Both Open Veins (“Colonialism at the UN”) & The Gringo Tambo (“UN international narcotics board calls on Bolivia to outlaw coca leaf”) have already commented on the recent UN report on coca. GT quotes some of the language in the UN document; Open Veins gives historical background on the matter.
Either way, the UN report seems quite odd. It’s also more aggressive than the US government’s policy towards coca, which has always accepted that Bolivia should retain some quantity of coca production (the numbers are frequently disputed, but often in the range of 4,000 to 6,000 hectares) for “traditional” purposes. In other words, even the US government—despite its promotion of a heavy-handed policy of forced eradication—recognizes that “coca” is not the same as “cocaine.”
So, frankly, I’m confused at the UN report. What happened?
This hard-line stance of the INCB may have something to do with the Bolivian diplomats' reaction in Vienna to their previous report (I believe about a year ago).
As I recall, the language of that report was mild compared to the present one, but nonetheless it unleashed the fury of the Bolivian delegation in Vienna, leading to a verbal (and almost physical) assault of the head on the INCB during the session, who was then "disinvited" to visit Bolivia.
Diplomacy has been one of the weakest points of the Morales' government. They have appointed inexperienced hotheaded MAS militants to critical diplomatic posts. The claimed innocuousness of coca leaf is already a very hard sell internationally, and if on top of that you put incompetent and foolhardy people to make the case for a cultural exception, you have a recipe for confrontation.