Drug shipments from the DR and Haiti to the US have decreased recently and a spokesman for the American Drug Control Policy office says that only nine per cent of all drugs now entering the US come from Hispaniola. Bradley Hittle heads up the Narcotics Countries of Origin Division. He said, “Most of that nine per cent comes from the Dominican Republic; ironically the amount of drugs coming from Haiti has declined in the last nine months. We don’t know why but we can speculate that’s because of the chaos in that part of the island.” Hittle took part yesterday in an international seminar entitled “The Caribbean and the United States: Building a national agenda.”San Pedro de Macorís to get big new free zone??A new free zone planned for San Pedro de Macorís will create 30,000 jobs and will attract large businesses such as LG and Hyundai. The President of the Chamber of Deputies, Rafaela Alburquerque, spoke yesterday at an American Chamber of Commerce meeting in San Pedro. She said the new Free Trade and Finance Zone will reactivate the economy of the eastern region as well as benefit the whole country by bringing in large amounts of capital and technology. El Siglo reports that 200 new businesses will go up in the San Pedro free zone. One hundred executive villas, a marina, a cruise ship wharf, a water purification plant, a golf course and a power plant will also be built in the area, according to Alburquerque.
