Pistols, machine guns, rifles, rockets, grenade launchers, mortar heads or hand grenades are sold or bought by drug cartels, paramilitary and guerrilla groups, insurgents, gang members, mercenaries, pirates or dictatorial governments.
According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, the illegal arms trade moves between 170 and 320 million dollars each year in the world. These figures represent between 10 % and 20 % of the legal market in the sector, according to data from the Spanish Institute for Strategic Studies, in Madrid.
Much a blind eye
After the dissolution of the USSR, a large number of weapons became obsolete or out of control, which facilitated their sale at low prices. Along with this, the laxity of some countries in establishing barriers to imports and exports, corruption in government levels and technological advances (electronic banking transactions, internet, etc.), as well as theft, boosted the market. black.
After drug trafficking, arms are the second most lucrative prohibited business in the world . Its consequences are also tragic: each year more than half a million people die from violence carried out through this illegal weaponry. In Mexico, of the fifteen million firearms that circulate in the country, thirteen million (85 %) have been sold fraudulently.
How do you circumvent international laws and agreements to acquire this material? According to political analyst Lora Lumpe, author of Arms Trafficking. In the global black market for small arms , there are two key pieces in the fabric: the arms brokers, in charge of bringing together sellers, buyers, financiers and insurers to make a deal; and transport agents, who hire vehicles, loading and unloading personnel and crews to carry the merchandise to the destination point.
