlacchi's 
leadership
	     
	     
# 8,250 officials 
	     
	     

is combatting drug production, drug trafficking and drug abuse in 
some of the most difficult corners of the world, while helping to 
make sure the money we spend brings maximum results.  I applaud 
the UNDCP's goal of dramatically reducing coca and opium poppy 
cultivation by 2008.  We will do our part in the United States to 
make this goal a reality.
	     
	     For all the achievements of recent years we must not 
confuse progress with success.  The specter of drugs still haunts 
us.  To prevail we must do more, with dynamic national 
strategies, intensified international cooperation and greater 
resources.  
	     
	     The debate between drug supplying and drug consuming 
nations about whose responsibility the drug problem is has gone 
on too long.  Let's be frank -- this debate has not advanced the 
fight against drugs.  Pointing fingers is distracting.  It does 
not dismantle a single cartel, help a single addict, prevent a 
single child from trying and perhaps dying from heroin.  Besides, 
the lines between countries that are supply countries, demand 
countries, and transit countries are increasingly blurred.  Drugs 
are every nation's problem, and every nation must act to fight 
them -- on the streets, around the kitchen table, and around the 
world.
	     
	     This is the commitment of the United States.  Year 
after year, our administration has provided the largest antidrug 
budgets in history.  Our request next year exceeds $17 billion, 
nearly $6 billion of which will be devoted to demand reduction.  
Our comprehensive national drug control strategy aims to cut 
American drug use and access by half over the next 10 years, 
through strength in law enforcement, tougher interdiction, 
improved treatment, and expanded prevention efforts.  We are 
determined to build a drug-free America and to join with others 
to combat drugs around the world.  
	     
	     We believe attitudes drive actions.  Therefore, we 
wage first the battle in the minds of our young people.  Working 
with Congress and the private sector, the United States has 
launched a major antidrug youth media campaign.  Now, when our 
children turn on the television, surf the Internet, or listen to 
the radio, they will get the powerful message that drugs are 
wrong and can kill them.
	     
	     I will be asking Congress to extend this program 
through 2002.  With congressional support and matching dollars 
from the private sector, we will commit to a five-year, $2 
billion public-private partnership to teach our children to stay 
off drugs.
	     
	     Other nations, including Mexico,  Venezuela, and 
Brazil, are launching similar campaigns.  I had the pleasure of 
talking with the President of Brazil about this at some length 
yesterday.  I hope all our nations can work together to spread 
the word to children all around the world -- drugs destroy young 
lives; don't let them destroy yours.

	     
	     The United States is also working to create a 
virtual university for the prevention and treatment of substance 
abuse, using modern technology to share knowledge and experience 
across national borders.  We will launch this effort next month 
in New Mexico, with an international training course on reducing 
drug demand.  Government officials and other professionals from 
Mexico, El Salvador and Honduras will work with experts on drug 
abuse and gang prevention from the U.S.  The course will be 
linked via satellite to the U.S. Information Agency's Worldnet 
system, so that anyone with access to Worldnet can tune in.
	     
	     Our National Institute for Drug Abuse in the United 
States, which funds 85 percent of global research on drugs, will 
post on the Internet live videotapes of its drug prevention and 
treatment workshops.  This means that anyone, anywhere, with 
access to a computer and modem -- a parent whose child is 
addicted to drugs, a doctor trying to help, a researcher looking 
for a cure -- anyone will be able to obtain the latest, most 
advanced medical knowledge on drugs.
	     
	     Such sharing of information, experience and ideas is 
more important than ever.  That is why I am especially pleased to 
announce the establishment of an international drug fellowship 
program that will enable professionals from all around the world 
to come to the United States and work with our drug fighting 
agencies.  The focus will be on the priorities of this special 
session:  demand reductions, stimulants, precursors, money 
laundering, judicial cooperation, alternative development, and 
eradication of illicit crops.
	     
	     These fellowships will help all of us.  It will help 
our nations to learn from one another while building a global 
force of skilled and experienced drug crusaders.
	     
	     Together we must extend the long arm of the law and 
the hand of compassion to match the global reach of this problem.  
Let us leave here determined to act together in a spirit of trust 
and respect, at home and abroad, against demand and supply, using 
all the tools at our disposal to win the global fight against 
drugs and build a safe and healthy 21st century for our children. 
   
	      Thank you very much.  (Applause.)

            END                        11:06 A.M. EDT