Caribbean is a top smuggling destination for illegal arms. U.S. lawmakers want answers
Citing a high level of gun violence across the hemisphere, two top Democrats on the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the chairman of the Senate’s Judiciary Committee are calling for a federal investigation into the illicit trafficking of firearms coming from the United States into the Caribbean.
On Monday, the three lawmakers sent a letter to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, Congress’ investigative arm, asking for it to look at the consequences of firearms trafficked from the U.S. to the Caribbean. The letter was signed by U.S. Rep. Gregory W. Meeks of New York, a ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee; Texas U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro, a ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere. and Illinois Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee. They noted that their offices have requested similar reports in the past focused on Mexico and Central America.
“This new request, focused on the Caribbean, will allow us to obtain a more robust picture of the overall impact of the illicit trafficking and use of deadly weapons and munitions in the region,” the lawmakers said, adding they also want to know what more can be done to curtail the flow of weapons.
Among what they are asking of the GAO: A country-by-country breakdown of the number and types of U.S. arms being trafficked to Caribbean countries, excluding Cuba, and whether the number is growing annually; information on where and how illicit weapons are being obtained in the U.S. as well as how they are being smuggled into their final destinations; and measures being taken by U.S. and Caribbean law enforcement to address the problem. They also want to know what legislation might assist the efforts of U.S. authorities to combat arms trafficking.
READ MORE: How U.S. gun laws and South Florida ports help fuel Haiti’s escalating gang violence
The U.S. lawmakers said that they are particularly concerned about the effects of illicit U.S. firearms on the security situation in Haiti, which is seeing unprecedented levels of violence and kidnappings by heavily armed gangs. They noted that during a hearing last fall before the House Committee on Foreign Affairs titled Haiti at the Crossroads: Civil Society Responses for a Haitian-led Solution, both activists and supporters alleged that “the U.S. was the principal source of weapons being used by criminal gangs, who are destabilizing the country, preventing the provision of basic government services, thwarting the distribution of humanitarian assistance, increasing levels of deadly violence, and causing an ever-increasing number of Haitians to lose hope and flee the country.”
Two reports published by Haiti-based organizations show the reach of violent gangs in Haiti society. On Monday, the Organization for Citizens for a New Haiti said that gang violence had led to the deaths of at least 195 people, the majority of them in the metropolitan area of Port-au-Prince in March.
Another report issued Tuesday by the Center for Analysis and Research in Human Rights in Port-au-Prince, which tracks kidnappings, said that 389 kidnappings were recorded for the first quarter of this year, which when compared to the same period last year and in 2021 is a 72% and 173% increase, respectively. The number includes 29 foreign nationals representing three countries, including a Haitian-American couple from Tamarac abducted more than two weeks ago.
“Haiti does not stand alone as a Caribbean nation being destabilized by the influx of illicit American firearms,” the lawmakers wrote. The United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime’s Global Study on Firearms Trafficking 2020 evaluated firearms trafficking seizure levels in seven Caribbean countries in 2016 and 2017. The study found that between 2,000 and 3,000 firearms were seized each year, with Jamaica, the Dominican Republic, and the Bahamas accounting for most of these seizures.”
They have also taken note of other reports including another from the United Nations that states that firearms are involved in 70% of the Caribbean’s homicides, compared to 30% at the global level. The U.N.’s Office for Disarmament Affairs also noted that Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, the Dominican Republic and Haiti, which all have high numbers of illicit firearms trafficking, also have high or increasing rates of violent crimes and homicides.
Lawmakers’ request for a GAO investigation comes on the heels of a decision last month by The Bahamas, Jamaica, Antigua and Barbuda, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and Trinidad and Tobago to provide support to Mexico in a civil lawsuit it has filed against U.S. gun manufacturers. The suit, which is being appealed after it was dismissed by a federal judge, argues that the marketing and distribution practices of several well-known firearms brands are facilitating the trafficking for arms in Mexico and fueling powerful drug cartels.
Caribbean nations in a “friend of the court” brief before the First U.S. Court of Appeals in Boston argue that the U.S.-made guns illegally trafficked across the borders, many of them from South Florida’s ports, are also facilitating crime waves in their small nations.
The U.S. Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security, which collaborates with other federal agencies, including Homeland Security Investigations, told the Miami Herald late last year that since 2020 about half of all firearms-export investigations have been concentrated in the Caribbean region — a top smuggling destination fueled by the demand of drug traffickers and huge black-market markups on U.S.-made guns. The other 50% are scattered throughout the world.
