Mexico’s Drug War Is Spreading To Its Central American Neighbors

As the violent drug war continues in Mexico, there are signs that other regional nations, in particular Mexico’s southern neighbor, Guatemala, are being drawn into the conflict, according to a Voice Of America report.

On Monday, the head of a U.N. commission targeting corruption in Guatemala resigned, citing drug-gang influence on law enforcement officials as the reason.

Speaking to reporters Monday in Guatemala City, the head of the U.N.-backed International Commission against Impunity, Carlos Castresana said he was abandoning his effort in Guatemala because the government had failed to reform its judicial system.

During the past two years there have been increasing signs that drug-trafficking gangs from Mexico have infiltrated Guatemala, as well as Honduras and El Salvador, recruiting operatives and establishing smuggling routes. The head of the Guatemala-based human-rights group the Myrna Mack Foundation, Helen Mack, says evidence the Mexican Zetas gang had entered Guatemala came two years ago in a shooting near a Caribbean coast resort in which 11 people were killed.

Read the full Voice Of America article here.