Caribbean & Central America - February 2008 (ISSN 1741-4458)

The security forces in El Salvador and Honduras launched large-scale operations in late January and early February aimed at cracking down on violent crime. Some 500 agents from El Salvador's Policí­a Nacional Civil (PNC) arrested 45 mara gang members in towns across the country on 31 January, including the leader of the Mara Salvatrucha (MS) in Santa Tecla, the capital of La Libertad department in the San Salvador metropolitan area. A day later, Honduran security forces launched an even bigger offensive.

El Salvador's new head of the PNC, Francisco Rovira, said that two-thirds of the maras arrested would now face prosecution for homicide, extortion and "unlawful gathering", while the remainder would be investigated. The joint police and army operation in Honduras (codenamed "Five Stars") targeted the main towns in almost all the country's 18 departments to "reduce violent crime". Another objective was to confiscate illegal firearms: the government reckons there are 600,000 arms in private hands in Honduras; only 40% are registered.

The security operations were almost certainly timed in response to a regionwide study into the mara phenomenon in Mexico and Central America, carried out by Costa Rican research company, Demoscopia, which was released days earlier (see sidebar). The study reached the unequivocal conclusion that the mano dura (firm hand) security initiatives favoured by El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras to combat the maras had merely served to strengthen the gangs, compelling them to become more cohesive underground organisations. The security operations were calculated to show that the mara threat can be countered by force.

• Mara study

The Demoscopia study into the mara phenomenon, entitled Maras and gangs; community and police in Central America, claims that: "In the last four years, the gangs have developed into military and business organisations ... and they are used as the labour force for drug trafficking and organised crime." It goes on to argue that the change in the modus operandi of the gangs underlined the need for governments on the isthmus to produce "functional and effective legislation" to address the mara issue before gang members grow financially powerful, potentially allowing them to enter the political arena.