Security Threats in the Tri Border Area (1)

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Security Threats in

the Tri Border Area

Maria Soledad Figueroa

10/12/2013Washington DC, United States




Transnational Security Challenges

Garret Martin

December, 2013

1

The tri-border area (TBA), the zone composed by the north-east of Argentina the

south-east of Paraguay and the south-west of Brazil is well-known for its reputation of

lawlessness and historical presence of terrorist elements, as well as the political corruption

that allows the multitude criminal activities and illegal markets to overlap with the

legitimate economic activity. Extended for 2500 Km² of subtropical jungle, countless

rivers and falls live around 700.000 people between the cities and the rural areas 1; and

excluding some big cities, this is one of the most diverse areas of Latin America in terms of

race and culture, converting this area into a perfect place for the development of illicit

activities and international organized crime organizations.

This paper will characterize the TBA, and discuss the main criminal activities

developed. Moreover, it will look for the responses in from the countries involved and in

the region to this increasing threat to security. To do that, the paper will be divided into two

sections: first, a description of the zone taking into consideration elements of geography,

demography, economy and the criminal networks trying to identify how this are deeply

connected in every day’s life; and secondly, will look into the different mechanisms the

governments as Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay had put in action to stop the threat as

individual sovereign states and in cooperation under the frame of MERCOSUR.

1 Bartolomé, Mariano César, and Elsa Llenderrozas. Redes (2002)





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December, 2013

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Characterization of the Tri-Border Area

Geography

The TBA borders are defined by three slightly new urban centers, Puerto Iguazú in

Argentina, Foz do Iguaçu in Brazil and Ciudad del Este in Paraguay. These three are

connected by two international bridges, Puente de la Amistad (Paraguay- Brazil) and

Puente Internacional Tacaredo Neves (Argentina- Brazil), only taking into account around

20 thousand cars (around 30 to 40 thousand individuals) cross the first bridge daily, which

means that border controls are reduced to minimum and only less of than 10% of the cars

and bagged are checked. And this is only one example of how everything works in the

TBA2.

Puerto Iguazú it the farther city of the region, besides there is no bridge or road that

connect the city to Ciudad del Este. Therefore, it’s the most remote to the illicit world, and

even though it plays an active role in the criminal activities this is minor to the ones playing

both of its partners. In addition, it’s the smallest city with only 32 thousand citizens while

Ciudad del Este has 239500 citizens and Foz do Iguaçu has 300 thousand 3. The Brazilian

city, Foz, it’s the leading of the group; founded as a military colony and in the 60’s with the

construction of the hydroelectric dam and the increasing commercial activity with Paraguay

over the 80s shifted its course. At the same time, Foz do Iguaçu is the most dangerous of

2 Bartolomé, Mariano César, and Elsa Llenderrozas. Redes (2002)

3 Lynn, Josefina, Triple Forntera, ¿Realidad o Mito?.





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December, 2013

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the three with 275 homicides register in 20024.Lastly, Ciudad del Este was founded by a

political act in 1957 because of the need to join Paraguay with Brazil, with the construction

of the city, both governments build the Pan-American Highway that connects Asuncion

with Curitiba.

Society

Looking into the qualitative demography of the area you can see that only in Foz

there are 65 different nationalities living together, the cultural diversity is one of the key

things that define the TB. In Ciudad del Este there are three main ethnic groups: Chinese

which by the 2001 was the largest with about 30 thousand individuals, which probably less

than a 30% would be formally registered; Lebanese, and Korean. Also there are thousands

of native communities in the rural areas of the Tri-Border Area, who have very close and

poor self-sufficient settlements.

