West African Drugs

The struggling continent has been becoming a conduit for drugs shipped particularly from Colombia and headed towards expanding the market in Europe. There have been signs here and there about the accelerating extent of the trade. The recent coup in Guinea is said to have been a drug coup. Recent assassinations in Guinea-Bissau being linked to the trade from Colombia. Nigeria and other north and west African countries have always been a transit point for heroin. But this is different, according to Chris Blattman and Stephen Ellis. Now it's cocaine, which is apparently pervasive in Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Sierra Leone, etc. Stephen Ellis' piece is a terrific history of the drug trade in west Africa. Very much worth a read.