Historic but not enough? Inside the Colombian president’s anti-drug strategy?

(Al Jazeera Media Network) On November 20, 2025, Colombian police burst into a shipping container in Buenaventura, Colombia’s largest port on the Pacific Coast, foiling a scheme to smuggle 14 tonnes of cocaine, valued at $390 million.

It was the Colombian police’s largest cocaine seizure in a decade — and a sign of Colombian President Gustavo Petro’s ramped-up campaign to intercept drugs.

Since taking office last year, United States President Donald Trump has repeatedly accused Petro of doing “nothing” to stop the flow of cocaine, resulting in Colombia’s decertification as an ally in the “war on drugs”.

But in the final months of his term, Petro is on a campaign to prove that his policy does work, in part by pointing to record cocaine seizures.

“We can say it proudly: We are the government that has seized the most cocaine in the history of the world,” said Petro at a cabinet meeting in January.

Though he took office in 2022 with a call to end the US-led “war on drugs”, Petro has since adopted a modified version of it, placing a greater focus on human rights.

He has cut back on the forced removal of coca — the leafy crop that is used to produce cocaine — arguing that it unfairly targets poor farmers. His administration is negotiating with drug-trafficking groups in the hope of reaching deals that reduce violence. And his administration has petitioned the United Nations to decriminalise coca, citing its traditional uses among Indigenous peoples across the Andes region.

But even as he tries to shift away from prohibitionist tactics, Petro has kept interdiction — the process of intercepting and seizing illicit drugs before they reach their destination — as a pillar of his strategy.

Now, Colombia is seizing more cocaine than ever. In 2025 alone, authorities confiscated a historic 985 tonnes of cocaine, almost four times the weight of the Statue of Liberty.

Still, experts caution that, even with record seizures, Petro has yet to quell tensions with the US.

“I think Petro’s reasoning was: ‘I’ll seize large quantities so the United States won’t pressure me over not eradicating crops.’ But it didn’t work out for him,” said Ana Maria Rueda, a drug policy expert at the Foundation Ideas for Peace, a Colombian research institute.

The numbers themselves may be misleading. Michael Weintraub, the director of the Center for Drug and Safety Studies (CESED) at Bogota’s Andes University, is among those who believe the size of the seizures alone does not equal success.

“ It is a very convenient talking point,” Weintraub said. “But I think we should ask ourselves whether this strategy makes sense.”

Petro is set to leave office in August. But his record of combatting drug trafficking in Colombia comes with high stakes.

Petro is the first left-wing president in Colombia’s history, and his party, the Historic Pact, has to contend with his legacy as the May 31 presidential election approaches.

But many experts are dubious of the increase in cocaine seizures under Petro. They believe that the increase in seizures is actually a result of higher coca production in Colombia, which has reached record levels in recent years.

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime reported that 253,000 hectares (over 625,000 acres) of coca were planted in 2023, a 10-percent jump over the previous year.

A land mass that size is capable of producing more than 2,600 metric tonnes of cocaine.

“It shouldn’t be that surprising, given the precipitous increase in coca crops over the last few years, that we would see a higher number of seizures,” said Weintraub.

The numbers are even less striking when considering the percentage of cocaine being seized.

In 2023, Colombia only intercepted about 28 percent of the cocaine estimated to be produced in the country, about 10 percentage points less than during the previous year.

Ultimately, a lot of cocaine still manages to evade authorities, according to Adam Isacson, director of the Washington Office on Latin America’s defence oversight programme.

Interdiction is a strategy that the Colombian Police and Navy have led for decades, involving the interception of drug shipments along rivers, roads and maritime routes.

The idea is that interdiction raises business costs for drug traffickers, which in turn drives up cocaine prices and reduces consumption.

But the problem with interdiction, Isacson explained, is that criminal organisations expect losses. They treat seizures as another expense in a wildly lucrative business.

“This is the frustration with the drug war,” said Isacson, pointing to the relatively small amount of cocaine seized.

“You’re sort of reduced to just getting a certain amount, maybe driving prices up and making it harder for the narco traffickers, but never really stopping the business.”

The Colombian Navy and the National Police did not respond to requests for comment about the efficacy of their efforts.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/longform/2026/4/14/historic-but-not-enough-colombias-gustavo-petro-defends-cocaine-seizures