US Builds New Partnerships to Uproot Transnational Organized Crime

The United States is expanding the reach of its global campaign combating transnational organized criminal groups, which are the hands behind criminal activity from drug trade and human trafficking to international terrorism.

A Mexican soldier uproots a marijuana plant to put it on a stack to be burned on a 300-acre plantation, the biggest found so far, in San Quintin, Baja California State, Mexico, near the border with the United States on July 15. The Department of State is launching partnerships with other countries, including Mexico, to combat transnational crime. Antonio Nava/AFP/Getty Images

The United States is expanding the reach of its global campaign combating transnational organized criminal groups, which are the hands behind criminal activity from drug trade and human trafficking to international terrorism. 

These criminal groups “respect no borders and are very global, partnering and entering into joint ventures with each other, exploiting weak borders,” said David Luna, director of Anticrime Programs, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs at the U.S. Department of State, during a Nov. 15 speech in Colombia, according to a transcript.

Luna said, “In the coming months, around the hemisphere and other regions, the United States is actively building partnerships with other nations against the destabilizing influence of transnational criminal networks and their corruptive power.”

His speech followed a new public-private partnership launched over the weekend to dismantle illicit trade networks and combat corruption in the Asia-Pacific. It was announced during the APEC Leaders’ Summit in Honolulu, Hawaii, attended by President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and other APEC leaders.