Essay: How Haiti became a failed state
NICHOLAS FORSANS, co-director of the Centre for Latin American & Caribbean Studies at Essex University in the UK, looks – in an article first published on The Conversation, at the background to the deteriorating security situation in Haiti…
Eleven prison guards held hostage by inmates in Ecuador freed
Quito, Ecuador Reuters Eleven prison staff members who had been held by inmates at the Esmeraldas prison in Ecuador were freed on Saturday, police said. They were among 158 guards and 20 administrative staffers taken hostage since Monday in at least seven prisons amid a sharp increase in violence in the South American country. Eight […]
In El Salvador, rising inmate numbers threaten humanitarian crisis: NGO
San Salvador, El SalvadorReuters Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele’s war against the country’s criminal gangs could generate prison overcrowding and even a violent reaction from criminals, said a report by the NGO International Crisis Group released Tuesday. After a historic rise in homicides in March, Bukele asked Congress to authorise a state of exception, which suspends […]
Explainer: What led to priests being killed in Mexico?
Mexico City, MexicoAP Two Jesuit priests and a tour guide murdered in Mexico’s Sierra Tarahumara this week are the latest in a long line of activists, reporters, travellers and local residents who have been threatened or killed by criminal gangs that dominate the region. Revs Javier Campos, 79, and Joaquín Mora, 80, had spent much […]
El Salvador invokes emergency powers after surge in homicides
San Salvador, El Salvador Reuters El Salvador’s Congress approved on Sunday emergency powers that temporarily suspended some constitutional protections after the Central American country recorded a sharp rise in killings attributed to criminal gangs. Police reported a total of 62 homicides on Saturday in the nation of some 6.5 million people. It was the highest […]
UK gangs exploiting children as young as seven to deal drugs
LondonThomson Reuters Foundation British schoolchildren as young as seven are being exploited by criminal gangs and forced to deal drugs, with some duped into debt bondage, researchers said on Friday. Thousands of children in Britain – most aged between 15 and 17 – are being used by so-called county lines gangs to carry drugs from […]