This article, produced by the Venezuela Investigative Unit, was originally published by InSight Crime, a Medellín-based foundation dedicated to the investigation and analysis of crime and security in Colombia and Latin America.

It is an election year in Venezuela, and President Nicolás Maduro is determined to cling to power. His criminal alliances will be crucial for the survival of his regime.

The Maduro regime is built on a hybrid system of governance, an alliance between the government and organized crime networks, a symbiotic relationship where non-state armed groups (NSAGs) provide senior Chavistas with access to criminal rents and repress activity in their areas of influence. In return, the state tolerates, and in some cases actively protects, their activities. The year 2024 is likely to see the further consolidation of this system.

During 2023, Maduro’s administration took a mano dura, or iron fist, approach to establishing order amid the proliferation of crime in the country, launching multiple “mega-operations.” In a highly publicized campaign, authorities targeted prisons, drug trafficking organizations, urban gangs, and illegal mining syndicates.

However, many researchers, academics, journalists, and social leaders who spoke with InSight Crime agreed that while the government has made much of its large-scale police and military operations, these actions were more political theater than a real attempt to dismantle criminal economies. It seems as if those targeted were not adhering to the government’s guidelines and regulation of criminal markets.

Hybrid armed groups such as the National Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación Nacional – ELN) cooperate and coordinate actions with state elements. They are involved in illegal mining in the states of Bolívar and Amazonas, help shepherd tons of cocaine up to the Caribbean, run human smuggling and human trafficking networks, and manage contraband.

The 2024 presidential election will determine the future of this hybrid state, which has granted different types of licenses for hybrid armed groups and state actors to administer its widespread criminal enterprise.

Below, InSight Crime presents the 10 criminal dynamics that will mark the presidential race in Venezuela in 2024:

1. The Hybrid State Will Increase Repression During Presidential Elections

The Venezuelan government and political opposition agreed last year to hold free and fair elections, amid the lifting of some US sanctions. However, the Maduro regime has been tightening the screws against dissenting voices and in late January refused to lift the ban on opposition presidential candidate María Corina Machado. This violates the agreement.

Past elections were overshadowed by violence and intimidation, like in 2021, when a citizen was murdered in a polling station in the state of Zulia by armed groups loyal to the Venezuelan ruling party. Previous elections, including the 2018 presidential contest, have not received official recognition amid allegations of widespread intimidation and irregularities.

In mid-January, Maduro issued threats against non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and launched the Bolivarian Fury Plan (Plan Furia Bolivariana), which greenlights security force actions against dissidents to prevent “conspiracies” and “terrorist attacks.”

As the year progresses, we will likely see other forms of coercion, including hybrid armed groups such as the colectivos and the ELN controlling the supply of important goods such as gasoline and food to either bribe or strong-arm voters.

Despite the increased international attention and threat of sanctions, previous experience demonstrates that Maduro will not hesitate to use political violence if he feels his position is threatened.

2. Mega-Operations: PR Boost and Regulation of Criminal Economies

Since 2022, authorities have adopted large-scale military deployments as a method of targeting high-profile gang leaders who refuse to fall into step with Maduro’s government.

But 2023’s operations failed to bring down the criminal kingpins on the government’s top 10 most wanted list, including Tren del Llano leader, Óscar de Jesús Noguera Hernández, alias “El Pipi” or Wilexis Acevedo, alias “Wilexis,” head of the gang that rules the José Félix Ribas neighborhood in Caracas. And although official reports state security forces wounded Miranda gang leader Deiber Johan González, alias “Carlos Capa,” his death remains unconfirmed.

Despite these failures, there has been a strong positive reaction to state content promoting the mega-operations on social media, so Maduro’s regime has a political interest in continuing them, Ezequiel Monsalve, litigation coordinator for Defiende Venezuela, explained to InSight Crime.

“The fight against crime will always be a good argument to gain followers, especially in populist governments,” he said.

In the coming year, as the government seeks to enforce political conformity and assert authority over illicit economies, mega-operations will likely be used to target criminal groups without connections to the state and further regulate criminal markets.

3. Venezuela Mega-Operations Unlikely to Stem Drug Flows Through Caribbean

Venezuela’s role as a transit point has grown with rising volumes of cocaine flowing through Venezuela and the Caribbean, much of it headed for Europe.

