Diverse groups traffic and distribute illegal drugs. Criminal groups operating from South America smuggle cocaine and heroin into the United States via a variety of routes, including land routes through Mexico, maritime routes along Mexico's east and west coasts, sea routes through the Caribbean, and international air corridors. Criminal groups operating from neighboring Mexico smuggle cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, amphetamine, and marijuana into the United States.2
Since the 1970's, Colombia has been home to some of the most violent and sophisticated drug trafficking organizations in the world. What started as a small cocaine smuggling business has, in the last thirty years, blossomed into an enormous multi-national cocaine empire.3
Israeli and Russian drug trafficking syndicates and Western Europe-based drug traffickers are the principal traffickers of MDMA (Ecstasy) worldwide. MDMA, primarily manufactured clandestinely in Western Europe, is smuggled into the United States by couriers via commercial airlines, as well as through the use of express package carriers.2
Criminal groups based in Southeast and Southwest Asia smuggle heroin into the United States. Using New York City as a major distribution hub, these criminal groups move heroin up and down the eastern seaboard and into the Midwest.2
Marijuana smuggled into the United States, whether grown in Mexico or transshipped from other Latin American source areas, accounts for most of the marijuana available in the United States. Marijuana produced in Mexico remains the most widely available. High-potency marijuana enters the U.S. drug market from Canada. The availability of marijuana from Southeast Asia generally is limited to the West Coast.2
A narco-terrorist organization is an organized group that is complicit in the activities of drug trafficking in order to further, or fund, premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets with the intention to influence a government or group of people.4
Drug trafficking has always been a profitable means for criminal organizations to further or fund their activities. The complicity of terrorist groups in drug trafficking varies from group to group and region to region. In the broadest sense, some terrorist groups may be involved in all aspects of the drug trade, from cultivation, production, transportation, and wholesale distribution to money laundering.4
Media Quotes
"Soon a dinghy was fighting its way toward shore carrying 110 pounds of almost pure heroin, stamped with the best brand from Southeast Asia's clandestine drug labs, police say. Proceeds from the drugs would go to prop up the impoverished North Korean government, they believe. U.S. officials say the capture is proof of their long-standing charge that the North Korean government has for years operated as a crime syndicate, smuggling drugs and counterfeit money around the world to generate income to keep itself alive."5
"In Sequoia, rangers said, visitors have encountered pot growers. 'We cannot keep up with the drug smuggling and smuggling of undocumented aliens that comes across the border through parks on a daily basis. We are aware of the connection with drug cartels. We had a ranger shot and killed last year - that was a drug thing. It's pretty outrageous,' he said, referring to an incident in Arizona. The pot fields are financed by the Mexican drug cartels that dominate the methamphetamine trade in the adjacent Central Valley, drug enforcement officials say. The officials say there is evidence that the cartels, in turn, have financial ties to Middle Eastern smugglers linked to Hezbollah and other groups accused of terrorism."6