In the city of Foz do Iguaçu live the second biggest and oldest Arab community of

Brazil, around 12 thousand approximately according to the data of the illegal immigration

amnesty in 1998, and in Ciudad del Este there are around 2 to 3 thousand but this number

increase to 10 thousand if you take into account the Arabs that work there but live in Foz do

Iguaçu; but in majority they stay out of Argentina because discrimination problems. About

its composition, 90% of it it’s Lebanese, also in the second wave of immigration in the 60’s

came Libyans, Syrians, Jordanian and Palestine among others. These communities are very

4 Hudson, Rex. TERRORIST AND ORGANIZED CRIME GROUPS IN THE TRI-BORDER AREA (TBA) OF SOUTH

AMERICA





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December, 2013

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traditional and tightly knit, having their own schools, clubs and keeping their own

language; in the area you can hear Arabic as much as Spanish or Portuguese (you can

frequently hear also Chinese, Korean and Guaraní).5

Economy

Puerto Iguazú suffer the distance in the economic activity but what suffers the most

is the unfavorable exchange rate; thanks to this, the Argentine small town lives out of

tourists because it’s the city of one of the seven wonders Iguazu Falls, the area also attract

people for sport fishing and other outdoor activities.

The main economic interaction happen between Ciudad del Este and Foz do Iguaçu.

The first one, has more of the 90% of the economy as an informal economy; as a

consequence the city’s retail economy ranked third worldwide (behind Hong Kong and Miami)

in volume of cash transactions, peaking at US$12 billion in 1994.

6

These illegal markets are

composed by drugs, weapons, humans and organ trafficking as well as fake or stolen products.

All these bring a new type of tourists to both countries, Shopping tourism, which is one of the

pillars for Foz and Ciudad del Este growth in the last years.


AMERICA6 Hudson, Rex. TERRORIST AND ORGANIZED CRIME GROUPS IN THE TRI-BORDER AREA (TBA) OF SOUTH

AMERICA





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December, 2013

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Illegal Activities:

Terrorist cells:

Since the terrorist attacks in Buenos Aires in 1992 to the Israel Embassy and to the

AMIA (Asociación Mutual Israelí-Argentina)7 in 1994 there was no doubt of the terrorist

presence in the Tri-Border Area. The SIDE (Secretaría de Inteligencia de Estado –

Secretariat of State Intelligence) had linked the attacks all the way back to Amad Barakat

and Imad Fayed Mugniyah two Lebanese citizens who were living in Ciudad del Este.

According to SIDE investigations, Baraket played an essential role in financing the

bombing and Mugniyah is considered responsible of the logistics of the attacks.

Consequently, there was a bigger concern to the situation in the TBA and an

increase in the demand of security. Moreover, media from all over the world starting

talking about the phenomenon and sparked off academic studies and policies about it. After

all this, they liked the Lebanese population in the area with international terrorist

organizations like Hezbollah, especially because a considerable number of the immigrants

came from Bekaa Valley which is the epicenter of Hezbollah activities. But also you can

find members of Al Qaeda ,Al- Jihad and al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya among others.

The linkage to the TBA with terrorist activities related to the political agenda of Middle

East made it become one of the most important issues of the moment in Argentina and in

the international community. After September 11 attacks in New York, the interest in the

issue became grater and grater and it evolved into two different theories:

7 Israeli-Argentine Mutual Association





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December, 2013

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Maxim: the terrorist in the TBA had knowledge and access to the information to the

attack to the World Trade Center before it happened.

Minimum: the TBA is used only a logistic presence and dominium of the zone and

control of one of the most scare assets, drinkable water.

Another discovery was the permanent flow of money in and out of the TBA to the

Middle East – between U$D 60 to 100 million yearly)8 product of the narcotrafficking of

cocaine by plane – through one of the more than a hundred clandestine airports in the TBA-

and marihuana by illegal roads. However this has decline significantly due to the

surveillance efforts from Brazil and Argentina and in a lower level Paraguay.

Meanwhile they launder money by the different legal loopholes in the countries,

also by the financial system, gambling and the buying and selling of real state; afterwards,

the local Arab community get together these funds to send it to their relatives in the Middle

East through some mosques.

Smuggling and forgery:

For these types of crimes Ciudad del Este is the epicenter. Just counting music,

image and video forgery it values up to U$D 150 million/ year. For this crime Brazil and

Argentina are on the priority list of the Copyright International Intellectual Alliance. But

this is not the only type of forgery, there is also, car parts, appliances, brand clothes, even

cigarettes (40% of the cigarettes consumed in Brazil are fake); in Ciudad del Este if it’s not

fake it’s stolen, in Argentina 6000 cars are stolen and sell in Paraguay, it takes hours for an


AMERICA





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December, 2013

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organization to get a car in Buenos Aires and take it to Ciudad del Este where is sold for

less than half of the actual price.