The country saw a sharp rise in seizures on its eastern seaboard between 2022 and 2023. The state of Monagas shot up the country’s drug-seizure rankings, with authorities seizing more than 2 tons of cocaine in 2023, compared to just 17 kilograms in 2022.

Although the government claims its large-scale military operations prove Venezuela’s commitment to combating drug trafficking, the regime is also using them to consolidate its control of dominant trafficking routes. The rise in seizures is partially a result of both increased government interdiction and drug trafficking networks unaligned with state actors looking for alternative shipping routes.

InSight Crime predicts that in 2024 cocaine earnings will increase by billions of dollars as the global supply chain adjusts to Colombia’s rising production. Venezuela, now a cocaine producer as well as a transit country, will likely see an even higher volume of drugs flow through its eastern states.

Still, Venezuelan security forces are likely to launch new mega-operations targeting regions that saw multi-ton shipments in 2023, with the goal of bringing these new routes under state control.

4. Elements of Underpaid Security Forces Just Another Crime Network

At the end of 2022, Maduro announced a program of police reform based on aggressive recruitment. Throughout 2023, the government added as many as 40,000 new officers to the force, according to public proclamations.

Reports of security officials participating in extortion, robbery, and human smuggling have regularly made headlines, especially in the latter half of 2023. In the Caracas neighborhood Cota 905, criminal networks embedded within security forces even replaced native organized crime, according to an investigation by the journalism outlet Connectas.

Venezuela was already struggling to pay, train, and oversee its security forces before the new recruiting drive. Security officials’ salaries, which continue to be paid in bolivares despite an unofficially dollarized economy, start at around $14 a month. Such is the cost of living in Venezuelan, that an average household needs $500 a month to survive, according to the CEDICE Liberty Public Spending Observatory.

But this hiring spree has caused minimum selection and training standards to be compromised, according to a 2022 report by MUFLVEN, a Venezuelan think tank focused on monitoring the use of lethal force. The combination of the rushed selection process and low salaries has made criminal activity increasingly tempting for security officers, Keymer Ávila, the report’s author and a professor of criminology at the Institute of Criminal Sciences of the Central University of Venezuela, told InSight Crime.

“Venezuela is currently a police state, but a chaotic and fragmented one. The state has lost control over the officers, who have their own agendas and needs, which they satisfy at their own discretion and without limits,” he said.

The last batch of Venezuelan security force recruits — a reported 16,000 officers — graduated on December 21, 2023. If Ávila is right, we will see many of them directly participating in organized crime throughout 2024.

5. Venezuelan Migrants Seek Alternate Routes

The Venezuelan diaspora grew to nearly 8 million people in 2023, surpassing all previous records. In addition to the 600,000 that poured out of Venezuela last year, many left other South American nations, where they had previously settled, for new destinations. Nearly 350,000 crossed into the United States, according to data from US Customs and Border Protection (CBP).

To get there, many crossed the Darién Gap — a dangerous patch of jungle between Colombia and Panama where powerful organized crime networks exert control over human smuggling and migrant exploitation. But a growing number also sought alternative routes to the United States.

One such route takes migrants by plane from the Colombian border city of Cúcuta to the Colombian island of San Andrés, and then by sea to the coast of Nicaragua. This route made headlines in the second half of 2023 after Colombian authorities dismantled a sophisticated network of high-ranking state officials that smuggled migrants along it.

Such networks convince migrants that the San Andrés route is safer than the Darién in order to sell more expensive “VIP” packages.

Venezuelans are continuing to migrate, despite Maduro raising the minimum salary by 48% this year, an increase which will soon be consumed by inflation. They are traveling along a variety of routes, adapting to deterrents, whether harsh migration policies or dangerous crossing, by seeking alternative paths and new destinations. In 2024, human smuggling networks are set to continue exploiting these dynamics, exploiting vulnerable migrants, many heading to the United States as an alternative to increasingly insecure or hostile South American countries like Ecuador and Peru, which have hosted Venezuelan migrants for years.

6. Brazil Offers a Huge Opportunity for Tren de Aragua

No other Venezuelan criminal group has so successfully expanded on a transnational level as Tren de Aragua, which piggybacked on the flow of Venezuelan migrants throughout South America. With the September 2023 loss of Tocorón, the prison that had acted as the group’s headquarters, it appears that Tren de Aragua no longer enjoys the same level of cooperation from the Venezuelan state that it did in the past. As a result, its leaders may prioritize further foreign expansion, and neighboring Brazil could offer the greatest potential opportunity.

