Al Giordano: State Dept Heavy Dispatched to Brazil

That didn't take long.

Days after Brazil's Congress approved a bill to decriminalize drug users, a heavy hitter from Foggy Bottom was dispatched to Brazil to discuss, among other matters, ''security concerns including terrorism and narcotrafficking,'' according to this press release from the U.S. General Consulate in São Paulo:

"Brasília, February 19, 2004 — Under Secretary of State Marc Grossman, the State Department’s top political affairs official, is visiting Brazil February 18-19. After touring the new facilities of the U.S. Consulate General in São Paulo on February 18, Grossman will hold talks today with high-level Brazilian government officials in Brasília. These annual discussions are part of an on-going bilateral dialogue between the United States and Brazil.

"Under Secretary Grossman will review a wide range of bilateral and multilateral issues in his meetings with senior Brazilian officials. Among the topics to be discussed are the state of bilateral relations, U.S. and Brazilian views on matters of regional and global importance, the United Nations, and security concerns including terrorism and narcotrafficking."

Let's take this opportunity to look at the U.S. Embassy and Consulate's team on the field in Brasilia and São Paulo, and their past histories that just happen to coincide with US Embassy dirty tricks and other atrocities in those regions, for some perspective on the underhanded smear campaign that has begun against leading drug policy reform advocates in Brazil at the very moment that the movement is on the verge of victory...

U.S. Consul General Patrick Duddy (see his official rap sheet here) is a recent arrival to Brazil. Interestingly, his official resume states that...

"He (Duddy) was the Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in La Paz, Bolivia. A career member of the Senior Foreign Service holding the personal rank of Minister Counselor, Consul General Duddy has served at U.S. embassies in Chile, the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Paraguay and Panama, as well as in Washington, D.C... He is also a graduate of the National War College where he received a master's degree in National Security Strategy."

The name "Duddy" is familiar to Narco News readers, as the Embassy official in Bolivia now revealed, through a Freedom of Information Act filing by Jeremy Bigwood, to have sent a classified cable to Washington, as Narco News has reported:

"A memo sent by the United States Embassy in La Paz, Bolivia, to Secretary of State Colin Powell and other officials in Washington last December reveals that U.S. officials knew that the December 6, 2001 assassination of coca growers' union leader Casimiro Huanca had been committed by Bolivian government security forces."

That official was the very same Patrick Duddy now promoted to General Consul in São Paulo. As a go-to guy in the La Paz Embassy's dirty war against social movements, he now appears in Brazil, where drug policy reform is moving forward at impressive speed. The question: Is Mr. Duddy repeating his Bolivian tricks in Brazil, as leaders and movements for drug policy reform are being smeared with false accusations right now?

U.S. Ambassador Donna Hrinak (read her rap sheet here), has quite the "Foreign Service" record:

"Donna J. Hrinak is the U.S. Ambassador to the Federative Republic of Brazil. She arrived in Brasília April 19, 2002, and presented her credentials to President Fernando Henrique Cardoso four days later.

"From July 2000 until her present appointment, she served as U.S. Ambassador to Venezuela."

Study those dates, carefully, kind reader: She was Ambassador to Venezuela during the attempted military coup there of April 11, 2002, and after that coup failed she was suddenly scooped up and transfered to Brazil. In other words, she was the top U.S. official in Venezuela for almost two years leading up to the coup attempt and during its three-day duration. Less than a week later - poof! - she was disappeared from the scene of the crime and airdropped into the scene of coming crimes.

Her rap sheet is filled with interesting locations and dates that correspond with various well known election frauds, assassinations, and atrocities from Mexico to Haiti to the Caribbean...

"She previously served as U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Bolivia (1997-2000) and as U.S. Ambassador to the Dominican Republic (1994-1997)...

From 1991-1993, Ambassador Hrinak was Deputy Assistant Secretary for Inter-American Affairs, responsible for overseeing U.S. policy and relations with Mexico and the Caribbean. Earlier, she was Minister Counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. She also has served at Foreign Service posts in Caracas, Venezuela; São Paulo, Brazil; Bogota, Colombia; Warsaw, Poland; and Mexico City. In the Department of State, she has worked as Regional Affairs Officer for Central America. Ambassador Hrinak joined the Foreign Service in 1974."

In defense of Brazilian drug policy leaders who now find themselves on the receiving end of Duddy-Hrinak type smear tactics, Narco News has dispatched our famous "swarm coverage" throughout Brazilian territory and Washington DC to get to the bottom of defamatory rumors that we referred to yesterday here in The Narcosphere.

We've already amassed interesting evidence about the falsehoods of the smears, the innocence of the accused, and the hypocrisy of various accusers. When our investigation is done, we will report it all to you.

STOP PRESS: In Brazil: Fábio Mesquita & Regina Bueno Exonerated February 22, 2004

Please Distribute Widely

Dear Colleague,

Hot off the presses! The AIDS News Agency of Brazil (Agência de Notícias da Aids) has just reported that the Special Commission of the of the City of São Paulo Brazil, last night, exonerated drug policy reform leader – and the city’s anti-AIDS coordinator – Fábio Mesquita, and subcontractor Regina Carvalho Bueno, of accusations of wrongdoing.

The latest development comes (in fact, the dubious and false accusations arrived just three weeks ago) at the precise hour when the Drug Users Decriminalization Bill moves toward increasingly certain approval by the full Congress and the signature of Brazilian President Lula da Silva, of the Workers Party (PT, in its Portuguese initials), and this victory is likely to put the legislation back on the fast track.

Mesquita – who voluntarily stepped down from his post earlier this month pending the results of an investigation into the legal complaint filed by the daily Folha de São Paulo (he was not “removed” as some have maliciously charged) – will, sources tell Narco News, soon be back at work coordinating one of the largest Harm Reduction programs in the world. Among the programs he founded is one that distributes 27,000 clean syringes a month to injected drug users in order to prevent the spread of AIDS and other illnesses through the sharing of dirty needles.

Mesquita is widely regarded as the father of the Latin American Harm Reduction movement, the popular cause in Brazil and elsewhere to limit the harms associated with drug use under prohibition. Narco News readers are already familiar with the victories already won by Dr. Fábio Mesquita (see Fabio Mesquita at the Threshold of Victory: Brazil’s Prognosis for a Speedy Recovery Due to “Dr. Harm Reduction’s” Cure, Narco News, May 12, 2003), and with those of Regina Bueno, who, as that story reported, was prosecuted in 1995 for distributing clean needles to addicts in Santos, Brazil.

The Commission additionally exonerated Regina Bueno of an accusation that Harm Reduction work she did as a subcontractor of a program sponsored by Unesco and the city anti-AIDS department constituted “nepotism” supposedly because she is the ex-wife of Mesquita....

Read more of the whole truth at...

http://www.narconews.com/

(And some pointed critique toward those who distorted the truth and defamed these great leaders and reformers)...

http://www.narconews.com/

From somewhere in a country called América,

Al Giordano
Publisher
The Narco News Bulletin
http://www.narconews.com/
narconews@hotmail.com

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