Almost half a century after it began, here’s how America’s ‘war on drugs’ is still devastating Latin America

The drug trade has so effectively penetrated state institutions that even the top echelons of the police force and the military have been linked to cartels

If you need insight into the alarming levels of social and political violence and the degradation of Latin America’s already fragile democracies in recent decades, you should pay attention to the dramatic increase of cocaine and marijuana trafficking.

Since the promotion of the so-called “war on drugs” by the United States during the 1970s, crime related to drug trafficking has increased, becoming one of the key problems faced by the region. Some 50 years later, it’s worth questioning what it has meant for the countries in which narcotics are produced and trafficked.

It’s all too clear that the drug war has not managed to stop the flow of illegal substances to consumers. In the case of the coca plant, government policies have barely managed to reduce areas of land in which the crop is cultivated, and technological advances have enabled a greater level of production per hectare.

On the other hand, drug use has not visibly reduced; in many countries in which drugs are produced and trafficked, consumption rates have actually increased.

A few years after the start of the drug war, the cocaine trade had already infiltrated the highest echelons of power in several countries in the region.

Around this time in Colombia, Pablo Escobar had already gained notoriety as a drug baron, and was preparing to move into politics, a strategy that would later be substituted by the criminal violence industry.

Over subsequent decades, drug money financed the activities of a variety of armed groups, resulting in the explosion of the paramilitary phenomenon in Colombia – a phase known as the “degradation of the internal armed conflict”, which resulted in hundreds of thousands of killings and the displacement of millions.

While under siege due to national armed conflicts in several countries in the late 1970s, Central America experienced an increase in the influence of military power structures.

The triumph of the Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua in 1979 provoked the intensification of pressure from the US on the region, in what could be considered one of the last stands of the Cold War.

US agents negotiated with Honduran drug baron Juan Ramón Matta, in order to finance with dirty money the Nicaraguan Contras and the counterinsurgency in Guatemala and El Salvador. Honduras (and Guatemala) would later form a key part of the cocaine route, serving as a bridge between the South American producer countries and Mexico.

At the turn of this century, major Mexican cartels entered by force in Central America as a result of the Mexican drug war led by president Felipe Calderón (2006-2012). Following their arrival, the levels of violence in the region drastically increased, leading the three countries of the so-called Northern Triangle (Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador) to become amongst the most violent on the planet.

The case of Colombia is paradigmatic. The Peace Agreement signed by the Colombian government and the FARC guerrilla group in 2016, fuelled expectations amongst the civilian population in general and human rights defenders in particular, but as yet it has failed to deliver the promised results.

According to the Information System regarding Aggressions against Human Rights Defenders from 2016 to June 2018, 263 human rights defenders were assassinated, with a significant increase in the number of attacks being registered in 2018.

The influence of organised crime groups in Colombia’s power structures was highlighted by the revelations of the notorious “parapolítica” scandal, which saw more than 60 senators imprisoned for their links with illegal armed groups.

The Central American case presents several parallels with Colombia. The were a series of bloody civil wars in the region during the 1980s and 1990s which ended with the signing of Peace Agreements, the last of which being in Guatemala in 1996. Since then, however, the levels of violence in the region have not diminished.

Following the end of a conflict which left more than 200,000 dead and 45,000 forcibly disappeared, certain power structures in Guatemala reconfigured and ended up participating in the new models of organised crime, repression, and territorial control.

The relationship between important political and military groups with drug traffickers has grown stronger since the 1980s.

After the 2009 coup d’état, Honduras experienced a period of political degradation, which led to major militarisation and a severe increase in organised crime activity and violence. The drug trade has so effectively penetrated state institutions that even the top echelons of the police force and the military have been linked to the cartels.

The serious levels of violence and impunity that the country faces have been major factors in propelling forced migration in Honduras, currently in the news due to migrant caravans making their way towards the United States.

But the state response in the context of the drug war has only served to further aggravate the situation. The eradication of coca in Colombia, for example, hasn’t generated particularly positive results.

One report shows that 38 leaders and members of the National Coordination for Coca, Poppy Seed and Marijuana Producers have been assassinated between 2017 and June 2018. And on top of that, there’s been an increase in authoritarianism and the implementation of emergency measures, justified by the supposed aim of combatting criminal activity.

In Honduras, militarisation of public security has seen an increase in human rights violations, especially in moments of acute political crisis. It’s no coincidence that in the key countries on the drug trafficking route homicide rates are among the highest on the planet, and far above those considered by the UN as representative of epidemic violence.

The work of human rights defenders has become particularly dangerous, to almost heroic proportions. These people put their own lives on the line and are forced to confront a culture of fear and silence violently imposed by organised crime groups born out of the drug war paradigm. According to a 2016 Global Witness report, in Honduras alone, 123 environmentalists were murdered between 2009 and 2016.

Putting a stop to an illegal economy which has reached these heights obviously requires great international coordination, including the tireless persecution of activities related to money laundering in the international banking system.

But we won’t achieve this while there is a lack of transparency in the financial sector, and while tax havens continue to operate. The solution to the global drug dilemma should be based on human realities.

Maria Useche is programme support officer at Christian Aid, Javier San Vicente is programme officer at Christian Aid Honduras and Nathalie Mercier is programme officer at Christian Aid Guatemala