Peru’s anti-narcotics agency Devida says dozens of dockworkers at the country’s ports have been murdered after being ensnared in illegal drug trafficking, according to Reuters.
Devida (a Spanish acronym for National Commission for Development and Life Without Drugs) says some 90 dockers have been murdered over the past two years in relation to drug gangs smuggling cocaine in shipping containers.
Dockworkers usually become involved either by the enticement of big money payoffs from the drug gangs or because they become hooked on the illegal substances themselves and are vulnerable to exploitation.
While Colombia is renowned as the world leader in cocaine production, Peru is a close second.
Devida has called on relevant government agencies to work with dockers’ unions and to tighten procedures for scanning the contents of containers before they are shipped.
In the bigger picture, Devida has approved of government plans to cut the drug supply at source by giving farmers incentives to not replant coca after crops have been destroyed by the authorities.
