Held to ransom Kidnapping trends in Latin America

摘要

Kidnapping in Latin America is one of the most popular crimes, being carried out both by major criminal organisations and by low-level groups and targeting victims from both poor and wealthy backgrounds. While many kidnappings are carried out solely for financial profit, they can also be used for intimidation, as part of turf warfare between rival criminal groups and to take political hostages.rnWhile this wide variety of motivations and perpetrators makes it difficult to ascertain the true number of kidnappings in Latin America, particularly as many are unreported, analysis of the officially reported cases indicates certain key trends. Most strikingly, the rate of kidnappings is falling in Colombia, which previously had the highest prevalence of abductions in the region. This positive trend largely reflects the government's ongoing offensive against self-avowed Marxist-Leninist insurgent group Fuerzas Armadas Revolucion-arias de Colombia (FARC), which had been responsible for a major proportion of kidnappings. With the FARC now on the back foot militarily, its capacity to carry out kidnappings will be curtailed in the short to medium term.