By J. R. Nicolás-Carlock and  Luna-Pla

In recent years, the analysis of economic crime and corruption in procurement has benefited from integrative studies that acknowledge the interconnected nature of the procurement ecosystem. Following this line of research, we present a networks approach for the analysis of shell-companies operations in procurement that makes use of contracting and ownership data under one framework to gain knowledge about the organized crime behavior that emerges in this setting. In this approach, ownership and management data are used to identify connected components in shell-company networks that, together with the contracting data, allows to develop an alternative representation of the traditional buyer-supplier network: the module-component bipartite network, where the modules are groups of buyers and the connected components are groups of suppliers. This is applied to two documented cases of procurement corruption in Mexico characterized by the involvement of large groups of shell-companies in the misappropriation of millions of dollars across many sectors. We quantify the economic impact of single versus connected shell-companies operations. In addition, we incorporate metrics for the diversity of operations and favoritism levels. This paper builds into the quantitative organized crime in the private sector studies and contributes by proposing a networks approach for preventing fraud and understanding the need for legal reforms.   

Trends in Organized Crime (2024) 27: pages 412–428

By The Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime

The influx of weapons to Ukraine after Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, added to an already large reservoir of weapons in the country (especially since the outbreak of the conflict in 2014), raised concern over the spread of these weapons in the hands of criminals further in Western Europe, and the possible effect on organized criminal activities.

Both Ukraine and Ukraine’s Western partners have been aware of the political and criminal risks of arms diversion, and have put in place strict oversight mechanisms to track the delivery of weapons. According to Vadym Dzyubynskyi, head of criminal investigation at the Ukrainian National Police:

• All lost and stolen weapons, which currently number 593 000, are all accounted for, numbered, and our European partners know about these weapons. If such a weapon emerges in any country in Europe or the world, we will immediately understand that it is a drop-in and a fake, that it is the work of Russian special services for disinformation and narratives about Ukraine.

Ukrainian soldiers interviewed in February 2024 all spoke of strict standards over weapons, both during and at the end of their service. But in this nervous climate, any official shortcomings have been heavily scrutinized. And although not directly connected to weapons diversion, corruption scandals over military procurement in Ukraine have fed into concerns over the accountability of materiel in the war. Parsing the true risk has become essential to deepen the discussion beyond the headlines.

In order to provide insight into this issue, in 2023 the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime (GI-TOC) established an arms monitoring programme (‘the Monitor’) to track the flows of weapons out of Ukraine and into Europe.

At the heart of the project was the collection of black market prices for weapons both in Ukraine and in Europe, on the assumption that a comparison of prices in different countries, and an analysis of changes in those prices, would help shed light on the nature of supply and demand at the national and transnational level. This data has been sourced from underworld contacts and law enforcement in various countries. Qualitative interviews with underworld sources, law enforcement, journalists, activists and others have helped flesh out the data picture with regard to demand for weapons among criminals, appetite for risk and potential drivers and barriers. In addition, the Monitor collected information on seizures and official reports on firearms, and commissioned a survey of dark web marketplaces.

GI-TOC ARMS MONITORING PROJECT , 2024. 76p.

By Jonathan P. Caulkins

Background and aims: Multiple countries are considering revising cannabis policies. This study aimed to measure long-term trends in cannabis use in the United States and compare them with alcohol use.

Design and setting: Secondary analysis of United States general population survey data.

Participants: The national surveys had a total of 1 641 041 participants across 27 surveys from 1979 to 2022.

Measurements

Rates of use reported to the US National Survey on Drug Use and Health and its predecessors are described, as are trends in days of use reported. Four milepost years are contrasted: 1979 (first available data and end of relatively liberal policies of the 1970s), 1992 (end of 12 years of conservative Reagan-Bush era policies), 2008 (last year before the Justice Department signaled explicit federal non-interference with state-level legalizations) and 2022 (most recent data available).

Findings

Reported cannabis use declined to a nadir in 1992, with partial recovery through 2008, and substantial increases since then, particularly for measures of more intensive use. Between 2008 and 2022, the per capita rate of reporting past-year use increased by 120%, and days of use reported per capita increased by 218% (in absolute terms from the annual equivalent of 2.3 to 8.1 billion days per year). From 1992 to 2022, there was a 15-fold increase in the per capita rate of reporting daily or near daily use. Whereas the 1992 survey recorded 10 times as many daily or near daily alcohol as cannabis users (8.9 vs. 0.9 M), the 2022 survey, for the first time, recorded more daily and near daily users of cannabis than alcohol (17.7 vs. 14.7 M). Far more people drink, but high-frequency drinking is less common. In 2022, the median drinker reported drinking on 4–5 days in the past month, versus 15–16 days in the past month for cannabis. In 2022, past-month cannabis consumers were almost four times as likely to report daily or near daily use (42.3% vs. 10.9%) and 7.4 times more likely to report daily use (28.2% vs. 3.8%).

