Costa Rica Is A "Warehouse"
For Drug Cartels
Costa Rica was one known as the bridge
between the Colombian and Mexican drug
cartels for running drugs into the United
States. But, more and more evidence is found
that Costa Rica has quickly become a
warehousing centre.
That distinction is further evidenced by
Friday's seizure by Costa Rican authorities
of more than a ton of cocaine, that was
being stored and readied for shipment and
the arrest of two Mexican nationals.
Police found 2,139 pounds (969 kg) of
cocaine stashed at a rural house near the
Pacific coast, 4 kilometres north of
Miramar, in the Puntarenas province -
northwest of San José - and
arrested two Mexican nationals at the scene.
They are believed to be members of Mexico's
Juarez cartel, the ministerio de Seguridad
Pública said.
President-elect Laura Chinchilla, a former
security minister who won a landslide
election victory on Sunday, has said
combating Mexican drug gangs operating in
Costa Rica will be a priority when she takes
power in May.
A three-year army crackdown on drug gangs in
Mexico has encouraged some traffickers to
push south into Central America, setting up
bases in countries like Guatemala as they
seek new routes to smuggle South American
cocaine to the United States.
Costa Rican authorities have seized 93 ton
of cocaine between 2006 and 2009 - nearly
twice the amount the country captured in the
preceding decade.
Costa Rica is known for being an oasis of
stability, high living standards and low
crime in a region scarred by Cold War-era
civil wars and plagued by violent street
gangs.
But it also sits halfway between the
cocaine-producing Andes and Mexico, whose
smuggling gangs earn some us$40 billion a
year smuggling the drug north using planes,
boats and trucks.
Police raided the house in Costa Rica early
on Friday following a tip-off from
neighbors, the ministry said.
The two suspects are from the northern
Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez, one of
the world's most violent spots. One had a
press credential from a Mexican newspaper,
the ministry said. |
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