Latin American drug traffickers expanding trade to Persian Gulf states

As Mexico’s drug cartels expand their reach beyond Latin America and the United States into Europe, Asia, and Australia, traffickers in Argentina and Brazil have begun looking toward the Middle East Gulf States as a new spot to haul their illicit goods.

Security experts estimate that around 75 percent of all the drugs seized in Qatar come from South America and that the new amounts of wealth pouring into countries like Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait have lured drug traffickers to the tightly watched region.

“It’s a very small amount that they have seized in Qatar but we can see from recent activity that Qatar is a new route for drug traffickers from Brazil and Argentina, among other countries, who are using the route to expand their illicit trade in the Gulf region,” said Johan Obdola, president of the Vancouver-based International Organization for Security and Intelligence (IOSI). “If you mention Dubai and Kuwait to anyone in the underworld, people say it’s money. And where there is money, there is opportunity for criminal activity.”