The group’s limited presence in Brazil has partly been due to the smaller number of Venezuelans migrating there amid language challenges. However, those numbers have shot up, almost doubling between November 2021 and 2023 to more than half a million, according to official figures cited by R4V.

And while Tren de Aragua has kept a lower profile in Brazil, the group has had a presence there for years. The security secretary of Roraima, a Brazilian state bordering Venezuela, warned that Tren de Aragua engaged in drug trafficking, arms trafficking, and human trafficking in the city of Pacaraima, in September 2019. Police in the town of Boa Vista blamed the group for 12 murders in a six-month period in 2021.

There have also been reports that the group has an alliance with the First Capital Command (Primeiro Comando da Capital – PCC), Brazil’s largest criminal organization.

Such an alliance could potentially make both groups stronger and more difficult to tackle, Federal University of Roraima professor Rodrigo Chagas told InSight Crime.

“The biggest problem is, if Tren de Aragua forms a partnership with the PCC, what does the PCC learn from them and what do they learn from the PCC?” he said.

In 2024, we may find out the answer.

7. Venezuelan Prisons Remain Hubs for Criminal Activities

In late 2023, between September and November, the Maduro regime “took control” of seven prisons in Venezuela that were controlled by organized crime groups.

The government had ceded control to prison gangs since around 2011 after violence among prisoners reached record levels. The criminal leaders, or pranes, promised to control violence within prisons in exchange for power and privileges.

As part of its pre-election crackdown on crime, the Venezuelan government decided to target the pran-led prison system. However, several of the most powerful pranes escaped ahead of the security force raids, raising suspicions that they were tipped off, according to Humberto Prado, the director of the Venezuelan Prison Observatory (Observatorio Venezolano de Prisiones – OVP). Most notably, Tren de Aragua leader Héctor Rusthenford Guerrero Flores, alias “Niño Guerrero,” fled Tocorón prison days before security forces moved in to take control.

Maduro has proclaimed the prison interventions a success and promised to continue them in the country’s other prisons. But the operations have not fixed the underlying issues that led to the evolution of the pranato system. With no state money to effect real change, and still more overcrowding, the prisons will likely remain centers of organized crime.

8. The Regime Will Continue to Exploit the Gold Trade in the South

Between July and September 2023, the Bolivarian National Armed Forces (Fuerza Armada Nacional Bolivariana – FANB) forcibly removed over 14,000 informal miners from the Cerro Yapacana National Park in the state of Amazonas, southern Venezuela. The outcome of this operation was presented as one of the most impactful crackdowns on illegal mining in the country’s recent history.

But what seemed like a targeted blow against illegal mining in Venezuela turned out to be yet another media campaign by the Maduro regime to appease international pressure around the environmental destruction of the Venezuelan Amazon. Informal mining in the area has not ceased, according to the director of SOS Orinoco, Cristina Burelli, who said that the military operation was merely a smokescreen.

“People are going up to the Yapacana National Park again, and they are reporting that the logistics remain the same,” she told InSight Crime. “That’s why we say: this was to take a photo, to make an announcement, to make a show.”

As Maduro seeks to increase revenue from gold for his beleaguered treasury, criminal structures like the ELN and the Acacio Medina Front of the ex-FARC mafia, manage mining activity in Amazonas and share illicit rents with the state. The regime depends on gold sales, amid high international prices, and will seek to tighten its grip on the gold sector during 2024.

9. Government Actions Against Smugglers Prove Toothless

The authorities hoped the reopening of the Venezuelan-Colombian border in September 2022 would reduce smuggling and the proliferation of via illegal border crossings known as trochas and provide some economic regeneration along the border.

Yet, around 60% of the vegetables sold in the country are imported illegally, according to the president of Venezuela’s Center for Agri-Food Studies (Centro de Estudios Agroalimentarios – CEA). This illegal trade undermines efforts to rebuild Venezuela’s agricultural sector.

In late October 2023, Maduro’s government launched “Operation Iron Fist 2023,” which aimed to “protect national industries” by employing the military to target smugglers. Despite the operation’s formidable name, the results have so far been limited to mostly small seizures and little disruption of smuggling networks.

The lack of impact may be by design. Elements of the Maduro regime have come to rely on contraband, which provides an income source for local politicians, underpaid security forces and government allies such as the ELN who charge smugglers passing through their areas of influence. And smuggling also helps prevent shortages that could risk Maduro’s popularity with voters during an election year.

