When the world gets closer.

We help you see farther.

Sign up to our expressly international daily newsletter.

blog

Extra! FARC Cocaine Labs Go Up In Smoke

[rebelmouse-image 27090378 alt="""" original_size="750x1399" expand=1]

El Tiempo, Aug. 3

"Police destroyed 104 FARC laboratories in Guaviare," reads the Wednesday front page of the Colombian daily El Tiempo. An accompanying image shows security forces operating in the nation's thick southeastern jungle.

The head of the anti-narcotics police announced yesterday that the 104 cocaine laboratories, run by the FARC (or Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) guerrilla army, produced some 100 tons of the drug annually.

Police have adapted their strategy over the past few months, targeting traffickers and producers rather than farmers who grow the coca plant, the daily reports.

The southeastern part of the nation has been battling drug trafficking for years. "This is a structural blow to the finances of drug trafficking," Gen. Jose Angel Mendoza, the anti-narcotics police director, said.

This major drug bust comes just weeks after the Colombian government and FARC rebels signed a historic ceasefire deal in hopes of ending more than five decades of civil war.

You've reached your limit of free articles.

To read the full story, start your free trial today.

Get unlimited access. Cancel anytime.

Exclusive coverage from the world's top sources, in English for the first time.

Insights from the widest range of perspectives, languages and countries.

Migrant Lives

What's Driving More Venezuelans To Migrate To The U.S.

With dimmed hopes of a transition from the economic crisis and repressive regime of Nicolas Maduro, many Venezuelans increasingly see the United States, rather than Latin America, as the place to rebuild a life..

Photo of a family of Migrants from Venezuela crossing the Rio Grande between Mexico and the U.S. to surrender to the border patrol with the intention of requesting humanitarian asylum​

Migrants from Venezuela crossed the Rio Grande between Mexico and the U.S. to surrender to the border patrol with the intention of requesting humanitarian asylum.

Julio Borges

-Analysis-

Migration has too many elements to count. Beyond the matter of leaving your homeland, the process creates a gaping emptiness inside the migrant — and outside, in their lives. If forced upon someone, it can cause psychological and anthropological harm, as it involves the destruction of roots. That's in fact the case of millions of Venezuelans who have left their country without plans for the future or pleasurable intentions.

Their experience is comparable to paddling desperately in shark-infested waters. As many Mexicans will concur, it is one thing to take a plane, and another to pay a coyote to smuggle you to some place 'safe.'

Venezuela's mass emigration of recent years has evolved in time. Initially, it was the middle and upper classes and especially their youth, migrating to escape the socialist regime's socio-political and economic policies. Evidently, they sought countries with better work, study and business opportunities like the United States, Panama or Spain. The process intensified after 2017 when the regime's erosion of democratic structures and unrelenting economic vandalism were harming all Venezuelans.

Keep reading...Show less

You've reached your limit of free articles.

To read the full story, start your free trial today.

Get unlimited access. Cancel anytime.

Exclusive coverage from the world's top sources, in English for the first time.

Insights from the widest range of perspectives, languages and countries.

The latest