Did you know that American drug money has financed terrorist activities in countries such as Colombia, and that the international drug trade generates profits which help terrorists flourish in Afghanistan?

Above: Village in Colombia destroyed by terrorism

In many countries, terrorism and drug trafficking go hand in hand. Drug production and trafficking are often a source of funding for terrorists' activities--Colombia and Peru are examples where the proceeds from the cocaine trade were used by terrorist organizations to destabilize those governments. In Afghanistan , opium production profits benefited the Taliban whose regime sheltered terrorists.

A narco-terrorist organization is defined as an organized group that is complicit in the activities of drug trafficking to further or fund premeditated, politically motivated violence to influence a government or group of people. Although the DEA does not specifically target terrorists, some of the powerful international drug trafficking organizations DEA has targeted have never hesitated to use violence and terror to advance their interests. As of October 2003, the DEA has identified seventeen Foreign Terrorist Organizations, as designated by the Department of State, with potential ties to the drug trade. More generally, we know that drugs and terror frequently share a common ground of geography, money, and violence.

Through the decades, several prominent narcotics traffickers have been associated with terrorism:

Above: Pablo Escob

Pablo Escobar: Since the 1970s, Colombia has been home to some of the most violent and sophisticated drug trafficking organizations in the world. The group that held dominance through the 1980s was the Medellin cartel. Its violent leader was Pablo Escobar, originally a common street thief, who built the cartel into a multi-billion dollar business. Escobar fought arrest and extradition, gaining a $500 million dollar bounty on his head before being killed by Colombian officials in 1993.

Above: Carlos Lehder

Carlos Lehder : Drug trafficker Carlos Lehder declared that "cocaine and marijuana have become an arm of the struggle against America ." He told a Spanish television interviewer in 1985 that cocaine was the "atomic bomb" with which to fight United States imperialism and spark revolution in Latin America . He is currently serving a life sentence in U.S. federal prison.

Abimael Guzman : Known by his followers in Peru as "President Gonzalo," Abimael Guzman was the founder of the Sendero Luminoso, or the Shining Path in the late 1960s. Guzman, a former university professor, derived the name of the organization from the teachings of Jose Carlos Mariategui, an avowed Marxist, who once stated that Marxism was a "shining path to the future." Guzman and the Shining Path, however, have followed Maoist teachings from Communist China as well as Leninism and Marxism.

The Shining Path has been characterized as one of the most violent terrorist organizations in the Western hemisphere. While at first using peaceful means of protesting the government of Peru , in 1980 Guzman shifted the focus of the organization to waging a "people's war" against the institutions of Peru , hoping to replace them with a Communist peasant revolutionary regime.

Abimael Guzman was arrested in 1992 by the government of Peru and sentenced to life in prison without parole. Once estimated as an organization of over 10,000, it is believed that the Shining Path has only small bands still operating on a limited basis today

Above: U Khun Sa

U Khun Sa, Leader, Shan United Army , Burma : The son of an exiled Nationalist Kuomintang (KMT) Chinese General and a Thai mother, U Khun Sa has been considered one of the most successful drug lords in the Golden Triangle area of Burma , Thailand , and Laos , becoming known as the "King of Opium." Starting in 1960, Khun Sa amassed a personal army that was estimated to number over 80,000 soldiers. Khun Sa used those troops, known as the Mong Tai or Shan United Army, to support poppy cultivation in the southern regions of Burma/Myanmar. Facing defections of troops, rivalries with the United Wa State Army, and a DEA operation known as "Tiger Trap," Khun Sa surrendered his army to Burmese troops in exchange for amnesty. It is reported that Khun Sa has continued to be engaged in the drug business and that the United Wa State Army has become deeply involved in opium and methamphetamine production in the Golden Triangle.

Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, Secretary General of Hezbollah: Hassan Nasrallah joined Hezbollah at age 36, shortly after the group's founding with Iranian support in1982. Elected leader of Hezbollah in February 1992, Nasrallah oversees an organization that was created with the goal of expelling Israel from a security zone in Southern Lebanon and the creation of an Islamic republic in Lebanon . Hezbollah does not recognize the creation of the state of Israel in 1948. As the organization has grown over the years, it has been connected both to terrorist activity throughout the Middle East as well as social programs benefiting the Shiite communities in Lebanon . Hezbollah holds twelve seats in the 128-member elected Lebanese parliament. Current support for Hezbollah comes from both Iran and Syria .