Between 2011 and 2020, the volume of cocaine seized in the nine states that compose the Brazilian Legal Amazon reached more than 99 tons, according to data compiled by the Federal Police. The number considers seizures of hydrochloride, cocaine base paste and crack and is 73.8% higher than the total amount of drug withheld in the previous decade.
Considering just the last five years – 2016 to 2020, the total volume was 56.5 tons, almost the same amount seized over the entire previous decade (56.9 tons). The data reveal a twofold growth: greater intensification of inspection by the authorities, and greater movement of drugs in the region.
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Report – Another data survey that indicates an increase of drug trafficking in the region is the 2022 global report from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), that placed Brazil as one of the main cocaine exporters outside the American continent of the world, along with Bolivia and Peru. Alongside this protagonism is the growing presence of criminal factions and the use of ports in the North and Northeast of the country for drug distribution, supplying the international trafficking market.
Brazil is also referred to as the main point of departure for cocaine seized in European countries, together with Colombia and Ecuador. The UN global report, released by the end of June, also highlights that between 2015 and 2021, 70% of the cocaine shipments seized in Africa came from Brazil and that almost half (46%) of the drugs confiscated in Asia are also originated from Brazilian ports.
According to the UN report, in recent years, there has been an increase in the use of maritime routes by international traffic. And, involved in this dynamic, some smaller ports in the North and Northeast of Brazil assumed an increasing importance for cocaine shipments to Europe. The change in route took place, according to the document, due to improved inspection mechanisms and apprehensions made at the Port of Santos, in São Paulo, the main port for illegal drug exports in the country at the time.
Factions increase presence and dispute over the trafficking route
In June, the 2022 edition of the Anuário de Segurança Pública [Public Security Yearbook], prepared by the Fórum de Segurança Pública [Public Security Forum] was launched, bringing together data from various state and federal agencies. In the publication, one of the chapters deals specifically with the increase in violence in the Amazon region, precisely because of the greater presence of factions that vie for space in strategic points of the so-called “trafficking route”.
For the researchers Samira Bueno and Renato Sérgio de Lima, director-executive and director-president of the Fórum Brasileiro de Segurança Pública [Brazilian Public Security Forum], respectively, the increase in violence observed in the region is due to various factors. “The deforestation, the illegal mining, corruption, criminality and the intense presence of militias and factions of organized crime, including over two dozen regional organizations and two large national organizations – PCC and Comando Vermelho – by disputing the main national and transnational drug trafficking routes, will transform the Brazilian Amazon into a scenery of wars that strongly impact the rates of lethal violence throughout the region and the country", highlight the researchers in a paper published in the 2022 edition of the Yearbook.
According to the authors, the average of lethal violence in the Brazilian Amazon region is 38% higher compared to the other regions of the country. However, urban areas present still higher rates of homicides and violent deaths. “In urban municipalities, with more than 50,000 inhabitants and/or a predominance of densely populated areas, the lethal violence in the Amazon is 47.9% higher than the national average for this type of municipality. The alert is clear enough, that is, ‘if we want to have a safer, fairer and more sustainable country, we need to rescue the Amazon from the logic of violence and terror”, he alerts. The document also points out that out of the 30 Brazilian cities with the highest rate of intentional violent death, 13 are located in the Amazon region.
Researcher Aiala Couto, professor at the Universidade do Estado do Pará [University of the State of Pará] – UEPA and a member of the Fórum Brasileiro de Segurança Pública [Brazilian Public Security Forum], also emphasizes, in the year book, the rampant growth of factions and drug trafficking in the Amazon. “On the other hand, we cannot fail to emphasize two important problems that, in our view, are associated to everything which has been mentioned so far involving drug trafficking and the growth of criminal factions. The first is the evidence that the Amazon props up as a strong geographical corridor for the transport of cocaine of Andean origin to Brazil, Europe and Africa; The second is a recent phenomenon which shows the interest of groups linked to organized crime in establishing connections with the cities of the region”, he points out.
The high rates of lethal violence in the Amazon are also on the agenda in the Federal Senate. Last July 6th, according to Agência Senado [the official news channel of the Senate department], the president of the parliament, Rodrigo Pacheco, approved a request for conducting a CPI process [ Parliamentary Commission of Investigation] on drug trafficking, protocolled by Senator Eduardo Girão (Podemos party -Ceará State), which aims to investigate organized crime and drug trafficking, verifying the relationship of these activities with the increase in homicides of young people and adolescents in Brazil, between the years of 2016 and 2020.
The Amazon is a “strategic region for the geopolitics of drug trafficking”, says the researcher
Aiala Couto also highlights that the different factions of organized crime operating in Brazil have started to see the Amazon as a strategic region for the geopolitics of drug trafficking, considering it possesses cross-border relations that involves multiple agents, each one with its own specific function within the universe of crime “Factions of the Southeast region of Brazil, for example – the Comando Vermelho, originally from Rio de Janeiro, and the PPC, from São Paulo, have interest in acting in border areas, as well as in cities considered important for the fluidity of the drug. The interest of these factions is related to the search for control of the main drug trafficking routes in the Amazon”, he details.
