Reports sent to the Brazilian Congress indicate that cocaine trafficking is the main “engine of organized crime” in the Amazon, with Brazil’s borders with Peru and Bolivia serving as the primary entry points for drugs. Reports from the National Secretariat of Penal Policies (Senappen) and the Brazilian Federal Police (PF) describe that Brazil’s two main criminal organizations are “strongly established in the Brazilian Amazon.”
These are the First Capital Command (PCC) from São Paulo and the Red Command (CV) from Rio de Janeiro, both of which originated in Brazil’s Southeast region.
According to Senappen, they are exploiting “the vast border and the supply chains of cocaine” in the Amazon. Beyond drug trafficking, these groups operate in transnational and environmental crimes, such as illegal mining, money laundering, deforestation, and land grabbing of public lands.
This information was published by the newspaper Folha de S. Paulo and confirmed by Lusa through documents sent by the PF and Senappen to the Brazilian National Congress. Brazil’s parliament established a Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry (CPI) on Organized Crime in November, which concluded its work on the 14th of this month.
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Researcher Aiala Colares Couto, who studies organized crime in the Amazon, explained that Brazil is the second-largest cocaine market in the world, behind only the United States, with Europe in third. For Aiala Colares, who coined the term “Narco-ecology,” the Amazon region is strategic for organized crime because it integrates various illicit activities connected to drug trafficking, such as mining and illegal logging.
He stated that the area is no longer just a major transit zone, but has become a major criminal hub related to drug trafficking, which sparks the interest of criminal factions in controlling key routes.
Brazil’s territorial size is a major public security challenge, and locations along organized crime routes are the most vulnerable, he explained. He emphasized that there is a gigantic territorial dimension where the state is not effectively present in all areas, which compromises institutional governance and favors criminal governance.
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The main routes identified by the PF and Senappen for the flow of intercontinental drug trafficking via Amazonian rivers are the Rio Negro, which rises in Colombia, the Solimões River, which rises in Peru, and the Acre and Iaco rivers.
The PF also highlights, in particular, air routes using clandestine helicopters and planes, without, however, detailing landing spots.
As for mapped land routes, there are two major highways, such as the BR-317, which starts at the Peru-Brazil border in Acre and continues to the state of Amazonas. According to the PF, this “Peru-Bolivia-Acre flow” of organized crime travels through rural areas on unpaved roads to avoid police forces.
There is also a high risk in rural areas of the Chico Mendes Extractive Reserve, which are used to bypass inspections, the corporation noted. The other land route mapped by Senappen is the BR-364, the main highway of the southwestern Amazon, which connects Northern Brazil to the Center-West and Southeast, starting from Acre and going to São Paulo.
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In response to the Organized Crime CPI, Senappen informed that Brazil has been acting in cooperation with other security forces, including joint action by Amazonian countries. The influence and activity of organized crime within Brazilian prisons remain a national problem, which also extends to the activities of the PCC and CV in the states of the Brazilian Amazon.
In this sense, the Senappen report states that, in addition to monitoring the prison population by producing intelligence, the agency has coordinated operations to seize mobile phones in prison units. Lusa learned that between 2023 and March of this year, the federal agency removed 7,966 mobile phones from prisoners across the country.
The Brazilian Federal Police informed the Organized Crime CPI that there is an integration of operations with Brazilian state forces and occasional cooperation with authorities in Peru and Bolivia, but that this is still insufficient. The corporation highlighted the need to expand bilateral agreements and shared intelligence mechanisms, especially for joint operations and information exchange to dismantle routes.
The corporation also presented suggestions to reinforce public security in the region, such as intensifying truck inspections at the border given the increase in commercial flow with the opening of the new Chinese port in Peru.
Implementing X-ray inspections for cargo and tourist luggage is another suggestion by the PF, in addition to regular ground and river patrol actions in critical areas. Expanding international cooperation with Peru and Bolivia for integrated operations is another desire of the corporation, along with aerial monitoring and the use of technology to detect clandestine aircraft.
The corporation also suggests that protection programs for extractivists and vulnerable communities in the region would be important to reduce the co-option of these people by criminal factions. This week, the Brazilian government authorized the appointment of 1,000 people who passed the Federal Police entrance exam as an action to intensify the fight against organized crime.
On Thursday, Brazilian President Lula da Silva also said he ordered the return of delegates who had been lent to other institutions to combat organized crime, who, in his assessment, were “pretending to work.”
