Mind numbing in more then one way...

Bolivia's Morales to lobby UN panel in support of coca farming
10/03/2009 16:00 MOSCOW, March 10 (RIA Novosti) - Bolivian President Evo Morales is poised to promote the growing of coca in his country during a UN drugs meeting in Vienna this week, according to South American media reports on Tuesday.
Bolivia signed an agreement with the United Nations in 1961 that gave the country 25 years to eradicate the growing of coca. More than 20 years since the deadline passed, however, the country is the third largest grower of coca in the world after Colombia and Peru.
Morales will attempt to convince the UN Narcotics Substances Committee to reexamine the legal aspects in regard to punishment for growing coca. The body opened a three-day meeting in Vienna on Tuesday.
Bolivia's first indigenous president came to power in 2006 as a leader of the country's coca farmers and has said that it is his "responsibility as the president and leader of the country" to promote the growing of coca as an essential part of Bolivian culture and traditions.
"We are defending our traditions and rituals, not cocaine," Morales said on the eve of his trip. "No one should ignore the history and culture of a people." He has said that coca leaves have been used in traditional medicine and religious ceremonies for thousands of years.
Morales is a strong supporter of the coca farmers and plantations, and has even included "coca's traditional culture" into the country's new constitution, which was passed in February.
The president has said that the strict punishment for growing coca, which has been in effect for decades, is a "provocation in regard to identity and culture" of the Bolivian people and that there are "strong arguments" that can be shown to the UN in regard to the "scientific, cultural, economic, and political" positive aspects of growing coca.
Though Morales supports the growing of coca in his country, he actively opposes drug trafficking. In the last two years alone, some 18,000 hectares (44,500 acres) of illegal coca plantations have been destroyed. According to Bolivian law, no more than 5,000 hectares (12,355 acres) are allowed to be sown for the country's internal consumption, although the total area under coca cultivation is estimated at more than five times that amount.