The Triple Frontier is a perfect spot where you have easy access in and out to the

entire world, and that is the main reason for becoming so important in narcotrafficking,

human trafficking or weapon smuggling. If the goods are going to the United States or

Europe they go from Ciudad del Este to Montevideo, Rosario or Buenos Aires and are

shipped from there, the same route is made when they come in. If on the contrary are

coming or going to Asia (Hong Kong, Taiwan or Malaysia), they uses the ports in Santo or

Paranagua in Brazil. Any of these different roads can be made by air, roads or by the

numerous rivers that connect all these places.

At the same time, through Paraguay and Bolivia the good can access Colombia and

later Venezuela. This is especially beneficial for the FARCs that one of the three

discovered heavens of the Colombian organization is in Guaíra – which is only 100 miles

from Foz do Iguaçu.

Other criminal activities:

Among other distinguish criminal organizations are the Argentine ‘local

Connection’ a criminal group made up from corrupt politicians, former member of the

military regime and dirty cops who are linked to the fundamentalist Islamic movements and

benefit from bribes and in some situation make the illicit.





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December, 2013

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Paraguay city, Ciudad del Este is controlled by different mafias dedicated to arms

trafficking and money laundering. Moreover, has a serious issue with Chinese “Triads”

these are especially dangerous because they are young groups that do not follow traditional

rules such as staying in their own world. Chinese organizations either provide protection to

local Chinese business or/ and impose ‘taxes’ to the Asian containers coming into the

country. Another ethnic mafia that it’s settled in the TBA is the Russian mafia involved

mainly in drug trafficking and cybercrime; illicit activity which Brazil with its epicenter in

Foz do Iguaçu is known for, being the highest exporter of internet crime in the entire

world.9

Government Corruption:

According to Hugo Antolin Almiron, corruption in Argentina “has penetrated deep

within the public offices and has affected every stratum of the society and has further

generated various types of misconduct.”10 In 2004 a witness (Abdolghassem Mesbahi, an

Iranian intelligence officer) in the case of the AMIA attack in Buenos Aires( July 1994)

testified against the former president of Argentina at that time Carlos Saúl Menem; saying

that the Iranian government carried out the attack and had paid the Argentine president the

sum of U$D 10 million to cover up. The charge against these acts have never been verified,

9 Rex, Hudson.

10 Various authors, NATIONS HOSPITABLE TO ORGANIZED CRIME AND TERRORISM (The Library of Congress)





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December, 2013

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and despite the fact that for obvious reasons Menem denies them, he acknowledge that he

has a bank account in Switzerland since 1986.1112

Brazil also plays its part in governmental corruption. A report released by the Drug

Trafficking Investigating Commission of Brazil’s Congress incriminates 827 indivudials

evolved in organized crime, drug-trafficking and tax evasis. Among those individuals ther

are 12 federal congressmen, 2 state governors, 15 state deputies and a large number of

mayors, police officers, lawyers and judges. As a conclusion, the Commission agreed that

the drug-related corruption is so extensive that it is nearly impossible to clean up in a short

period of time “without calling in the military and restructuring and rearming the country’s

police”13 Later on in mid-2002 another Congressional report implicated the highway

robberies of truck cargo to about 100 politicians, police and entrepreneurs already involved

in the theft of the cargo.14

Numerous signs show that despite the corruption in Argentina and Brazil is the one

in Paraguay who contributes the most and the key to the whole criminal network in the

TBA. Due to the amount of open causes that the Public Administration itself has related to

this issue. The Governmental, political and diplomatic corruption in the TBA and

especially in Paraguay allows criminals to bribe judges or purchase entry visas

unpunishably.

11 Curios is it too that coming from a Syrian family in the North-West of Argentina Carlos Saúl Menem is the

only Christian in an Muslim family –Requisite for presidency till 1994.12

Rex, Hudson.13

Rex, Hudson.14

Various authors, Nations hospitable to organized crime and terrorism.