Conclusions

Long-term trends in cannabis use in the United States parallel corresponding changes in cannabis policy, with declines during periods of greater restriction and growth during periods of policy liberalization. A growing share of cannabis consumers report daily or near daily use, and their numbers now exceed the number of daily and near daily drinkers.

Addiction, Volume119, Issue9, September 2024, Pages 1648-1652

By The International Crisis Group 

Over half a century on from the declaration of a “war on drugs”, Latin America is struggling to manage the eruption of violence tied to the narcotics trade. Though drugrelated organised crime has brought notorious peaks of violence in the past, above all in Colombia and Mexico, never has it spread so wide, and rarely has it penetrated so deeply into states and communities. Criminal groups have splintered, multiplied and diversified, adding lethal synthetics like fentanyl to the traditional plant-based supply of marijuana, cocaine and heroin, as well as moving into new rackets like extortion. Where communities are poor and unprotected, criminal groups act as employers and overlords; where state officials are present, they coerce and corrupt them. With Washington pushing for a fresh military-led crackdown on drug cartels, perhaps involving U.S. forces, Latin American leaders face difficult decisions. Despite the pressure to comply, experience suggests that a balance of improved policing, alternative livelihoods, gun control and, under specific conditions, negotiations would be more effective in reducing violence. The map of the drug trade in Latin America has been transformed in the decades since supply routes from the Andes to the U.S. first emerged. Demand for narcotics outside the region remains at record highs, with newer markets booming – particularly for cocaine in Europe and fentanyl in the U.S. At the same time, waves of U.S.- backed law enforcement, based on capture and extradition of crime bosses (known as kingpins), drug seizures and forced eradication have revolutionised the supply chain. Although Colombia and Mexico remain at the heart of the drug business, a main route to the U.S. and Europe runs down the Pacific, passing through countries that were largely untouched by illicit trafficking such as Costa Rica and Ecuador. Each of these has seen rates of violence rise sharply; in 2024, Ecuador was South America’s most violent nation. Across the region, surges of bloodshed have marked the new hubs of a fast-shifting, hyper-violent drug trade. Understanding how this rolling crime wave came about is fundamental to arresting it. Drug-related organised crime has adapted to the threat posed by law enforcement by becoming more flexible and resilient. In place of hierarchical syndicates that could be dismantled once their leaders were identified, the trade increasingly functions through networks of providers who subcontract each step of the route to lower tiers of operators. High-level financiers engage sophisticated international traffickers, who oversee drug exports to user markets. These in turn partner with national and local crime groups to meet the orders. National groups manage production or ensure safe passage of the drug along a particular trafficking corridor. At the local level, urban gangs are contracted by larger criminal allies for small-scale logistical services like smuggling drugs through ports. All the layers of these networks have learned that capturing state officials is a business asset. Using a mix of threats and payoffs, they target police officers, judges, prosecutors and politicians who can ensure that business runs smoothly, without the risk of arrest or seizure of shipments. Likewise, prisons in some of Latin America’s roughest settings are run by inmates, who manage their criminal enterprises behind bars and carry out vendettas against rivals inside and outside.

Brussels: International Crisis Group, 2025. 51p.

By Ruggero Scaturro | Giorgio Fruscione

In the Western Balkans, religious radicalization gained international attention in the early 2010s, with around 1 000 people travelling to Syria and Iraq to join jihadist groups between 2012 and 2016. The roots of this radicalization trace back to the Yugoslav wars, the presence of mujahideen networks in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Islamist charities spreading Salafi jihadism in the 1990s.

However, not all fighters from the Western Balkans are religiously motivated. Between 2014 and 2021, around 300 people fought in eastern Ukraine, mainly for political reasons, with Serbia being a major source of combatants supporting pro-Russian separatists. Since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, this trend has resurged, with more individuals reportedly joining mercenary units like the Wagner Group.

Instability in the Western Balkans has also fuelled the spread of organized crime beyond the region, first across Europe and later to other continents. In the 1990s, the Yugo Mafia gained significant media attention in Northern Europe. Meanwhile, violent extremists from the Western Balkans maintain transnational connections through diaspora networks and using online platforms.

Geneva: Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, 2025. 45p.

By Andrés Aldana, Hernán Larralde & Maximino Aldana

Among all types of corruption, police corruption is probably the one that most directly hurts society, as those trusted with protecting the people either side with the criminals that victimize the citizens, or are themselves, criminals. However, both corruption and its effects are very difficult to measure quantitatively other than by perception surveys, but the perception that citizens have of this phenomenon may be different from reality. Using a simple agent-based model, we analyze the effect on crime rates as a result of both corruption and the perception of corruption within law-enforcement corporations. Our results show a phase transition in which crime can propagate across the population even when the majority of police officers are honest. We find that one of the parameters that strongly controls crime incidence is the probability that regular citizens become criminals. In contrast, other actions, such as arresting crime lords, or the amount of crime-associated money that is confiscated, have little impact on the long-term crime incidence. Our results suggest that in addition to combating corruption within law-enforcement institutions, to further reduce the incidence of crime, policymakers should strive to restore confidence in these institutions and the justice system.

