Paraguay has long been a key link in South America's drug trafficking chain, but has grown in importance with the emergence of new criminal players and economies.
Itapúa is a minor marijuana producer but an important transit corridor for cannabis smuggled into Argentina. Some areas of the river border it shares with Argentina are considered hotspots for…
Alto Paraná is home to some of Paraguay’s most dynamic criminal economies. Contraband goods continue to flood Brazil and Argentina via Ciudad del Este and surrounding river routes.
Amambay is at the heart of Paraguay’s most worrying organized crime trends: cocaine trafficking, marijuana production, and the rise of violent criminal groups.
Misiones does not play an important role in regional criminal dynamics, despite some marijuana trafficking in the department.
Operation ‘Tiburón Galloway’ began as a local investigation by prosecutors in the Italian region of Calabria in 2001, but quickly snowballed into a multinational, multiagency investigation.
President Joe Biden’s policy documents on Latin America tread familiar ground. But the region contains a range of other security and criminal threats that are of direct concern to the…
Authorities in Brazil have dismantled a criminal organization specialized in the cloning of debit cards to steal emergency aid and other relief funds, highlighting how criminal groups are cashing in…
The reported leader of the PCC in Paraguay, known as “Bonitão,” has been extradited back to Brazil after a tumultuous few days which saw gang members stage a daring, if…
As COVID-19 threatened the well-being of the populations they depend on for criminal income, it was largely in the interest of criminal groups to try and keep the pandemic under…
“Plata o Plomo” is an overused phrase to describe the way criminals threaten officials and civilians to ensure compliance with their wishes. In one Brazilian case, it seems more appropriately…
On June 10, 2016, Jorge Rafaat was driving his armored Hummer when he pulled up to a stop light in central Pedro Juan Caballero, a Paraguayan city at the border…