Drug trafficking is the illegal substance smuggling from the areas they are produced such as Colombia to consumption markets, most often former USSR, Canada, the United States and Western Europe. Several civilized criminal groups began drug trafficking as an initiation to organized crime. The three regularly smuggled drugs across international boundaries are marijuana, heroin and cocaine. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime estimates firearms trading produce a yearly profit of about two hundred to three hundred US dollars. Dealers of illegal weapons and criminal networks have a vital obligation in black markets that provide an environment for criminal business people, terrorists and criminal drug networks to acquire weapons. Despite the risks involved, trafficking of illegal weapons is highly profitable, especially small arms trafficking (Vermaaten, 2017)
Drug and illegal weapons trafficking has also influenced narcoterrorism operations globally. Narcoterrorism refers to combining drug business to organized crime with an ideological concept of economic empowerment, ethnic, social, confessional and political contradictions and likewise countering political formations. Narcoterrorism underlies three dimensions; the first is a terrorist and radical group utilizing drug business to their political inclinations. Second is government enhancement of drug for guns activities and drug-related operations to increase their political and capital opportunities and finally employing terrorist tactics such as kidnappings, bombings and murders through organized crimes engaged in drug trafficking to maximize income or profits. Terrorism cuts across different criminal activities, including money laundering, human and weapons trafficking, and corruption. The profit gained from illegal drug trafficking finances terrorist operations (Nevirko, 2017).
The single most weakness that minimizes the ability of the international community to combat the illegal weapons trade is the lack of international data on firearms seizures. For instance, most arms entering Mexico from the United States get through official entry points, revealing police laxity to inform international organizations on the illegal arms dealings. The police also acquire profit from the drug and illegal weapons sale (Vermaaten, 2017).
References
Nevirko, D. D. (2017). Narcoterrorism as a Threat to the National Security of the Russian Society.
Vermaaten, H. (2017). Answering the challenge of transnational organized crime. Old Dominion University Model United Nations, 1-16.
