South America

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Peru Tightens Prison Security to Break Criminal Command from Behind Bars

Peru is expanding its strategy to prevent criminal organizations from continuing to operate from prisons, where they coordinate extortion, contract killings, drug trafficking, and other illicit activities carried out beyond prison walls. Measures adopted and announced throughout 2026 combine prison reform, Armed Forces participation in perimeter security, control technologies, and cooperation with the United States to strengthen state control over…

Central America

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Honduras Leads Maritime Counterdrug Effort During Operation Barracuda

Honduran security forces, working in close coordination with regional and U.S. partners, seized 2,560 kilograms of suspected cocaine and detained nine suspected smugglers during Operation Barracuda, a multinational maritime counterdrug operation conducted September 6–21, 2026. The operation underscored Honduras’s leadership in combating transnational criminal organizations and demonstrated how coordinated intelligence, aerial surveillance, and maritime capabilities strengthen regional efforts to disrupt…

Caribbean

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Operation Ultramar: Dominican Republic, US Disrupt Traffickers in the Central Caribbean

From August 15–28, 2026, the Dominican Republic and the United States combined intelligence, surveillance, maritime patrol aircraft, surface vessels, and partner-nation interdiction capabilities during Operation Ultramar, a coordinated counternarcotics effort in the Central Caribbean. The operation demonstrated how the Dominican Republic and the United States, supported by regional and international partners, can apply persistent systemic friction to transnational criminal organizations…

Spotlight Interviews

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Academia

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As Brazilian authorities dismantle giant Stolen Smartphones’ Racketeering Scheme, a possible Hezbollah connection emerges

Summary: On September 10, the Office of Public Prosecutions of the Brazilian state of São Paulo launched Operation Frankmobile. The target: a vast criminal network engaged in theft of thousands of mobile phones, extraction of personal information from the devices for the purpose of defrauding their owners, technical alteration of the stolen goods, and their resale as new phones. The…

Special Report

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Criminal Highways: How Latin America’s Rivers Fuel Transnational Crime

Latin America’s vast river networks are playing an increasingly important role in organized crime logistics. From the Amazon Basin to the Paraguay-Paraná Waterway, thousands of miles of rivers and tributaries cross remote areas and border regions, linking zones of cocaine production, illegal mining, and illicit natural resource exploitation to Atlantic ports and international markets. Criminal networks use these waterways to…

Photo Galleries

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