International

A Drug Smuggler's Paradise

By John Burnett

Published October 19, 2004 at 9:00 PM PDT

This story was published more than 20 years ago.

U.S. officials estimate up to three-quarters of the cocaine that enters through the country's southern border passes through Central America, by land or sea.

The corridor has become a smuggler's paradise: under-funded and often corrupt security forces, scant U.S. counter-drug operations, vast stretches of lawless jungle and shoreline, and a compliant population.

In the first of a three-part series, NPR's John Burnett reports that the countries once known as banana republics are fast becoming "cocaine republics."

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International

John Burnett

John Burnett is a national correspondent based in Austin, Texas, who has been assigned a new beat for 2022—Polarized America—to explore all facets of our politically and culturally divided nation. Prior to this assignment, Burnett covered immigration, Southwest border affairs, Texas news and other national assignments. In 2018, 2019 and again in 2020, he won national Edward R. Murrow Awards from the Radio-Television News Directors Association for continuing coverage of the immigration beat. In 2020, Burnett along with other NPR journalists, were finalists for a duPont-Columbia Award for their coverage of the Trump Administration's Remain in Mexico program. In December 2018, Burnett was invited to participate in a workshop on Refugees, Immigration and Border Security in Western Europe, sponsored by the RIAS Berlin Commission.