10. ELN Remains Key to Colombia Border, Political Control

The signature policy of President Gustavo Petro, “Total Peace,” which seeks to bring an end to Colombia’s six-decade-long civil conflict, has immense relevance for Venezuela. While the ELN is in stumbling peace talks with President Gustavo Petro’s government in Colombia, the group’s armed structures in Venezuela are growing and profit from collusion with local state elements.  The Colombian rebels are now the dominant criminal actor on both sides of the border.

With a presence in 19 of the 20 Venezuelan border municipalities with Colombia, the ELN has established itself as the gatekeeper of cross-border corridors through which shipments of drugs, contraband merchandise, and migrant populations transit daily. This geographical advantage was one of the main reasons why InSight Crime named the group the most powerful criminal actor in the region for 2023.

In past years, the ELN used violence against civilians and other criminal actors to control the border region. But in 2023, the Colombian guerrilla group’s factions changed tact, turning instead to social and political control.

With the state’s implicit backing, the ELN has become a quasi-legitimate authority for residents in the Venezuelan border area, coordinating medical visits, delivering water, and providing economic aid to local Indigenous communities. This has fostered a positive impression among residents, according to an Indigenous leader from the border state of Zulia who requested anonymity due to possible retaliation.

“Let it be very clear that the community does not reject the presence of the ELN in the area,” he told InSight Crime.

The Maduro regime will need the ELN to block opposition activity and campaigns during 2024. It will also need continued access to the criminal rents that the ELN manage in Venezuela. Thus, the ELN’s dominance over the Colombian-Venezuelan border will probably be one of the most nuanced issues in Venezuela’s criminal scenario in 2024 and affect ongoing peace talks in Colombia.

This article, produced by the Venezuela Investigative Unit, was originally published by InSight Crime, a Medellín-based foundation dedicated to the investigation and analysis of crime and security in Colombia and Latin America.

Collective Mining Ltd. (TSX: CNL, OTCQX: CNLMF, FWB: GG1) announced yesterday that a second rig has been mobilized to the Trap target due to strong visual mineralization observed in follow up drilling currently underway. Trap is one of a series of porphyry targets within the company’s Guayabales Project located in Caldas Colombia. The company’s 2024 exploration plan includes up to 40,000 meters of diamond drilling with three rigs currently operating and a fourth rig anticipated to start drilling by the middle of February 2024.

Trap Highlights: see Figures 1-4 below

• The company recently announced the discovery of a gold rich porphyry system at Trap which is located approximately 3.5 kilometers to the northeast of the flagship Apollo system. The Trap target covers a large surface area measuring approximately 2 kilometers by 2 kilometers with assay results previously announced on January 18, 2024 for the initial three drill holes as follows:
  • 102.2 meters @ 1.53 g/t AuEq (TRC-1)
  • 646.0 meters @ 0.81 g/t AuEq (TRC-2, bottomed in mineralization) including;
    •  301.5 meters @ 1.01 g/t AuEq from 19.5 meters depth
  • 159.75 meters @ 1.04 g/t AuEq (TRC-3)

• Geological inspection of the initial three discovery holes plus interpretation of precious and base metal assay data suggests that the csericite,chloride,sulphide
• Collective has only drill tested the upper levels of a porphyry system consisting of overprinting early and late-stage porphyry veins associated with a pervasive phyllic (sericite – chlorite – sulphide) alteration assemblage. On January 19, 2024 a follow up drill hole was initiated from Pad 2 to test the mineralized system at depth and is currently coring in a southeast direction at approximately 745 meters in length.

• Visual observation of the current drill hole is showing a noticeable increase in total sulphide content and alteration in comparison to the prior holes with three overprinting styles of mineralization being observed as follows:
  • Porphyry quartz veins containing pyrite and minor chalcopyrite
  • Late crosscutting sheeted carbonate base metal (“CBM”) veinlets enriched in sphalerite and galena
  • Dark polymetallic sheeted veinlets

• Sufficiently encouraged by the deeper drill hole visuals, Collective is mobilizing a second drill to Trap with drilling anticipated to commence in the coming days. Additional assay results from Trap are expected in Q1 2024.

David Reading, Special Advisor to the Company commented: “The current drill hole at Trap is very exciting as it highlights the presence of stockwork and sheeted porphyry veins which relates to pulses of mineralized fluids typical of large systems. Additionally, based on core inspection of this hole, there is a noticeable increase in total sulphide content relative to the discovery holes previously announced by the Company.”

