Colombian Defense Minister Juan Carlos Pinzón announced yesterday that Colombia will expand its support to the Dominican Republic to help combat narcotrafficking, reduce the violence related to the drug trade and to strengthen security. The pledge came in a meeting with Dominican president Danilo Medina Sánchez and Dominican Defense Minister Sigfrido Pared in Santo Domingo.
Colombian assistance will focus on improving the amount of information shared between intelligence organizations in both countries. Later this month, representatives of the Colombian National Police will come to the Caribbean nation to train their Dominican counterparts in anti-narcotrafficking tactics and share best practices from Colombia’s drug war. Minister Pinzón has engaged other countries in the region dealing with drug trafficking threats, including Panama, Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, Jamaica, and Trinidad and Tobago.
The Dominican Republic continues to be one of the main traffic points for narcotics distributed through the Caribbean. In the past two years alone, there has been an 800 percent increase in the amount of cocaine exported to the United States and Europe. According to the European Union’s COPOLAD Program, the Dominican Republic’s anti-drug trafficking efforts are hamstrung by lack of state control and technological resources at its Multimodal Caucedo and Haina ports.
