Drug and violence links from around the region

From the Miami Herald 

The U.S. government’s anti-drug smuggling offensive on the Mexican border has caused a “balloon effect” that is expected to spur more narcotics trafficking through the Caribbean, South Florida’s top federal official warned Thursday.

Cocaine and other illegal drugs flooding the United States are still flowing mostly through a pipeline from Colombia to Mexico across the Southwest border. But the trend is expected to shift, U.S. Attorney Wifredo Ferrer said in Miami Thursday.

“We’re hitting them hard there,’’ Ferrer told reporters. “It’s only a matter of time before we see an increase here.’’

That's right. Our success in Mexico and Central America is leading to an uptick in drugs through the Caribbean. 


Some other drug and violence-related stories

Feds seize drug sub with 7.5 tons of cocaine off Honduran coast

Mexico's drug war comes to Belize (Why not the United States' drug war?)

 Guatemala: Drug Trafficking and Violence 

As Elections Loom, Report Profiles Guatemala's Drug Trafficking World

More on the the decline in homicides in Guatemala from Carlos Mendoza at CABI

At least 6 Colombians killed in Guatemala attacks (it's early yet, but October still looks a little more violent than the past few months)

Guatemala's murder rate hit a terrifying 52 per 100,000 in 2009. Colom is leaving with a murder rate approaching 40 per 100,000. Not bad considering where Honduras and El Salvador are today.

Mexico's southern border awash in crime and violence

Tim Johnson of McClatchy Newspapers has an article up on Mexico's southern border awash in crime and violence.  He provides a decent description of the porous border between Mexico and Guatemala. However, I don't really care for the introduction.

If the border that separates the United States and Mexico is fairly easy to penetrate, then Mexico's other border - the southern one, abutting Guatemala - is virtually a sieve.

If the US-Mexico border were actually "fairly easy to penetrate", immigrants from Latin America and around the world would not be paying $5,000 or more for people to take them across Mexico and into the United States. Years ago, migrants could cross the border on their own or pay a coyote a small amount to help them.

If the US-Mexico border were actually "fairly easy to penetrate", several hundred people would not be dying each year from a variety of causes including murder and exposure to the elements (heath stroke, dehydration, hypothermia). And the number killed crossing the border does not include the hundreds, most likely thousands, that are killed each year crossing Mexico on their way north.

A lot of people successfully cross the US-Mexico border each day. However, I guess I just don't agree with the description that it's "fairly easy to penetrate."

Drug Cartels Infiltrate the Catholic Church in Mexico?

Al Jazeera reports that officials in Mexico are concerned that drug cartels have used the Catholic Church to launder profits from the drug trade.  While US authorities have a $7 million reward for Heriberto Lazcano, one of the leaders of the Zetas gang, his plaque is predominantly displayed in one church's chapel.