Richard Tosdal, Special Advisor to the Company added: “The current drill hole appears to start at the margin of a porphyry system and then enters porphyry quartz diorite with sheeted quartz veins surrounded by pervasive phyllic alteration assemblages composed of sericite (probably muscovite), chlorite and sulphides typical of the upper parts of porphyry copper-gold systems.”

Figure 1: Core Photos Highlights From the Current Drill Hole Underway at Trap

Figure 2: Plan View of the Trap Target and Visual Results From the Hole Currently Underway

Figure 3: Drill Core Tray Photo Highlighting Overprinting Styles of Porphyry Mineralization

Figure 4: Plan View of the Guayabales Project Highlighting the Trap Target Area

The Rural Agricultural Planning Unit (UPRA) provides an analysis of the figures compiled by  the National Administrative Department of Statistics (DANE), in the “Report on imports of agricultural and agro-industrial products”, in December 2023 and in the consolidated report for the year.

2023 closed with a decrease of 13.1% in the total value of imports, compared to the previous year, totaling US$9,598 million CIF. This reduction is mainly attributed to the decrease in imports of corn, with US$299.5 million (-13.8%), wheat by US$259.6 million (-29.3%) and coffee by US$231.2 million (-47.3%); which means a decrease of 4.9% in imported tons totaling 14.2 million in 2023. This behavior “is mainly explained by the reduction in imports of wheat by 312,320 tons (-14.9%), corn by 208,057 tons (-3.2%) and rice by 53,783 tons (-24.1%),” said Claudia Cortés, director of the UPRA.

In addition, the trade balance closed the year with a surplus of US$1,193 million FOB, although this figure represents a decrease of 9.9% compared to the previous year. In terms of volume, there was a deficit lower, by 1.8%, than the balance presented in 2022, totaling a negative balance of 9.03 million tons.

Imports of agricultural and agro-industrial products in December 2023

For December 2023, the figures reveal an increase of 2.2% compared to the same month in 2022, reaching US$872 million CIF. This increase was mainly driven by the purchase of soy (834.9%), ethyl alcohol (452.6%) and pork (74.2%).

In volume, the increase was 22.2% compared to December 2022, with a total of 1.4 million tons; This is mainly explained by the increase in corn imports, by 243,005 tonnes (46.8%); soybeans, 55,879 tons (963.6%); and ethyl alcohol, 33,928 tons (561.9%).

Context of the international oil price and representative market rate

In December 2023, the international price of oil was US$75.7 per barrel and showed a decrease of 6.9%, compared to the previous month. On the other hand, in December there was an average exchange rate of $3,954; the youngest in the last 18 months.

This week, all eyes are will be on January inflation print that will be published on Wednesday at 6 pm. December’s reading of 0.45% (and 9.28% year-over-year) was better than expected and allowed the Banco de la República last week, in their miserly way, to reduce rates 12.75%.

The hope is that we will see another decline for January. There will, however, be concerns. Firstly, there will be concern over the impact of the 12% minimum wage increase and the products indexed to that rise.

Second comes the impact that El Niño will have on energy demand and prices in the hottest regions of the country. On the coast, electricity prices are already 30% higher than a year ago.

Regardless of the inflation rate, it won’t impact Banco de la República as February is a non-decision meeting. Consider a nonsensically positive situation where inflation dropped to 7% in January. (I am exaggerating a point to make a point.) Rates will regardless remain at 12.75% until the end of March when the central bank has its next rate-decision meeting.

El Niño has taken a few days off with some most welcome rain and cooler weather. But worry not, you sun worshipers, as  IDEAM Colombia continues to point to an even hotter month in February. Thus far, despite the numerous forest fires, Colombia has been fortunate to avoid the tragic level of deaths seen recently in central Chile where fires continue to rage.

The other main macro number from National Administrative Department of Statistics (DANE) this week will exports for December. These numbers have been volatile — but generally lower during 2023. November saw a 9% decline due to a 19.5% decrease in commodity exports. It hard to see a more positive situation this time around, although bit by bit the comparable are getting easier.

In political news, María Corina Machado is making press once again. Amid global street protests there is word that the United States will ask Colombia to mediate with Venezuelan head of state Nicolas Maduro over the lifting of the ban on her running at the Venezuelan elections.