By Laura R. Blume

Why do drug traffickers sometimes decide to use violence, but other times demonstrate restraint? Building on recent work on the politics of drug violence, this article explores how Central American drug trafficking organizations’ strategies impact their use of violence. I argue that three inter-related political factors—corruption, electoral competition, and the politicization of the security apparatus—collectively determine the type of relationship between traffickers and the state that will emerge. That relationship, in turn, determines the primary strategy used by traffickers in that country. Drawing on over two years of comparative ethnographic fieldwork in key transshipment points along the Caribbean coast of Central America, I show how co-optation strategies in Honduras have resulted in high levels of violence, evasion strategies in Costa Rica have produced moderate levels of violence, and collusion strategies in Nicaragua have generated the lowest levels of drug-related violence.

Comparative Political Studies,Volume 55, Issue 8, July 2022, Pages 1366-1402

By The International Drug Policy Consortium

In 2024, the World Drug Report broke its historical silence on the human rights dimension of drug policy with a special chapter on “Drug Use and the Right to Health.” The present analysis compares this chapter with the April 2024 report on “Drug Use, Harm Reduction, and the Right to Health” by the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health, Dr. Tlaleng Mofokeng, to assess whether the 2024 edition of the World Drug Report constitutes a genuine move towards integrating a human rights perspective into the global drug control regime.

The answer is negative. The World Drug Report chapter suffers from a critical and unjustifiable methodological flaw: it has been developed without any reference to the standards and recommendations on drugs and the right to health developed over the last 15 years by UN human rights mechanisms. These standards were created precisely to provide Member States with guidance on their human rights obligations. Instead, the chapter is often guided by the UNODC’s own policy preferences and its desire to manage political tensions at the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND).

The result is a flawed rendering of the right to health that omits essential elements such as a robust interpretation of harm reduction and support for the decriminalisation of people who use drugs. It also glosses over the undeniable tension between the drug control regime and the right to health, and introduces problematic concepts such as “the right to health of communities affected by drug use.” This notion is not grounded in human rights standards and risks decentring people who use drugs.

Although the special chapter pitches itself as the basis for a new framework to evaluate States’ performance with regards to the right to health, Member States should withhold support for this flawed initiative until it fully integrates the guidance developed by the UN human rights system.

London: International Drug Policy Consortium, 2025. 23p.

By Anneli Botha

Transnational organised crime is at the heart of the illicit extraction and smuggling of natural resources in Mozambique’s Cabo Delgado province. Is there evidence that insurgents are capitalising on the extraction of natural resources to radicalise and recruit new members, legitimise and justify their existence and attacks, or finance their activities? In the absence of interviews with militants, this study reflects on the views of community members living in areas where natural resources are extracted, and insurgents operate. Key points • Mozambique’s government needs to consider a more effective information campaign to get ahead of incorrect perceptions insurgents could capitalise on. • Words should be followed by action addressing the disparity between expected financial growth following the discovery of natural resources and the reality on the ground. • Despite efforts from extraction companies to build community relations, more is needed to address negative perceptions and strengthen community resilience through efforts to make locals more employable. Piecemeal efforts are not going to be enough

Research Paper  Centre for Crime and Justice Studies, 2025. 26p.

By Ndubuisi Christian Ani, Feyi Ogunade and John Kamma 

Gangsterism in Liberia lies at the intersection of a society ravaged by civil war, a declining economy, social exclusion of a bulging underclass, collusion between state officials and illicit markets, and inefficient law enforcement. For youths, gang involvement offers a sense of belonging, a surrogate family structure, and a means of protection and economic benefits. Gangs are also available for hire by politicians, criminal networks and business people seeking to intimidate their opponents or protect properties. Key recommendations • A policy against gangsterism and criminal groupings is urgently needed in Liberia. A comprehensive policy would offer opportunities for a holistic response that involves the improved provision of public services, including enhanced law enforcement, in communities. • Youth-focused development is a critical priority for addressing the causes of gang violence and drug abuse in Liberia. Without discounting the importance of quick-impact youth empowerment initiatives, development programmes need to be long-term. • Schools should have drug prevention programmes. • International support could help Liberia establish treatment and rehabilitation centres to address substance abuse and criminality. • The Economic Community of West African States and African Union should establish a joint task force with Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea to disrupt kush production points Research Paper and supply chains  

ENACT Africa, 2025. 28p.

