Europe's cocaine flown from Nairobi-UN report

NAIROBI, March 1 (Reuters) European cocaine habits are increasingly fed through African nations and the Kenyan capital is the major transit point for trafficking the drug by air, the United Nations drug watchdog today said.

''Cocaine is smuggled by air into Europe via cities in eastern Africa, mainly Nairobi,'' the UN's International Narcotics Control Board said in its 2006 annual report on drug trafficking trends.

''Significant seizures of heroin'' are regularly made at airports in Kenya, Mauritius, Ethiopia and Tanzania, the report said.

Police seized a 1.1 tonne cache of cocaine in December 2004 worth an estimated 88 million dollars, one of Africa's biggest drug seizures to date.

Several Kenya Airways employees soon after were caught smuggling the drug into London's Heathrow Airport, raising fears some of the cocaine had escaped from police custody.

Today's report said trafficking networks take advantage of the region's weak interdiction capacity and lack of officers trained to investigate narcotics.

''A lack of adequate funds and specialists ... are contributing to Kenya becoming a major route for heroin and cocaine trafficking,'' Kenya's assistant minister of health, Dr Wilfred Machage, told a news conference.

Diplomats say corruption among police and customs agents makes Kenya an attractive destination for smugglers.

Reuters SY RS2145