This is a key, key moment. It’s a massive ask given the threat that Machado is to Maduro’s presidency. But, if Colombian President Gustavo Petro could pull off a compromise of some sort, it would be a feather in his credibility cap.

In terms of the markets, COLCAP has started 2024 well (it is, after all, as cheap as hell), and the Colombian oeso remains stable at this 3,900 pesos to $1 USD level and we continue to watch of as the Gilinskis and GEA continue the swap of shares in Grupo Sura, Grupo Argos, and Nutresa.

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On January 26, Patricia Janiot, in her talk show Break Poin, aired a conversation with right-wing Argentine President Javier Milei that has caused heated reactions across Colombia.

The 44-minute interview could have gone unnoticed: Milei detailed Argentina’s economic problems, talked about his Ley de Bases, and discussed his intentions to deregulate the country’s economy. These topics have been well worn subject matter ever since he launched his campaign.

But then came one brief moment, which lasted no more than 5 seconds, when Janiot asked Milei about different figures in current Latin American politics — including Colombian President Gustavo Petro.

Milei’s description of the head of state as a “communist murderer who is sinking Colombia” caused an earthquake in international relations, with supporters supporting the claim while others took great offense.

The Colombian Foreign Ministry issued a statement. “The government of Colombia strongly rejects this statement, which attacks the honor of the president who has been democratically and legitimately elected. President Milei’s words disregard and violate the deep ties of friendship, understanding, and cooperation that have historically united Colombia and Argentina,, and that have been strengthened over two centuries.”

Petro, in a speech in Tumaco, also made news; “It is not about — because they attack us as communists, socialists — the state being the owner of the means of production. Of course, those who attack us have no idea what is communism and what is socialism.”

Although the words were not directly intended as a response to Milei, many media outlets understood them as such.

This was, of course, also not the beginning of this saga.

A few days before Milei won the presidential election against candidate Sergio Massa, Petro stated his support for “hope” and not “barbarism.” From is X account, Petro even compared Milei to Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet and Argentine dictator Jorge Rafael Videla.

Milei, at the time, was being questioned for putting Victoria Villarruel, a military daughter who justifies Videla’s military dictatorship, as his vice-presidential candidate.

More recently, when Milei pledged to pull back free public education in Argentina, Petro got back into the debate with another post on X

“We will receive 20,000 Colombian students who were educated for free in Argentina. They are literally expelled from that country, for them there was no so-called ‘freedom.’ We will manage so that they can continue their studies in Colombia without major obstacle and also for free.”

(Photo: Argentine President Javier Milei. (Photo credit: Cancillería Argentina)

German logistics provider the Rhenus Group is making a splash in Latin America with the acquisition of freight forwarder BLU Logistics and the purchase of a 51% majority stake in port agency LBH Group.

Both have a significant presence in the region, with BLU maintaining a footprint in Colombia, Mexico, Argentina, Ecuador, Uruguay, and Paraguay. For its part, LBH has a presence in 30 nations overall, six Latin American nations, and associates in several Central American countries.

Combined, the two moves will add some 2,200 employees to Rhenus, according to the Holzwickede-based company.

“Our strategic acquisitions,” said Rhenus Group CEO and Chairman Tobias Bartz, “allow us to strengthen our global network and our range of services in the LATAM region, where we are seeing an increase in demand for logistics services, especially for the e-commerce sector.”

Bartz added that the proximity to the US and North American markets, and the related opportunities for nearshoring, also contributed to the company’s desire to have a larger presence in South America.

“The Colombian market demands exports to the United States and China, and Rhenus is focused on boosting imports from countries such as China and Germany, supporting investments in the LATAM market,” he said. “Anticipating slight growth in 2024, exports are expected to increase from $40 billion to $41 billion, and imports from $11.8 billion to $12.6 billion.”

This article, written by Anastasia Austin, was originally published by Insight Crime, a Medellín-based foundation dedicated to the investigation and analysis of crime and security in Colombia and Latin America.

As Ecuador grapples with a security crisis, senior US military officials visited the country and signed a multimillion-dollar aid portfolio that is being compared to Plan Colombia. But does that comparison hold up?

A delegation that included General Laura Richardson, commander of US Southern Command, met with Ecuador’s President Daniel Noboa and other high-ranking officials on January 22 to discuss US-Ecuadorian cooperation in the fight against organized crime.

