South American drug cartels are invading the West African region with the help of local criminal groups to find their way to the European market. Some senior officials in the region have been indicted for the illegal trade including the son of former President Lansana Conte who openly admitted to the illegal business.
Mexican and Colombian drug cartels have expanded their activities to various countries in West Africa including Nigeria where they used local gangs to find safe haven for their onward distribution for the profitable European market, the Cable News Network (CNN) reported on Tuesday.

Burkina Faso in particular has come under the microscope over the last year for its involvement in the million dollar drug trade. Some senior military officials are reported to be actively involved in the cocaine business. Some members of the army nearly clashed with Police officers who were trying to search a cargo plane full of cocaine which landed at the country’s main airport.

The army rejects for a search on that plane thereby allowing the crew to disembark and does their transaction with impunity This incident happens exactly one week after a small cargo plane with cocaine substance make a forceful landing at the Sierra Leone International airport.

A senior official of the United States Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) told the US Senate that "West Africa is a smuggler's dream, suffering from a combination of factors that make the area particularly vulnerable. It is among the poorest and least stable regions in the world. Governments are weak and ineffective and officials are often corrupt.”

Similarly, retired four-star Army Gen. Barry McCaffrey, who was drug policy director for US former President Clinton said according to the Daily Trust newspaper that West Africa also is particularly attractive to traffickers because it is near "the soft underbelly of Europe.”

A UN report said about 1,000 tons of pure cocaine are produced each year, nearly 60 percent of which evades law enforcement interception and makes it to market, that's a wholesale global market of about $70 billion. According to the report at least nine top-tier Latin American drug cartels have established bases in 11 West African nations because there is "less law enforcement in West Africa," just as there is more profit in Europe than the United States.

The UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon recently stated in his report to the Security Council that Drug trafficking still poses serious threat to the regions stability.