Hugo Banzer opens Bolivia drug meeting

The Bolivian president, Hugo Banzer, has opened a two-day international conference on the illegal drugs trade in the eastern city of Santa Cruz.

Delegations from Europe, the United States and Latin America will share ideas on combatting drug-trafficking.

As the conference began, Mr Banzer announced that after an intensive three-and-a-half year offensive, all illegal coca plantations in the Chapare region had been eradicated.

The government said only two-thousand hectares of illegal coca plantations remained in Bolivia, down from forty-five-thousand when Mr Banzer took office in 1997.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service