By Matthew Chidozie Ogwu, MalikMatěj Malík, Pavel Tlustoš, Jiří Patočka

Fenethylline (street name, captagon) is a synthetic amphetamine-type stimulant that is emerging as a significant public health and security concern, particularly in the Middle East. This systematic review synthesizes original research articles, epidemiological studies, systematic reviews, policy analyses, and case reports to provide a comprehensive analysis of fenethylline’s health impacts, addiction potential, and dynamics of illicit trade. Initially developed for therapeutic use, fenethylline illicit production and use have escalated, raising concern about its physiological, psychological, and socio-economic impacts. This stimulant profoundly affects the central nervous system, enhancing wakefulness, concentration, and physical stamina while inducing euphoria. These effects come at the cost of serious adverse health outcomes, particularly with prolonged or heavy use, including cardiovascular complications, neurological damage, and addiction. The dependence-forming nature of captagon contributes to escalating substance use disorders, placing a burden on healthcare systems. Beyond its biomedical implications, fenethylline trafficking has become a global issue, with supply chains deeply intertwined with politically unstable regions where illicit economies thrive. The geopolitical dimensions of captagon’s trade amplify its global security threat, influencing international relations and regional stability. This paper underscores the urgent need for systematic data collection and coordinated efforts to regulate illicit fenethylline production and distribution. Strategies such as improved surveillance, public health interventions, and international cooperation are essential to mitigate its escalating risks. Addressing this issue requires a multidisciplinary approach, integrating public health, law enforcement, and policy development to curb its impact on global health and security.

Drug and Alcohol Dependence Reports, March 2025, 39 p.

By The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).  UNODC Regional Office for Southeast Asia and the Pacific

  This report presents the results of the twenty-second Myanmar opium survey, covering the 2023/2024 opium growing and harvesting season. The last three surveys in Myanmar covering the 2020/2021, 2021/2022, and the 2022/2023 seasons showed an increase at the national level in both areas under opium poppy cultivation and opium production. The 2023 survey reported an 18% increase in the area under cultivation to an estimated 47,100 hectares. For the first time in three years the 2024 survey shows a modest decline in the area under cultivation by 4% to 45,200 hectares, indicating a possible stabilization at recent high levels. Three consecutive years of expanding cultivation followed by a year of limited decline could indicate some degree of saturation in regional heroin markets supplied by Myanmar. Declining prices of fresh opium in Myanmar and declining purity adjusted prices of heroin in regional markets could have dissuaded a further increase of production in Myanmar in 2024. However, information from the field suggests that the stagnation in productivity could also be related to the ongoing internal conflict. While instability and conflict, and their impact on the rule of law have traditionally been seen as a driver of illicit crop cultivation, the expansion of the conflict and shifts in the territorial control of armed actors, especially in the growing areas of Shan and Kachin, have limited the mobility of rural population, and likely prevented farmers from accessing cultivation areas further away from their villages. The dynamics of internal conflict might also explain the uneven development across Myanmar’s states in regions, with some areas showing declines in cultivation and others continued growth. In October 2024, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimated that there were some 3 million people internally displaced across the country, with Shan and Kachin in particular seeing escalating tensions and clashes in late 2023 and early 2024. The 2024 survey shows decreases in illicit opium cultivation in half of the geographic areas observed, including South Shan which traditionally experienced the most extensive opium cultivation. Eastern Shan, Chin, and Kayah had modest increases between survey years. Overall, cultivation in Shan State, which continues to be the centre of opium production in Myanmar at 88% of total cultivation area, decreased by 4% to 39,700 ha, with decreases in South and North Shan (-9% and -4% respectively) while East Shan increased by 10%. Cultivation in Kachin saw a moderate decrease of 10%, a change from past trends when above-average increases were observed. Estimates for Chin and Kayah, where the overall area remained small in comparison to other areas, showed an 18% and 8% increase, respectively. Overall potential opium production decreased at greater rates than cultivation due to a decline in opium yield. In 2024, average yield declined by 4% from 22.9 kg per hectare to 22kg per hectare, resulting in an estimated opium production of 995 (700-1,580) metric tons, or 8% less than in 2023. Nevertheless, both yield and production remain at high levels across the last decade. The decrease in cultivation and production coincided with a decrease in farmgate prices of both fresh and dry opium in USD terms, by 4% and 8%, respectively. In 2024, fresh opium traded at just over US$300 per kilogram, down from US$317 the year before, although it remained high compared to the last low point in 2021 when it stood at US$131 per kilogram. In combination with lower production, nationally farmers earned slightly less income than the previous year, between US$230 – US$518 million in 2024 (US$271 - US$613 million in 2023). The farmgate value only represents a small share of the overall opiate economy, with heroin manufacture and export making up a larger share. Wholesale prices of heroin in the region declined even more, contributing to a much larger decrease in the value of the total national opiate economy of about 40%, now ranging between US$589 million and US$1.57 billion, representing between 0.9 – 2.4% of Myanmar’s 2023 GDP  

Thailand: UNODC Regional Office for Southeast Asia and the Pacific 2024. 88p.