According to professor Aiala Couto, however, local factions have learnt and understood better, along the last few years ,the mechanisms of operation of illegal networks throughout the Amazon and, as a consequence, the states of Amazonas and Pará, considered to be the great "corridors" for the circulation of illicit goods (drugs, wood and smuggled mining) “have become the locus of emergence of regionalized criminal groups, such as Família do Norte (FDN-AM) and Comando Classe A (CCA-PA)”, analyses the professor in the document Anuário de Segurança Pública .
According to Brigadier General Evandro Luiz Lopes Ferreira, the head of Centro de Coordenação de Operações [Operations Coordination Center] (CCOp), and a member of the Comando Militar do Norte [Northern Military Command] (CMN), the states of Pará, Amapá, Maranhão and Northern Tocantins – areas under the responsibility of the CMN in the Eastern Amazon – are not border states with those countries considered to be drug producers. This fact explains the main interest of criminal organizations linked to drug trafficking (in the region) being related to the transportation of illicit materials for possible export. “Our border is with the French Guiana, Suriname and Guiana, which are not big drug producers. For that reason, we assume Pará is a drug “passage” to other states or international destinations.
Cartographies
The progress and activities of criminal factions in the Amazon are also detailed in the study "Cartographies of violence in the Amazon region: final report", published in February this year. The document was written by members of the Research Group Territórios Emergentes e Redes de Resistências na Amazônia (Terra), [Emerging Territories and Resistance Networks in the Amazon], from UEPA [University of Pará State].
The research reinforces that the "Amazon is surrounded by factions and, being an area of drug trade, it is a stage for strategies with Brazilian factions so that the illicit substances can enter the country's borders and reach the main markets. Thus, Brazilian factions depend on such relationships to receive the drug loads and fully operate the sale of cocaine, ecstasy and skank in the domestic market and in transactions involving the global market", highlights the report.
Bruno and Dom's murder warns about violence in the region
The state of Amazonas is the main gateway for cocaine from Peru and skank, from Colombia, “because it has the most influential drug trafficking routes: the Solimões River and the Javari River”, says the professor.
Aiala also details that “the Solimões route became the scene of disputes and conflicts involving pirates from the Coarí region, members of the FDN and of the PCC factions. The latter commanded the region since they arrived crossing the states of Mato Grosso and Acre, making several alliances along the way. 'Os Crias', a faction created from the dissidence of members of the FDN, operates on the triple border controlling the most important route used by Peruvian drug traffickers”, he points out.
The Yearbook highlights that, according to Aiala, “the Vale do Javari territory faces a series of public security problems that affect indigenous and riverine communities in the region. They suffer attacks from miners and smuggler loggers”.
Bruno Pereira and the British journalist Dom Phillips were murdered in Atalaia do Norte, in the indigenous territory of Vale do Javari. A month after the double homicide, on June 5th, the case continues to be investigated by the Federal Police. Until last Wednesday (6), three people had been arrested for their alleged involvement in the crime and another five are still being investigated. The authorities are investigating the possible existence of masterminds and the motivations for the crime. One of the lines of investigation points out that both were killed for reporting criminal practices in the region, among them, illegal fishing of pirarucu, a typical species of fish in the Amazon region, on indigenous land.
For the researcher Aiala Couto, groups that commit illegal practices are interrelated in the region. “The complexity that is established in the Amazon involves a network of criminals who are related to both drug trafficking and environmental crimes. This dynamic weakens public security policies, negatively affecting forest peoples who are exposed to a context of violence. Confronting it, therefore, must go through the fight against organized crime and must consider the local specificities of the region, which is the target area disputed”, he adds.
The Port of Vila do Conde: drugs mixed in beer, ore and even in açai
The Port of Vila do Conde, located in the municipality of Barcarena, about 60 kilometers from the capital Belém, in the state of Pará, is one of the main ports in the Amazon region. Daily, legal cargoes are exported through its facilities, such as ore, wood and other products derived from Amazon fruit crops, such as açaí.
The frenetic movement of ships going to Europe and the low level of inspection, according to a police source who works in the investigation of crimes related to drug trafficking, make the place, managed by Companhia Docas do Pará (CDP), an area frequently used by organized crime. “It is a strategic port where drugs arrive and are sent to European countries. We often receive a cargo report, but we need a court order to access and to open a container. Then, we miss the right time, the information leaks and the operation ends up in frustration. Even so, it is a port where drug apprehension is frequent, but a lot of things still pass through it. If there is efficient inspection, there is something to be seized every day”, reveals the source, who asked not to be identified.
“Many cargoes are modified in the containers, within the CDP area. The seals attached outside the boarding area are adulterated. It is in the boarding area that, in most cases, they insert the drug that will be sent,” the informer says.
In a note published, CDP informs that operates with a Federal Port Security crew at the Port of Vila do Conde, “in addition to a complete system of electronic security – CFTV, as established by the Security Plan approved by the Comissão Nacional de Segurança Pública [National Public Security Commission] in Ports, Terminals and Waterways – Conportos”. The Company explained that all operations with containers, including their inspection, take place at the customs terminal, by a port operating company, under a leasing contract, responsible for this type of operation. The note also informed that “there are not any internal administrative proceedings in progress against CDP employees regarding illicit drug trafficking - narco trafficking”.