The visit came less than two weeks after Noboa declared war on Ecuador’s gangs, who responded by wreaking havoc throughout the country. His administration has seen some success in the early days of militarization but lacks a long-term strategy and is struggling to finance the fight.

“We want to help Ecuador through this,” Richardson said in an interview with Ecuadorian news outlet Primicias.

So far, the United States has provided “critical” security and emergency response equipment and has promised a five-year aid portfolio including military equipment, humanitarian assistance, disaster relief, and capacity building. The aid package is worth around $93 million, Richardson told Primicias.

The United States has also agreed to increase military-to-military cooperation with Ecuador through joint operations, as well as increase intelligence sharing and the presence of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to counter the organized crime threat.

The agreement is being compared to Plan Colombia, a US security assistance program that spent close to $10 billion between 2000 and 2015, about 70% of which went to training, assisting, and equipping Colombia’s military.

While Plan Colombia had some success as a counter-insurgency strategy, especially against the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia — FARC), it largely failed as a counter-narcotics strategy and did little to undermine organized crime.

InSight Crime Analysis

The US-Ecuador cooperation agreement contains some elements of Plan Colombia, but it is fundamentally different in size, scope, and commitment.

The cooperation plan includes increases in military-to-military cooperation, intelligence sharing, and training missions – all key characteristics of Plan Colombia. However, there is a significant difference in monetary size. The average annual aid package provided during Plan Colombia was close to $650 million per year, while the proposed aid to Ecuador does not even reach $100 million.

Moreover, while Plan Colombia funneled 70% of its funding towards military hardware, intelligence equipment, helicopters, training exercises, and security advisors, Richardson emphasized the US commitment to long-term goals in Ecuador, including capacity building and humanitarian aid.

Finally, while Ecuador has become a clear strategic priority in the region for the United States, the investment in Colombia also had a personal component for US audiences, according to experts.

“The Colombian reality was in the hearts and minds of politicians,” Dr. Jonathan Rosen, a professor of security policy and author of The Losing War: Plan Colombia and Beyond, told InSight Crime.

“Given its proximity to the United States and given the history, it was not hard to sell people on [Plan Colombia]. Colombia was on the average radar of the American citizen … It was not as ‘distant’ as Ecuador is.”

Yet Plan Colombia did little to disrupt organized crime in the country or the flow of Colombian cocaine to the United States or elsewhere.

“There was a lot of success capturing leaders,” Rosen said. “But Colombia still produces 90% of all cocaine coming to the United States. You’re still seeing a litany of corruption scandals … and you’re seeing organized crime fragment into all these different groups.”

Unlike Colombia, Ecuador has no guerrilla insurgency. Instead, the country faces a complicated criminal landscape where over a dozen groups fight for control of key drug trafficking routes and criminal economies, sometimes forming unstable alliances.

Its institutions are severely debilitated and corrupt, making intelligence sharing a double-edged sword.

“It’s not just worrying, it’s also limiting,” an official in Ecuador’s Interior Ministry who did not have authorization to speak on the record said of links between gangs and Ecuador’s security forces. “We have to understand that organized crime is not something alien to the state.”

What Ecuador needs, experts told InSight Crime, is institutional capacity building and social reforms.

“What we are doing now is not going to eliminate the root cause of the problem,” the Interior Ministry official said. “We are putting on band-aids … short-term measures that won’t stop the problem if there are no structural changes in how society functions and how the social fabric is managed.”

Any aid package must also come with oversight, experts said, including from the United States, as well as Ecuadorian government agencies, civil society groups, and journalists.

“If you give money to corrupt officials, they can squander it,” Rosen said. “There has to be accountability, there has to be transparency … [Get it] in as many places as you can.”

This article, written by Anastasia Austin, was originally published by Insight Crime, a Medellín-based foundation dedicated to the investigation and analysis of crime and security in Colombia and Latin America.

(Photo credit: Xavier Granja Cedeño – Cancillería Ecuador)

The following notice was released by the US Federal Voting Assistance Program (FVAP) to help inform US citizens about how they can vote from overseas.

Finance Colombia is re-publishing it here in full as a courtesy to our readers. Please reach out to the agency if you have any questions.

