Border agents seize $4.2 million in cocaine in the latest sign of shifting smuggling patterns

Border agents seize $4.2 million in cocaine in the latest sign of shifting smuggling patterns

US Customs and Border Protection’s Air and Marine Operations agents seized 328 pounds of cocaine from a vessel near Puerto Rico on November 15, in what is the latest sign that traffickers may be returning to once popular Caribbean smuggling routes. A CBP DHC-8 Maritime Patrol Aircraft picked up a small, wooden “yola” vessel traveling eastward […]

Argentina shifts drug trafficking offensive to private ports

Argentina shifts drug trafficking offensive to private ports

Argentina’s government has stepped up security at the ports in its main grain exporting hub of Rosario, counting on cooperation with private terminal operators to keep drug traffickers away from a key industry. Some 3,000 federal police, coast guard, gendarmerie and airport police have been deployed in Santa Fe province in recent weeks with about […]

Turkish sailors sentenced to 42 years for UK’s biggest cocaine haul

Turkish sailors sentenced to 42 years for UK’s biggest cocaine haul

Two Turkish sailors were jailed for a total of 42 years on Friday after their attempt to smuggle a huge haul of cocaine into Europe was thwarted, partly due to some swift international co-operation between Britain and Tanzania. Some 3.2 tonnes of cocaine, the biggest class A drug find ever made in Britain, was found […]

Some drug cartels now make more money from gold than cocaine

Some drug cartels now make more money from gold than cocaine

Organized crime networks in Latin America have long made their money off of drugs. But over the past decade, as gold prices have soared, cartels have increasingly turned to illegally mining the metal to earn cash. In Peru and Colombia, they’re now making more money exporting illegal gold than cocaine. Eighty percent of the gold […]

Venezuela: Bolivarian Narco State in the Making?

Venezuela: Bolivarian Narco State in the Making?

The same drop in oil prices that has hit the Russian economy so hard has hit Venezuela’s even worse. Under the late President Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan economy had become completely reliant on oil revenues. In 1998, the year before Chavez was elected president, oil accounted for 77 percent of Venezuela’s exports. By 2011, 96 […]