Mérida Initiative for Mexico and Central America: Funding and Policy Issues
April 19, 2010 - R40135
Increasing violence perpetrated by drug trafficking organizations and other criminal groups is threatening citizen security in Mexico and Central America. Drug trafficking-related violence claimed more than 6,500 lives in Mexico in 2009, and several Central American countries have among the world's highest homicide rates. Mexican drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) dominate the illicit drug market in the United States and are expanding their operations by forming partnerships with U.S. gangs. On October 22, 2007, the United States and Mexico announced the Mérida Initiative, a package of U.S. counterdrug and anticrime assistance for Mexico and Central America that would begin in FY2008 and last through FY2010. Congress has appropriated some $1.3 billion for Mérida programs in Mexico, $248 million for Mérida and related programs in Central America, and $42 million for Caribbean countries in P.L. 110-252, P.L. 111-8, P.L. 111-32, and, most recently, in the FY2010 Consolidated Appropriations Act, P.L. 111-117. Each of these acts contains human rights conditions on 15% of certain law enforcement and military assistance provided to Mexico and Central America. P.L. 111-117 places Central America funding into a new Central America Regional Security Initiative (CARSI), which splits Central America from the Mérida Initiative. The act also provides $37 ...