Tag: narco wars

Afghanistan

Afghanistan opium production hits new record

The latest stats from the UN's annual Afghanistan Opium Survey are in, and the news is grim. Opium production in the war-torn country jumped nearly 87% in 2017, to record levels—an estimated 9,000 metric tons. Areas under poppy cultivation rose by 63%, reaching a record 328,000 hectares and boosting the number of Afghanistan's 34 provinces now cultivating opium from 21 to 24. Since overthrowing the Taliban in 2001, the US has spent nearly $7 billion to combat opium—to spectacularly counter-productive results. (Photo: VOA)

Central America

Nicaragua: women march against army ‘massacre’

The International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women march in Nicaragua's capital was shut down by the riot police, who blocked the streets off shortly after demonstrators gathered. The Managua march was emotionally charged, as it was led by Elea Valle—a campesina woman whose husband, son and daughter were killed two weeks earlier in a raid by army troops on their home in the country's eastern rainforest.

Mexico

UN rights chief against Mexico security legislation

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein warned that Mexico's proposed security legislation will contribute to the atmosphere of impunity in the country. The Law on Internal Security, approved by the Chamber of Deputies last month and now before the Senate, would would allow place police officers to be placed under the command of the armed forces.

Southeast Asia

Duterte backtracks on drug war de-escalation —surprise!

Just weeks after the Philippines' Rodrigo Duterte won rare favorable headlines by pledging to pull the National Police out of his ultra-deadly "drug war," he's already threatening to send them back if the "drug problem becomes worse again." Not coincidentally, the threat comes just as Trump green-lighted Duterte's campaign of mass murder, meeting with him at the Manila ASEAN summit and issuing only praise—with not a peep about human rights. 

Central America

Perverse ironies of Honduran political crisis

The US "certifies" Honduras for continued military aid exactly as the government declares a state of emergency and unleashes the armed forces on protesters. The crisis was sparked by President Juan Orlando Hernández's apparently fraudulent election to a second term. Yet Hernández and his conservative National Party supported the 2009 coup d'etat that ousted Manuel Zelaya from the presidency for merely broaching a second term in supposed violation of the constitution.

Southeast Asia

Duterte drug war de-escalation: how real?

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte won rare favorable international headlines when he said he would pull his National Police force out of his brutal "war on drugs," which has now reached the point of mass murder. The move came after public outrage over the police slaying of an unarmed youth. But Amnesty International notes that he made such promises after a similar outrage a few months back—and nothing changed. 

Mexico

Yet another deadly prison uprising in Mexico

The latest grim manifestation of the unrelenting prison crisis in Latin America comes from the northern Mexican state of Nuevo León, where authorities confirmed that 16 inmates were killed, and 25 wounded, in an uprising at the dangerously overcrowded Penal de Cadereyta facility.

Mexico

Mexico: cartels (or cops) kill yet another journalist

Authorities in San Luis Potosí found the body of local reporter Edgar Daniel Esqueda Castro outside the city's airport, dead of three gunshot wounds. He had been abducted by armed men in police uniforms in a night raid on his home the previous night. Authorities in San Luis Potosí deny that their police were invovled in the abduction.

The Andes

Colombia: security forces ‘massacre’ cocaleros

Some 15 civilians were killed and more than 50 were injured when Colombian security forces opened fire during coca eradication operations in a hotly contested incident at a village in the southern region of Nariño. The National Coordinator of Coca, Opium and Marijuana Producers (COCCAM) refutes the authorities' claim that renegade FARC rebels attacked the eradication patrol with improvised explosive devices.

Southeast Asia

Indonesia unleashes ‘shoot-to-kill’ policy

Indonesian President Joko Widodo, following in the bloody footsteps of the Philippines' Rodrigo Duterte, has issued a "shoot-on-sight" policy for drug suspects. The hardline policy comes amid a sudden media blitz about the drug "state of emergency" in the archipelago nation.

Southern Cone

Brazil deploys army to conflicted Rio favela

Brazil's ongoing favela wars have taken a dramatic turn for the bloody—prompting the government to send military troops into Rio de Janiero's notorious Rocinha. This is the most violent of the city's sprawling favelas—informal urban settlements virtually abandoned by the government for anything other than militarized anti-drug operations. The violence in Rocinha is the deadliest since the launch of a "pacification" program in 2011 to push warring narco-gangs out of the city's favelas.

The Andes

Colombia: Supreme Court justice gets prison

Francisco Javier Ricaurte Gómez, one of the most powerful men in Colombia's justice system for the past 15 years, is now the first former chief magistrate of the country's Supreme Court to go to prison. He is the most senior of several top judges and judicial officials convicted in accepting bribes to pervert criminal cases related to paramilitary activity and illegal resource exploitation.