Cocaine first seized; by 2020, gangs are already trafficking methamphetamines. Prosecution data point to a drop in drug seizures under Bukele’s management.
El Salvador continues to be a transit point for drug cartels to move their products to the United States and other nations, where gangs are playing an increasingly active role because they control the territory of many communities in the country.
The gangs went from charging extortion to those who sell the drug in their territories to being the direct marketers, without neglecting consumption.
According to criminologist Carlos Ponce, the evolution of gangs has been remarkable in recent years and they are now direct protagonists in the trafficking and marketing of illegal substances.
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“At first the gang started extorting people who sold drugs in their territory, but over time the gangs have become more involved in the business, selling drugs and also working with some organizations of international drug trafficking, ”Ponce argues.
The security expert adds that the gangs “have taken a leap in this illicit business.”
The gang has even already ventured into clandestine drug labs in the country. In October last year, police dismantled clandestine methamphetamine laboratories on MS-13. The brigands used the facade of a “Christian ministry” not to preach the gospel, but to process drugs.
According to the Police and the Public Prosecutor’s Office, the brigands were preparing various substances in two laboratories that operated in Mexicans and in the Sant Lluís residential area in San Salvador.
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This finding coincides with Ponce’s thesis of the evolution of these criminal groups, which have not only made inroads into drug trafficking, but also into money laundering, as evidenced several years ago with the Chess operation.
Seizures in five years
El Diari d’Avui has worked with data obtained via Access to Information offices in the last five years in drug trafficking around the country through requests made to the Attorney General’s Office, because the information, although public , does not exist in the web portals of this institution or in the National Civil Police.
The data reflect the emergence of drugs that were previously not very common in authorities’ seizure reports such as heroin, ecstasy and methamphetamines, which could mean that these narcotics, unlike cocaine and marijuana, are now moving more presence in the Salvadoran square.
Official data reveals that in the last five years 12 tons of different types of illegal substances have been confiscated. Cocaine is the most confiscated drug: about nine tons, while marijuana is 2.5 tons.
The map of narcotics shows heroin, which long ago was considered a drug that only went through the country, but now has a local consumer market. Heroin, which since 2017 has had an increase in seizures and presence in El Salvador, for the case, this year confiscated 298 grams; one gram in 2018; but in 2019 they confiscated 995 grams. Already by 2020, the authorities do not report seizures.
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Ecstasy is also circulating more in the streets, last year, the Public Prosecutor’s Office recorded a seizure of 1,648 grams (1.6 kilos).
In its passage to other countries, the drug has not stopped circulating in El Salvador, but is also admitted for local consumption.