Registering to vote and submitting a ballot is fast, easy, and can be done from anywhere in the world

Start by confirming your voter registration with your state  Some states require absentee voters to register annually so you may need to re-register.  Go to FVAP.gov to connect to your state’s voter portal to register to vote, request a ballot, and more.  Once you confirm your registration, follow a few simple steps to vote in the 2024 U.S. elections:

1.   Request Your Ballot

Most states provide the option to request ballots through their state election portals, which you can easily access via FVAP.gov.  You can also choose to complete a Federal Post Card Application (FPCA). The completion of the FPCA allows you to request absentee ballots for all elections for federal offices (President, U.S. Senate, and U.S. House of Representatives) including primaries and special elections during the calendar year in which it is submitted.  FPCA forms that are correctly filled out and include a signature and date are accepted by all local election officials in every U.S. state and territory.  FVAP’s easy online assistant can assist you with completing the FPCA.

Whether you request your ballot through your state’s portal or the FPCA, we encourage you to select the option for receiving your ballot electronically (by email, internet download, or fax) when available.  This is the fastest way for you to get your ballot and ensures you have it in time to return a completed form before your state’s deadline.

2.   Receive and Complete Your Ballot

States are required to send out ballots 45 days before a regular election for federal office and states generally send out ballots at least 30 days before primary elections.  Most states allow you to confirm your ballot delivery online.

3.   Return Your Completed, Signed Ballot

Some states allow you to return your completed ballot electronically and others do not.  If your state requires you to return paper voting forms or ballots to local election officials by mail, you can do so through international mail, professional courier service, or through U.S. Embassy Bogota’s diplomatic pouch.  The diplomatic pouch provides free mail service from embassies and consulates to a U.S. sorting facility.  You will need to place your ballots in U.S. postage-paid return envelopes or in envelopes bearing sufficient U.S. postage in order for them to be delivered to the proper local election authorities.

If using the diplomatic pouch, ballots may be dropped off at the U.S. Embassy, Carrera 45 No. 24B-27 Bogotá, D.C., at Gate 2, the main vehicle gate, during business hours Monday through Friday.  Please note that it can take up to four weeks for mail to reach its destination if sent by an embassy or consulate via diplomatic pouch.  All overseas U.S. citizens are advised to submit their forms and ballots accordingly.

Researching the Candidates and Issues/Online Resources

Go to the FVAP links page for helpful resources to aid your research of candidates and issues. Non-partisan information about candidates, their voting records, and their positions on issues are widely available and easy to obtain on-line. You also read national and hometown newspapers on-line, or search the internet to locate articles and information. For information about election dates and deadlines, subscribe to FVAP’s Voting Alerts ([email protected]).  FVAPalso shares Voting Alerts via Facebook (@DODFVAP), X (formerly Twitter) (@FVAP), and Instagram (@fvapgov).

You can learn more at the Federal Voting Assistance Program’s (FVAP) website FVAP.gov. If you have any questions about registering to vote overseas, please contact U.S. Embassy Bogota at [email protected].

Bystanders as well as a taxi driver were shocked Tuesday when at the intersection of Carrera 51D and Calle 59 in the Prado neighborhood, just north of downtown Medellín a naked foreigner either fell or leapt from a tree, completely naked, onto a passing taxi, severely damaging the car’s roof and crushing the rear window.

Hoy en Medellín, un hombre se lanza desde un arbol hacia el taxi. Al parecer es una persona con enfermedades mentales. pic.twitter.com/m9NN012GCy

— Periódico Punto de Quiebre (@Puntodequiebr15) January 31, 2024

Though completely naked and without identification, witnesses indicated the man was a foreign citizen perhaps due to his accent. He was attended to by police and an ambulance, having suffered contusions and lacerations. The taxi was seriously damaged though the driver appeared to have escaped injury.

(Photo: Twitter)

US auto financing firm Southern Auto Finance Company, LLC (SAFCO) recently announced that Colombian loan provider Finanzauto has acquired a minority equity stake in the company.

The Pompano Beach, Florida-based lender called this a “significant investment” and “mutually beneficial partnership” that is an “important milestone in SAFCO’s growth.” Specifically, SAFCO says this will help the company broaden its operations overall and further reach underbanked consumers in Colombia.

Finanzauto is a owned and controlled by SEISSA, a Colombian business group that has owned a diverse profile of companies in various industries dating back for almost a century.

“Our partnership with Finanzauto heralds an exciting new chapter for SAFCO,” said George Fussell, CEO of SAFCO. “Together, we embark on a journey filled with prospects and enhanced capabilities, positioning us to explore new horizons and achieve unparalleled success.”

(Photo credit: Jared Wade)