Security & Strategic Review - June 2022

The targeted killing of Marcelo Pecci, a Paraguayan prosecutor who was overseeing high-profile drug investigations and had a reputation for incorruptibility, has produced shock due to both the brutality of the assassination, and what it says about Paraguay’s increasingly brazen and sophisticated criminal gangs.... Read More

Colombia took a symbolic step towards reconciliation on 26 April when, in a historic first, ten former soldiers admitted their role in the ‘false positive’ killings during the country’s internal conflict.... Read More

For the third time in his year-long presidency, Ecuador’s President Guillermo Lasso declared a 60-day state of exception on 29 April in response to a seemingly irrepressible crime wave.... Read More

The seemingly intractable dispute over the Las Bambas copper mine in Peru’s Apurímac region has flared again, with the mine forced into a shutdown and President Pedro Castillo declaring a state of emergency in response to dogged anti-mining protests by local residents.... Read More

The term ‘cracolândia’ is used in Brazil to designate an area where drug dependents, often crack users, congregate to take and buy drugs.... Read More

Members of the judicial profession congregated in the Argentine city of Rosario on 12 May to take part in an event organised by the association of federal judges (Ajufe) in a show of solidarity for their colleagues in the city, who have been facing threats due to their work fighting local criminals.... Read More

Traditionally safe and peaceful Uruguay is suffering from a wave of drug-related violence which poses a challenge for the government led by President Luis Alberto Lacalle Pou.... Read More

Delegations from the Mexican and US government met on 27 April to present the main achievements of the revamped Mexico-US security alliance, officially known as the Bicentennial Framework for Security, Public Health, and Safe Communities, which was launched late last year.... Read More

From 2 to 4 May, authorities told residents of Valle de México area (comprising Mexico City [CDMX] and surrounding areas in the Estado de México) to refrain from using their cars or participating in outdoor activities.... Read More

Mexico’s national guard (GN) has proved controversial since its launch in June 2019.... Read More

Costa Rica’s new president, Rodrigo Chaves, whose Partido Progreso Social Democrático (PPSD) government took office on 8 May, faces various security-related challenges.... Read More

Authorities and NGOs are attempting to raise awareness around forest fires, which are an increasing threat in Central America and can have serious knock-on effects for the health of humans and the natural environment.... Read More

Panama plans to continue green energy investments, the country’s energy minister, Jorge Rivera Staff, told the BNEF Summit, a clean energy forum organised by Bloomberg Finance in New York on 19-20 April.... Read More

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega has said that Colombia doesn’t want to accept an international ruling on maritime activity in disputed waters in order to “keep trafficking the drugs they take to Europe and the US”.... Read More

In an April 2022 report for the US-based think tank Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Professor R Evan Ellis, a research professor with the US Army War College Strategic Studies Institute and an indefatigable monitor of China’s engagement with Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), looked at China’s engagement with the Caribbean and how Beijing might capitalise, to the detriment of US strategic interests, on the wider stresses that Caribbean nations are feeling as a result of the combined effects of the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic, drug-trafficking, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.... Read More

*** ANTI-COLONIALISM PLAYS INTO BVI CRISIS.... Read More