Brief /
Smuggled Ecuador Gas Fuels Colombia Cocaine Production
A massive flow of smuggled fuel from Ecuador into Colombia is benefiting drug traffickers who use it to produce cocaine and to gas up boats moving...
Brief /
Human Smuggling from Asia to Latin America On Rise
Authorities dismantled a transnational human smuggling ring that brought migrants from South Asia to Brazil and then transported them all the way to the US-Mexico...
Brief /
Women in Brazil PCC Cell Take Part in Planning Killings
Female members of a cell of Brazil’s violent PCC prison gang ordered and carried out the killing of another woman, challenging the assumption that women only...
Brief /
Illegal Fishing Threatens Food Security in Bolívar, Colombia
Destruction of wildlife spurred by illegal fishing in the Ciénaga de Simití swampland in the northern Colombia department of Bolívar has sparked a full-blown...
Analysis /
Sucumbíos: Lawless Ecuador Border Province Is Sanctuary for Traffickers
In January 2019, heavily armed gunmen traveling in a truck and on a motorbike ambushed a small group of anti-narcotics agents in Sucumbíos, the Ecuadorean province...
Brief /
Venezuela Archipelago, New Hotspot for Drug Smuggling
The Los Roques Archipelago -- a group of islands off Venezuela's northern coast known for their white sand beaches and turquoise waters -- has become a staging...
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More than 500 Venezuela Security Officials Involved in Extortion, Kidnappings
More than ten percent of extortion and kidnapping cases recorded in Venezuela involve members of the police and military, demonstrating the country’s continuing...
Analysis /
Ex-FARC Mafia Kill Colombia Indigenous Amid Illicit Crop Conflicts
FARC dissidents massacred a group of indigenous guards protecting a reserve in Colombia's southwestern department of Cauca, adding to the killings of indigenous and...
Analysis /
Brothers’ Arrest Displays History of Narco-Politics in Honduras Drug Corridor
Two brothers -- longtime political powerbrokers in a northeastern region of Honduras that is a major maritime and aerial drug route -- have been arrested in a case...
Analysis /
Will Killers Walk Free in Cartel Ambush of Mormon Family in Mexico?
The brazen murder of several children and women from a prominent American Mormon family by cartel gunmen in northern Mexico has yet again highlighted the country's...
Analysis /
Esmeraldas: An Ecuador Province Gripped by Drug Conflict
For the Ecuadorean province of Esmeraldas on the Pacific side of the Colombia border, 2019 began with a warning that the horrors of the past year were no...
Brief /
Honduras Prison Murder Silences Trafficker With Links to President’s Brother
An alleged drug trafficker whose ledgers proved key to convicting the Honduran president’s brother was brutally murdered in prison, leading to speculation that he...