El Centro

This analysis in Spanish looks at the challenge of organized crime and gangs in Chile.

This opinion piece takes a critical look at current calls for US military intervention to address threats from criminal cartels in Mexico.

This opinion piece assesses the negotiations between the Government of El Salvador under Nayib Buckle and various Salvadoran gangs.

This book review of Caryn Dolley's "Clash of the Cartels: Unmasking the global drug kingpins stalking South Africa" looks at South Africa's role in the global illicit economy.

In recent years, unauthorized US border crossings by non-Mexican Latin American nationals have increased significantly. This article examines the impact that these new migrants have had on Ciudad Juárez, Mexico. It focuses especially on the period immediately preceding the COVID-19 pandemic to the present. Since 2018, Central Americans, Cubans, Haitians and Venezuelans have passed through Juárez in record numbers, and many have settled at least temporarily there. Through ethnographic observations and interviews the author analyzes the impact the new migrants have had on border society and how Juarenses have responded to each of the immigrant groups. Acts of charity and generosity toward the migrants are common, but so too are xenophobia and hostility, especially from local politicians, tabloid journalists, local law enforcement, and members of organized crime. As large numbers of migrants, especially Venezuelans at present, have flooded into downtown Juárez, the impact has been transformative to local business and street culture and led to brewing social tensions on the border that may worsen in the future.

In this commentary, two former foreign area officers with experience in Latin America address the pitfalls of US military intervention against criminal cartels in Mexico's crime wars.

This article reviews the 1846 Battle of Monterrey from an urban operations perspective. The review provides salient lessons for contemporary military operations.

The Ministério Público do Rio Grande do Norte (MPRN)—public prosecutor’s office in the state of Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil—launched Operação Plata (Operation Plata) on Tuesday, 14 February 2023 to investigate money laundering related to drug trafficking by a suspected leader of the Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC). The cell investigated laundered money through multiple means. Most notably, their laundering efforts including establishing evangelical churches as front operations.

This article examines the Estado de excepción (state of exception) declared on 24 November 2022 in Honduras.