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El Salvador Essay

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EL SALVADOR
Even though El Salvador is a small country in relation to its dense population, and its mountainous territory prevents traffickers from transporting their goods by air, it does, however, allow them to use those same mountains to cover up smuggling routes used to traffic weapons, contraband, illicit drugs and even people. For many years traffickers used boats or submarines to move drug from Colombia to northern Guatemala or Mexico. They did this in order to circumvent a part of Central America, yet with sea patrols improving and new cartels creating competition, smugglers needed to find a new way. So several gangs switched to moving their shipping overland, using Central America as a bridge. The Central American nation is referred …show more content…

Even though police officers blame 90% of this on juvenile street gangs, other government agencies believe this violence rate is a result of international organized crimes such as drug trafficking, guns, people and laundering money. They estimate only about 20% of El Salvador’s murderers are attributed to gangs. The U.S aid program, Partnership for Growth, identified these problems to be one of the barriers to the country’s economic growth.
• ¿What is El Salvador’s position on this issue?
Over the past ten years, many articles and decrees concerning drug related activities were altered, for example Article 34 that established the quantity of 2 grams to differentiate between possessions for use and trafficking, this means that as the quantity of grams increase, so does the prison sentence ranging from 1 to 10 years, this could be applied to all drugs. This article also reduced the prison sentences, yet not lifting the classification as a crime.
• The United States has been helping Latin American countries fight drug traffic, trying to get rid of drug production at its source in Southern countries like Colombia, Bolivia and Peru, and also trying to slow down drug shipments through Mexico's northern border. That has left drug cartels sending their shipments through Central America bringing along several violence and corruption

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