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December, 2013

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Accorging to an investigation by the Paraguay’s National Directorate of Civil

Aeronautics (-DINAC-Dirección Nacional de Aeronáutica Civil, National Directory of civil

Aeronautics) found that 570 individuals/ yearly on average had enter the country though

Ciudad del Este either without or with fake documents paying bribes around 5 thousand US

dollars.

One of the most distinguish acts of Paraguayan corruption is the issues of fake visas.

By the end of 2001 Carlos Cácena a Paraguayan judge charged some consulates that had

become into offices of illegal visas issues. The most famous case is the one of the

Consulate in Miami with Carlos Weiss in charge, he solely sold more thaN 300 passports

and visas shipping them to individuals heading to the TBA; one of them was Ahmad Assad

Barakat who enter the county in 1989 using a visa from the Paraguayan Consulate in

Panama, office that was not authorized to issue visas.15

Police Corruption:

“The effectiveness of a country’s security forces in combating organized crime and

terrorism is clearly a factor in determining whether conditions are conducive to allowing

these illicit activities to flourish. The efforts of the security forces of Argentina, Brazil, and

Paraguay have been ineffective in this regard because they have been of hindered by

corruption, human rights abuses, and inadequate funding and training .”16

On the hand, the effectiveness of Brazil’s police forces while fighting to organized

crime and terrorist groups in the TBA it’s almost nule, thanks to the lack of respect for

15 Various authors, Nations hospitable to organized crime and terrorism.






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human rights and the vast distribution of corruption/ involvement in crime of all the

Brazilian public officers. The state police officers of the country had committed several

abuses to human rights, including torture, arbitrary arrest and detained persons, and also

extra- judicial killings. However it’s not only the police involved in this activities, these

goes up all the way within the military police and politicians. The police has been involved

in criminal activities of all kind from killing for hire, death squad executions, kidnappings

and narcotrafficking.

Brazil’s politicians play an active role in these activities and that is the reason why

they have demonstrated lack of will in the need to reform the police force, the penal code or

any aspect of the criminal justice system. In overall, the entire situation has created in

Brazil a climate of impunity that only works to encourage more human rights abuses.

In Argentina the situation is not much better. There are three main reasons why the

police have no motivation to combat crime. First, their objective is to maintain social order

not investigating serious international crime. Second, the slow motion of the justice system

has frustrated the majority of the officers that wanted to do something; as a consequence

some them have taken law into their own hands when they considered that the sentences

were too light. Last, but not least is the poor wage police officers receive, their pay starts

around U$D 400 per month17. This leaves a gap open, and the satisfaction they don’t

receive from the State they get it from bribes and other forms of corruption.

This have been like this for years, according to Maria del Carmen Verdú statement

(from the Center of the Prevention of Police Repression), “In the last decade, there has not






Garret Martin

December, 2013

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been any major illegal business without police participation, from prostitution to gambling,

robbery, or kidnapping.”18Like in Brazil, there is no change coming in the horizon in this

matter for Argentina.

Finally Paraguay has not bright future in this matter either. Paraguayan polive has

been continually involved in extra-judicial killings, torture and abuse of convicted prisoners

among other criminal activities. In October 2001, Paraguayan Congress increased

surveillance on the country’s Arab communities, after this; there were charges that the

police were extorting large amounts of money from them in return for not reporting their

activities as they were supposed to. And that is only one example of all their work. The lack

of trust in the national police in Ciudad del Este is the reason why, every shop, bank or

money exchange office has its own private security.

What has been done about the TBA?

“Las propias necesidades del MERCOSUR como proceso de integración regional

no han sido suficientes para consensuar medidas efectivas para enfrentar los problemas de

seguridad de esta región fronteriza.”19

Although the different policies that the three countries have implemented have some

kind of effectiveness, the TBA is far for being consider a safe area. Argentina and Brazil

have coordinated several security policies that helped decease the level of criminality in the


19 Bartolomé, Mariano César, and Elsa Llenderrozas. Redes (2002) [ The own needs of MERCOSUR as an

regional integration process have been not enough to reach an consensus in effective ways to face the

security problems of this borderland.”