By The Research and Trend Analysis Branch, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC),

Now entering its second year of enforcement, the ban continues to hold. In 2024, the area under cultivation was estimated at 12,800 ha, or 19% more than in 2023 (10,800 ha) . Despite the increase, opium poppy cultivation is still far below the priorban levels. In 2022 an estimated 232,000 ha were cultivated. The increase in cultivation came with a geographical shift. The South-western provinces of the country were long the center of cultivation up to and including 2023. In 2024, this changed and now 59% of all cultivation took place in the North-east, particularly in Badakhshan. The rapid and currently sustained decline in poppy cultivation and opium production has important and wide-ranging implications for the country and opiate markets long supplied by product from Afghanistan. Questions remain as to how the country will cope with the continued reduction in opiate income and how opiate markets downstream will react. Farmers that lack sustainable alternatives face a more precarious financial and economic situation and need alternative economic opportunities to become resilient against picking up poppy cultivation in the future. Distributors and dealers closer to destination markets, as well as consumers, are likely to experience supply constraints in the coming years, should the ban remain in place. Following a major hike in 2022 and 2023, dry opium prices stabilized slightly in the first half of 2024 to around US$730. These prices are several times higher than the long-running pre-ban average of US$100 per kilogram. Extremely high farmgate prices and questions about dwindling opium stocks may encourage a resumption in poppy cultivation, especially in places outside of traditional cultivation centers, including neighboring countries. 

Vienna: UNODC, 2024. 20p.

By The United Office on Drugs and Crime

  In the Sahel countries and their neighbours, the high prevalence of infectious diseases, including malaria, coupled with challenges in terms of the availability and affordability of and access to healthcare, creates an environment in which the demand for medical products and services is not fully met through formal channels. The disparity between the demand for and supply of regulated pharmaceutical products leaves room for trafficking, provides an incentive for the involvement of organized criminal groups and fuels the ongoing threat to public safety and public health in the Sahel countries. Between January 2017 and December 2021, at least 605 tons of different medical products were seized in West Africa during international operations.  While there are no reliable estimates of the overall quantities of medical products that are trafficked in different ways and forms in the Sahel countries, studies point to a percentage of substandard and falsified medicines in the medical market of between 19 and 50 per cent. Some 40 per cent of the substandard and falsified medical products reported in the Sahel countries between 2013 and 2021 was discovered in the regulated supply chain. Just as regulated medical products can be diverted, illicitly manufactured medical products can find their way into authorized pharmaceutical outlets, which shows how much the regulated (legal) and unregulated (illicit) supply chains are interconnected. The Sahel countries rely heavily on imports of medical products because their pharmaceutical industries are still in the early stages of development. Of total pharmaceutical expenditure in sub-Saharan Africa in 2019, imports represented as much as 70 to 90 per cent (roughly 14 billion United States dollars ($)). Medical products diverted from the legal supply chain often originate in the main exporting countries of medical products to the Sahel countries, in particular Belgium and France, and to a lesser extent China and India. Others are manufactured in neighbouring countries, including in North Africa and the Gulf of Guinea. The seaports in the Gulf of Guinea, Conakry (Guinea), Tema (Ghana), Lomé (Togo), Cotonou (Benin) and Apapa (Nigeria) can be identified as major entry points for medical products destined for the Sahel countries. Trafficking by air, using postal shipments or carried out by commercial air passengers, is employed for smuggling smaller quantities of medical products. Once in West Africa, trafficked medical products reach the Sahel countries through smugglers who follow traditional trafficking routes using buses, trucks and private cars. Investigations have revealed the involvement of a wide range of opportunistic actors in trafficking in medical products in the Sahel countries, from employees of pharmaceutical companies, public officials, law enforcement officers and health agency workers to street vendors, all motivated by potential financial gain. Despite terrorist groups and non-state armed groups being commonly associated with trafficking in medical products in the Sahel, most reported cases in the region show that the involvement of such groups is limited and mainly revolves around consuming medical products or levying "taxes" on them in the areas under their control. In sub-Saharan Africa, as many as 267,000 deaths per year are linked to falsified and substandard antimalarial medicines. In addition, up to 169,271 are linked to falsified and substandard antibiotics used to treat severe pneumonia in children.     

Vienna: UNODC, 2022. 28p.

By Jennifer McDonald

Across the country, law enforcement agencies routinely seize currency from individuals using civil forfeiture—a legal process that allows agencies to take and keep property without ever charging owners with a crime, let alone securing a conviction. Studies examining civil forfeiture have found it to be a multibillion-dollar industry that punishes people without proving they have done anything wrong. This study is the first to examine how U.S. Department of Homeland Security agencies—U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the U.S. Secret Service, and the U.S. Coast Guard—use civil forfeiture to take and keep currency from often unsuspecting travelers at airports across the country. DHS agencies are just a few of the many government agencies that conduct airport seizures, but newly available data give fresh insight into their activity. This study, covering 2000 through 2016, quantifies just how often DHS agencies have seized currency at airports—and just how much currency has flowed into the federal government’s coffers as a result.

Arlington, VA: Institute for Justice, 2020. 32p.

