By Frank Smyth, July 5, 2012, InsightCrime.org
The last time Guatemala extradited one of its own drug lords was nearly 20 years ago. And the complications faced by US agencies back then have continued to plague US efforts through six administrations led by four…
By Frank Smyth, January 13, 2012, World Policy Journal
For Guatemala and its majority Mayan population time is repeating itself. A former military commander and intelligence chief with a bloody past promises to bring law and order to the Central American nation. Worried about rising crime and the increasingly violent penetration by Mexican drug cartels, voters elected Otto Pérez Molina…
By Frank Smyth, November 18, 2005, The Texas Observer
The alert went out across the state this past July. A McAllen-based FBI analyst wrote a classified report that the Department of Homeland Security sent to U.S. Border Patrol agents throughout Texas. About 30 suspects who were once part of an elite unit of the Guatemalan special forces were training drug traffickers in paramilitary tactics
By Frank Smyth, March 10, 1995, The Wall Street Journal
Colombia has been reluctant to prosecute top leaders of the Cali cartel and dismantle their organization. The Clinton administration is pushing Colombia to do more, while the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, led by Jesse Helms (R., N.C.), threatens to impose trade…
By Frank Smyth, March 1, 1992, The Progressive
The women wore white gúipils embroidered with pastel flowers and a thin brown trim. The men’s pants were of a matching design, cut off below the knee. The people of Santiago de Atitlán –more than 5,000 of them– marched the half mile out of town to the site of the former army garrison. “Here,” said one, “we are planting the peace.”






















