HomeNewsBriefMexican Drug Flights Use Landing Strips in North Argentina: Report
BRIEF

Mexican Drug Flights Use Landing Strips in North Argentina: Report

ARGENTINA / 26 OCT 2011 BY GEOFFREY RAMSEY EN

Reports indicate that Mexican drug cartels have set up clandestine air strips for drug shipments in isolated regions in northern Argentina.

According to a Univision special investigation (see video report below), the remote salt flats of the northern Argentine province of Catamarca are home to as many as 1,500 hidden landing fields. According to regional officials, Mexican nationals have purchased large swaths of land in the Catamarca region, which traffickers may be using to bring large quantities of narcotics into the country.

Locals in the area report having seen planes land in the area in recent months, followed by individuals offloading shipments of what appear to be drugs onto trucks. 

This phenomenon is part of a trend, as Mexican cartels increasingly penetrate the illicit drug markets in South America. This is an illustration of just how much of the market Mexican drug trafficking groups have gained power over since two decades ago, when they served mostly as the distributors for larger Colombian organizations.

share icon icon icon

Was this content helpful?

We want to sustain Latin America’s largest organized crime database, but in order to do so, we need resources.

DONATE

What are your thoughts? Click here to send InSight Crime your comments.

We encourage readers to copy and distribute our work for non-commercial purposes, with attribution to InSight Crime in the byline and links to the original at both the top and bottom of the article. Check the Creative Commons website for more details of how to share our work, and please send us an email if you use an article.

Was this content helpful?

We want to sustain Latin America’s largest organized crime database, but in order to do so, we need resources.

DONATE

Related Content

HOMICIDES / 7 FEB 2022

Stopping near their target, one of the criminals stays on the vehicle while the other jumps off, shoots the victim…

ARGENTINA / 12 AUG 2022

Uruguayan authorities have dismantled a smuggling ring moving weapons into the country from Argentina.

ELITES AND CRIME / 18 JAN 2023

The US trial of Genaro García Luna, the architect of Mexico's war on drugs, will seek to prove whether he…

About InSight Crime

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime Cited in New Colombia Drug Policy Plan

15 SEP 2023

InSight Crime’s work on emerging coca cultivation in Honduras, Guatemala, and Venezuela was cited in the Colombian government’s…

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime Discusses Honduran Women's Prison Investigation

8 SEP 2023

Investigators Victoria Dittmar and María Fernanda Ramírez discussed InSight Crime’s recent investigation of a massacre in Honduras’ only women’s prison in a Twitter Spaces event on…

THE ORGANIZATION

Human Trafficking Investigation Published in Leading Mexican Newspaper

1 SEP 2023

Leading Mexican media outlet El Universal featured our most recent investigation, “The Geography of Human Trafficking on the US-Mexico Border,” on the front page of its August 30…

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime's Coverage of Ecuador Leads International Debate

25 AUG 2023

This week, Jeremy McDermott, co-director of InSight Crime, was interviewed by La Sexta, a Spanish television channel, about the situation of extreme violence and insecurity in Ecuador…

THE ORGANIZATION

Human Rights Watch Draws on InSight Crime's Haiti Coverage

18 AUG 2023

Non-governmental organization Human Rights Watch relied on InSight Crime's coverage this week, citing six articles and one of our criminal profiles in its latest report on the humanitarian…