By The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime

The ratio of registered vehicles to people in the Sahel countries is low and per capita daily gasoline consumption is estimated to be among the lowest in the world. Nevertheless, an average at-pump price of $1 per litre would result in a combined annual total market value of at least 5 billion United States dollars ($) for both legal and illegal fuel in the region. Despite some of them producing oil, the Sahel countries rely on fuel imports from Algeria, Libya and Nigeria, where fuel is heavily subsidized. It appears that the low fuel prices in Algeria, Libya and Nigeria are among the most significant drivers of fuel trafficking in the Sahel. In addition to fuel trafficking, cheap gasoline and diesel also fuel the activities of illegal non-state armed groups, including groups deemed “terrorist” by the international community. Moreover, there are some indications that there may be deeper linkages to other forms of smuggling, such as trafficking in medical products, drugs and firearms. There are four major fuel trafficking flows into the Sahel countries: from Nigeria via Benin to Burkina Faso and Mali; from Nigeria via the Niger to Mali; from Algeria to Mali; and from Libya to the Niger and Chad. A large portion of the market for trafficked fuel in the Sahel countries appears to be informally organized. However, recent investigations have revealed the involvement of structured groups with links to prominent individuals with interests in retail fuel companies, financial institutions and corrupt law enforcement officials. This highlights the importance of the formal trade in laundering smuggled fuel. Companies associated with individuals under United Nations Security Council sanctions are also reported to be involved in fuel smuggling from the Niger to Mali. The introduction of fuel subsidies and licensing policies has led to the emergence of powerful business elites in the Sahel countries with sufficient political influence to protect fuel smuggling activities. Opportunities to earn illegal revenue indirectly from fuel trafficking through bribery and other forms of corruption compromise the level of repression that the Sahel countries can exercise on the illicit fuel trade. Issues with, and gaps in, the rule of law in some areas, owing to a combination of a high level of insecurity and vast, porous borders, constitute a key enabling

factor for fuel trafficking in the Sahel. The lack of state presence in remote areas gives room for the proliferation of criminal activities.

Vienna: UNODC, 2022. 24p.

By Natascha Eichinger, Ekaterina Spassova, Murat Yildiz, et al.

The continued global demand for opiates, and the conditions that sustain opiate production in Afghanistan, pose a threat to public health, governance, and security at regional and global

level. This is likely to continue following the change of regime in Afghanistan in August 2021. Afghan opiates are trafficked to almost every continent worldwide. In 2021, the income from opiates in Afghanistan amounted to some USD 1.8–2.7 billion: however, much larger sums are accrued by international Drug Trafficking Organizations (DTOs) along illicit drug supply chains outside Afghanistan. While most opiates trafficked from Afghanistan are trafficked by land methods, a proportion of the opiates produced in South-West Asia are also trafficked by maritime methods to global destinations.

� Some of the opiates produced in Afghanistan and South-West Asia are trafficked via the southern route by maritime means. Seizures of opiates – and methamphetamine – have been increasing in the Indian Ocean, the result of sustained interdictions by national authorities and international maritime coalitions including the Combined Maritime Forces (CMF) and the EU Naval Force – Somalia (EUNAVFOR). � Drug packages seized in the Indian Ocean are marked with a wide range of stamps including hand pressed and hand-written markings. These stamps are made up of several elements consisting of sequential and non-sequential numbers, names, locations, and different objects. The stamps can provide some detail on the manufacturers and traffickers involved in the production and transport of drugs to international markets. � Stamps can often be used for branding purposes in a similar way to brand logos used with legitimate goods or can be used to identify or alternatively conceal the producers of a batch of heroin. The number of different stamps marked on a package of heroin can be an indicator of how many producers or traffickers were involved with that package. � Stamps are chosen by individual Drug Trafficking Organisations (DTOs). They appear to be well known amongst DTOs and usually can not be copied by other traffickers. However, in some cases a “franchising” process is possible, with smaller traffickers purchasing the right to use stamps associated with larger DTOs. � Dates printed on heroin packages generally indicate the production year. However, there is less clarity when two dates are stamped on a package. In some cases, the second year may indicate when heroin manufacture continued by the same lab, or alternatively can be the expiry date of the heroin or the date when the package was distributed to international markets. Printed dates can also be updated by hand-written markings. � Sequential and non-sequential numbers stamped on heroin packages are generally seen as being coded communications between heroin manufacturers and traffickers, although the specific messages are not known. Sequential numbers (for example 555 or 777) have been found in both the Indian Ocean between 2017 and 2021, and in Central Asia and the Russian Federation in 2012. By comparison, nonsequential numbers (for example 355 or 787) seized in the Indian Ocean are not seen in Central Asia and are only infrequently seized in the Indian Ocean. It is possible that sequential numbers may be associated with relative purity of the heroin contained in the packages stamped with these numbers. � Words stamped on heroin packages appear to be an indicator of where the heroin was produced. Heroin produced in southern Afghanistan is reportedly stamped with Pashto words, while heroin produced in northern Afghanistan and the Islamic Republic of Iran is more likely to be stamped with Farsi words. Heroin produced in eastern and western Afghanistan often has words in English, Farsi and Pashto, while heroin produced in Pakistan is labelled with words in English and Urdu. � Heroin and methamphetamine manufactured and trafficked by the same DTO may be stamped with the same or very similar stamps. In some cases, heroin packages are stamped with images of

animals which may be an indicator of relative purity of the heroin or an indicator of the location of the manufacturer. � Although some conclusions can be drawn from the analysis of heroin stamps seized in the Indian Ocean, there is still a lack of clarity on the meaning and purpose of some stamps – even among the drug traffickers interviewed in Afghanistan. Further analysis is required, including the analysis of drug stamps seized in locations outside of the Indian Ocean. It would be advantageous to develop a database of the different markings of heroin stamps to aid such analysis.