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December, 2013

13

area but there is still a long way to go through. Paraguay also plays its part, but in a minor

way because it’s the one who benefits the most with the situation in the TBA.

After the attacks in Buenos Aires, the issue became urgent, and together with the

rush of MERCOSUR and the different integration processes, in 1996 the countries involved

developed the Tripartite Command of The TriBorder, with the participation of Paraguayan

National Police, Argentine Gendarmerie and Federal Police (and the Misiones’ provincial

Police) working along with the SIDE (today SI), and the National Aeronautical Police of

Brazil and the Federal Police of Brazil. This tri-national organization has as objective

increase the cooperation for security of the TBA, by exchange of information and creating s

databank and, leading simultaneous operatives in the three countries.

In the same year, the three signed and agreement – Acuerdo de Seguridad y

Facilidad de Transito de last tres fronteras- in order to coordinate de action against

terrorism and narcotrafficking and crating another databank. And later in 1997 two

different reunions of MERCOSUR happening having the TBA as the main issue of their

agenda. The first meeting was oriented to the cooperation and coordination of policies

relatives to the security in the region and the creation of a mechanism of semiannual

meeting system. The second one by the end of the year developed the Plan de Cooperacion

y Asistencia Recíproca para la Seguridad Regional – Plan for the Cooperation and

Reciprocal Assistance for the Regional Security- by this the countries of MERCOSUR seek

uniform legislation that helps punish the different complex and transnational crimes that

affect the TBA.





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December, 2013

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However the Tri-Border Area has not only been under the scope of the countries

that are involved, since 90’s all the international community has an eye on what is

happening in the South-Cone. In addition, after the 2001 the US has paid special attention

to what is going on and in 2002 has implemented the mechanism 3 + 1, were the US plays

an active role in the analysis of the security issues of the TBA.

Finally in 2006 MERCOSUR release and agreement over the frame of cooperation

in terms of regional security between the States involved, by this put into action several

coordinated simultaneous operatives in the TBA that fight against terrorist activities and

narcotrafficking; at the same time this program train special officers and generate different

mechanisms to maintain the coordinated efforts in the field of public security and security

of individuals and goods.

Conclusions

The Tri-Border Area present a sample of a reduce scenario were a great number of

the new transnational threats work and interact all together. There, in only 2500 km² you

can find terrorists interacting and making business with the FARCs selling, trading

weapons and narcotics, but also the Russians with all kind of internet crime, or the Chinese

with its mafias, money laundering from all of them, and all types of criminal activities and

the government in small or great amount participating of these in some kind of way.

Therefore, the intrinsic complexity of the area is in great part due to the bond between the

criminal organizations and the corruption of the public officers from police to politicians.





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However, there are some other aspects of Latin American countries that create the

perfect climate as to develop these types of organizations. The institutional instability, the

weakness of the State as a structure, as an organization, only leads to crisis in the within the

countries and lead only to more and more social and economic deterioration. Many

individual seek the satisfaction the State can’t provide in the internal structure of these

organizations.

Moreover, the fragmentation of Latin American scenario makes it very hard to

construct regional consensus to what to do about the TBA. Brazil and Argentina are

historical enemies, and many times this complicates the decision-making; there will always

be level of competition between them. Meanwhile Paraguay, takes some steps in the

‘correct’ way in combating the illegality in Ciudad del Este; while does some criminal

move on the backstage.

The only way to solve or attack the situation is to present a united front, is to get not

one but three political decisions that this is what they want and get into a consensus of how

they are going to do it. Taking the words of Elsa Llenderrozas, “es necesario reforzar

mutuamente dinámicas democráticas e institucionalizadas para la resolución de los

conflictos internos y utilizar la capacidad política y la importancia de los liderazgos

regionales para proyectar estabilidad institucionalidad en la región”20 while looking for

common position in terms of security.

20 Llenderrozas, Elsa. Democracias débiles y factores de inseguridad: nuevos desafíos para los países

sudamericanos. [ it is necessary to mutually strengthen the democratic dynamics e institutionalize them for





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Documents

Security Threats in the Tri Border Area (1)