A British politician said he was forced during a trip to Columbia to eat coffee whitener to prove to a group of soldiers that he was not trafficking drugs.

Michael Fabricant, a Conservative Member of Parliament representing Lichfield and Burntwood, said he was on a South American vacation with a friend when he was stopped by a group of Columbian soldiers toting M16s, The Times of London reported Friday.

Fabricant said the soldiers searched his and his friend's bags and found an unlabeled jar of Coffee Mate that the soldiers mistook for cocaine.

It took some explanation, as I don't speak more than two or three words in Spanish, for them to accept it was Coffee Mate, Fabricant said Friday from back in Britain. They didn't want to taste it as pure cocaine is fairly poisonous so I had to eat several mouthfuls in front of them, with guns aimed at me, until they could see that it had no ill effect -- except afterwards I felt as sick as a dog.

You've got to be very careful about what you eat and drink in certain places, and I didn't want to put milk in my coffee, Fabricant told The Guardian, explaining why he had brought the artificial whitener. I doubt the soldiers even knew what it was or what I was on about. And I suppose it does look a bit like cocaine.

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