Vienna: United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, 2022. 36p.

By The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime

Key findings • Hawala is a Money or Value Transfer Service (MVTS) that has been used for centuries, originating in the Middle East and South Asia. It is overwhelmingly used for legitimate purposes, including personal and business financial transactions and for the sending of remittances by migrants and refugees to family members. Cultural preferences, convenience, low-threshold accessibility, low processing fees, reliability, and faster value transfer services are some of the reasons for using hawala, and customers using the service come from all walks of life. • Despite being widely used for legitimate purposes, some attributes of the hawala system also make it vulnerable to use by organised crime for the purposes of transferring illicit funds and values. This includes financial transfers by drug traffickers, migrant smugglers and other criminal actors and organisations, as well as safekeeping of funds obtained from illegal activity. The 113 hawaladars interviewed for this study do not commonly ask about the source of money or the reason for sending and receiving money. Additionally, when they did have doubts about the source of the funds, over half of the interviewed hawaladars reported that they had never refused a hawala transaction. • There is no single global regulatory framework for the hawala system. However, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has produced international standards and recommendations for countries to take measures to regulate the hawala system and ensure regular monitoring and compliance. Specific regulations and monitoring regimes vary by country, but FATF recommends countries take a risk-based approach to regulating the hawala system. Of the 18 countries covered by this study, the hawala system was regulated in most of them. However, in four countries it was not regulated, and in Afghanistan – following the events of August 2021 – the current regulatory status of the hawala system is unclear as of the time of writing. • Of the 113 hawaladars interviewed for this report, 43 per cent of hawaladars declared they had a license to operate. In jurisdictions where it is a requirement, 25 per cent operated without a license and 31 per cent preferred not to respond. 36 per cent of the interviewed hawaladars stated that they provided reports to the Central Bank or other relevant financial authorities about their hawala activities, while 64 per cent either had never reported or preferred not to answer the question. Licensed hawaladars collected more personal information from their customers and require identification documents, while for unlicensed hawaladars a name and contact number is sufficient to process a transaction. • Of the hawaladars interviewed in this

study, over one-third reported that they ran multiple branches within the same country and more than half of them reported having offices in other countries. Regular hawala customers are likely to receive a discount on commission charges by hawaladars. • People engaging in regular and irregular migration constitute one customer base of the hawaladars interviewed in this study. Over half of reported that they had migrants as customers. The findings of this study suggest that hawaladars – knowingly and unknowingly - facilitate irregular migration and migrant smuggling by providing multiple financial services including, but not limited to, money or value transfer, safekeeping of funds and introducing migrants and refugees to migrant smugglers. • There are multiple reasons why migrants and refugees would use hawala before, during and after traveling, and these are broadly linked to the features of the system, and, for some, lack of access to any other financial system, such as banks or mobile money services. Migrants and refugees may be directed to a hawaladar by a friend or relative, smuggler, fellow traveller, shopkeeper or accommodation provider. • The interviewed hawaladars identified the following services they provided to migrants and refugees during their journeys: guiding migrants on their journey; helping with finding work upon arrival; referring migrants to support organizations; providing temporary accommodation or referring migrants to an individual who provides temporary accommodation; and finding local medical aid, as undocumented migrants may not be able to or may be reluctant to access hospitals. • Some hawaladars also assist migrants and refugees by finding, recommending or introducing them to a smuggler; and finding or directly renting out boats and trucks for transportation. • The majority of customers using the services of the 113 hawaladars interviewed for this study sent funds to countries located in the Near and Middle East/ South-West Asia sub region, followed by Western and Central Europe and South-Eastern Europe subregions. Customers in the Near and Middle Eastern sub-regions frequently sent funds to hawaladars in most of the eighteen countries where interviews were conducted. Customers of the interviewed hawaladars in the countries of the North American sub-region only sent funds to hawaladars interviewed in Afghanistan, Denmark, Nigeria, Somalia, and the United Republic of Tanzania. • Hawala is widely associated with transferring money or value - this was the most common type of service provided by the sample group in this study. However, sending and receiving money is just one among several financial services hawaladars provide. Cash savings, currency exchange, short-term lending, safekeeping of funds, and trade guarantees were other services the interviewed hawaladars provided to their customers to varying degrees. Some of them safekeep customers’ funds. The amount of funds kept for safekeeping with the interviewed hawaladars ranged from US$ 20,000 to US$ 500,000. • Hawaladars often operate additional businesses alongside their hawala business. Some of the side businesses mentioned by interviewed hawaladars were grocery store, travel agency, selling mobile top-up cards, construction company and electronics shops. • A hawala transaction does not always proceed directly from country A to country B. Depending on the source and destination, sometimes a transaction is carried out through one or more intermediary hawaladars located in at least one other country. Hawaladars interviewed for this study reported that there are multiple hawala hubs located in several regions of the world where such intermediary hawaladars operate. • Hawaladars interviewed in this study reported processing both domestic and international transactions, however, nearly three out of four processed mostly international transactions. The amount of a single hawala transaction varies substantially. Transactions handled by the interviewed hawaladars ranged from as low as US$50 and as high

