News Briefing – Week of 30 November 2020

30/11 – The Spanish Guardia Civil dismantled an organization in Granada that distributed large consignments of marijuana in Europe. 30 people were arrested and more than 13,000 marijuana plants, as well as numerous firearms were seized.   30/11 – The Panamanian Servicio Nacional Aeronaval (Senan), in coordination with the US and Colombian Coast Guard as…

Latest activities implemented by EU-ACT

EU-ACT in Ukraine: Successful online webinar on financial investigations Project EU-ACT, a component project of the Global Illicit Flows Programme, successfully implemented a two-day webinar on 16 and 17 June 2020 on the topic “Improving parallel financial investigations for law enforcement agencies in Ukraine”. The event, that brought together over 120 participants representing all law…

News Briefing – Week of 23 March

  Several prisoners escaped from four Brazilian prisons after authorities announced the suspension of the one-day release programme. This decision was taken as a preventive measure to avoid the spread of the Coronavirus, COVID-19.   Honduras is becoming a cocaine producing country in addition to being a transit country.  Reporting indicates that, between 2009 and 2020,  12…

Newsbriefing – Week of 11 March

On Monday, the U.S Customs and Border Protection announced the seizure of 1.5 tonnes of cocaine, the biggest shipment of cocaine seized in New York and New Jersey in 25 years, in the Port of New York-Newark. The cocaine, which has an estimated street value of $77 million, was hidden in a shipping container originating…

Newsbriefing – Week of 3 December

After numerous seizures during the month of November, the Venezuelan authorities reported an increase in drug flows coming from Colombia through the country’s coastal state of Anzoátegui. It seems that the region is also the centre of an air-trafficking network, sending drugs to the Caribbean, Honduras and Mexico. The dismantling of ​a network of ketamine…

CRIMJUST supports Peru in fostering international judicial cooperation in organised crime and drug trafficking

Under the framework of CRIMJUST, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) delivered a workshop in International Judicial Cooperation in cases of organised crime, drug trafficking and money laundering, in collaboration with the National Commission for Development and Life Without Drugs (DEVIDA PERU) and the Iberoamerican Network of Anti-Drug Prosecutors (RFAI), on 26-28…

News Briefing- Week of 9 of July

Between March and May 2018, INTERPOL coordinated operations in 36 countries across Africa, Asia, the Middle East and South America, with the aim of shutting down factories and cutting off supply chains behind a wide range of counterfeit goods and the organised crime networks directing them. The operations yielded  global seizures worth USD 25 million.…

News Briefing- Week of 25 of June

Left-wing candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador has claimed victory in Mexico’s presidential election, held on 1 July. One of his main policies is combating Mexico’s record levels of violence, much of it related to drug cartels. Epidiolex, a cannabis-based treatment for childhood epilepsy developed, is set to be launched in the autumn after being approved…

UNODC Assists the Public Ministry of Panama to Launch a Regional Workshop on Asset Recovery and Mechanisms for the Prosecution of the proceeds of crime

CRIMJUST delivered a Regional Workshop on Asset Recovery and Mechanism for the Prosecution of the Illicit Product on 11 June 2018 together with the School of Public Prosecutors of the Public Ministry of Panama. With the participation of officers from the Public Prosecution Office(s) of Panama, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala and the Dominican Republic,…

News Briefing- Week of 4 June

The European Drug Report 2018, released on 7 June by the EMCDDA, mentioned that the purity of street cocaine across Europe is at its highest level in a decade and that the number of people seeking treatment for cocaine addiction has risen. Solution to fight illegal drugs can be country-specific, as the 3-year Mexico-Filipino cooperation…