Tgeucigalpa, Honduras.
The Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez called on the international community to implement the maras and gangs, as one of the foremost perpetrators of human rights violations worldwide, during their participation in the 14th United Nations Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice, taking place March 7-12 in Tokyo City, Japan.
“These subversive groups have taken thousands of lives from us, weakened our social fabric and are a permanent threat to all of humanity,” recalled the president during his conference call.
He said that just as criminals have mutated, “our legal mechanisms, institutions, governments and international organizations need to be updated to face this new reality.”
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“To defeat our common enemies, we must recognize them for what they are. Maras and gangs, such as Al Qaeda, ISIS and others, are no longer atypical subjects of international law, these are terrorist groups that should be tried and condemned by the entire international community, ”he said.
He emphasized that organized crime groups have weapons of war, technology more advanced than that of the states themselves, international illicit financing systems, advanced cybercrime equipment, hidden intercontinental networks dedicated to extortion, human trafficking and a huge variety of new crimes.
Results
“In 2011, unfortunately, we were the most violent country on the planet due to the presence of organized crime in our country, mainly drug trafficking, maras and gangs, but today we reduced the murder rate by nearly 60%,” Hernández assured.
He also indicated that the traffic of cocaine going to North America via Honduras had been reduced from 87% to just 3%.
The constant mutation of these criminal groups and the advanced technology they possess have turned these non-state actors into crime corporations, illegal multinational organizations dedicated solely to capitalizing on the aftermath of terrible atrocities.
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“ In our case, we made decisions that no one was willing to make before because they were life-threatening, from a constitutional reform to allow for the extradition of Honduran criminals in connection with drug trafficking, organized crime and terrorism, through a police sweep that of force. cleaning up the institution, firing nearly 50% of all its members and most of its generals for serving the criminal world, ”the president recalls.
“ We reaffirm the pivotal role of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), with whom we recently signed a strategic partnership and established a presence in the country, as well as in supporting states in their actions to fulfill our obligations in crime prevention and criminal justice, ”he said.