as US$200,000. To keep a record of these transactions, most hawaladars interviewed in this research reported that they keep a paper (ledger book) as well as an electronic (digital) record of hawala transactions and other services provided. • Hawaladars use a variety of methods to settle their accounts including through cash, reverse transaction, bank transfer or trading in goods and services. Reverse transaction was the most often used method of account settlement among the hawaladars interviewed in this study, followed by settlement through bank transfer. Misuse of the hawala service • In addition to its widespread legitimate use, hawala is vulnerable to misuse by organized crime groups and other criminal actors. More than one-third of the interviewed hawaladars judged the hawala system to be more vulnerable to illegal transactions compared to the formal banking system, while some perceived an equal vulnerability in both systems. A lack of proper oversight by national authorities, a lack of reporting by hawaladars, a lack of regulation, policy, or guidelines for hawaladars to follow, the operation of unlicensed hawaladars, and the closed nature of the hawala system are all potential reasons for vulnerability. • There are no exact estimates as to the extent to which hawaladars, knowingly or unknowingly, facilitate the misuse of their financial services for criminal purposes. Some hawaladars interviewed for this research reported the direct involvement of other hawaladars in transferring funds associated with illegal activities. Additionally, some criminal groups have hawaladars, who may be relatives, working specifically for them for the purposes of transferring funds linked to organised crime. • Several of the interviewed hawaladars reported that they do not ask the purpose of transactions from their customers. As a result, it is possible that hawaladars involved in handling transactions of illicit proceeds are not aware of the nature and source of the money they are transferring or safekeeping. This is particularly the case with hawaladars who are dealing with smaller transactions which usually do not arouse suspicions. However, some hawaladars reported that they could not refuse a transaction from customers connected with Organized Crime Groups (OCGs) due to the risk of negative consequences for themselves and their businesses. • It remains a challenge to precisely document the degree to which hawaladars are transferring illicit funds; it is also difficult to trace illicit financial flows, to separate them from licit flows, and to establish concrete financial links to criminal activities. Law enforcement agencies face challenges in investigating crimes linked to hawala systems, because of the closed nature of the business and, in some cases, the kinship ties of the actors.

Vienna: United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, 2023. 91p.

By The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime

Sahel countries are some of the largest gold producers in Africa. While gold production data can be unreliable, Burkina Faso, Mali, Mauritania and the Niger are estimated to have produced 228 tons of gold in 2021, worth over 12.6 billion United States dollars ($). The gold sector is a major economic driver in the Sahel countries. Artisanal and small-scale gold mining (ASGM) production is estimated at 108 tons per year in Sahel countries, although official ASGM production data is largely unreliable due to the informal nature of the sector. ASGM provides a livelihood to over 1.8 million people in areas where income-generating activities are limited. The sector is characterized by high levels of informality because it often takes place on unlicensed and undeclared mining sites. Gold mining without licenses is illegal in all Sahel countries, although Member States have taken measures to formalize ASGM. Barriers to accessing mining licences often push communities involved in ASGM into a vicious cycle of illegality. Without protection of the law, they depend on a local economy often controlled by transnational organized crime (TOC) groups to fund their operations and to sell their gold production, with limited opportunities for structural investments. These communities are potentially susceptible to

recruitment by armed groups, including violent extremist groups. Porous borders enable gold to be easily moved within the Sahel countries and smuggled out of the region, including to the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Vienna: UNODC, 2023. 36p.

By Rivke Jaffe

Rivke Jaffe explains how despite Jamaica’s “dons” are associated with crime and violence, they have become figures of political authority and seen as legitimate leaders.

Throughout Kingston, Jamaica, figures known as “dons” exercise political authority and are seen as legitimate leaders despite their associations with crime and violence. In the absence of strong government support, they provide impoverished residents with access to security, conflict resolution, and various forms of welfare through their own resources and connections to Jamaica’s political parties. In The Rule of Dons, Rivke Jaffe shows how dons’ power relies on a widespread belief in their right to rule, explaining how criminal power is legitimized through a set of aesthetic, affective, and spatial mechanisms. She argues that dons must credibly embody an outlaw persona that stands outside of the political establishment while also connecting strategically to state institutions and mobilizing democratic ideals such as freedom and equality. As such, dons represent a form of authority that involves balancing an autocratic form of rule

with an established democratic order. While donmanship represents a historically and culturally specific type of political authority, Jaffe’s analysis of this phenomenon offers insights into the entanglement of violent autocratic rule and democratic institutions far beyond Jamaica.

Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2024. 217p.