Central America and the Caribbean have a combined homicide rate of 33.3 murders per 100,000 residents. In Europe, the murder rate is 3.5 per 100,000. In Central America, one out of 50 males over the age of 20 will not live to see his 31st birthday, according to statistics released on October 6 in the Global Study on Homicide prepared by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime.
According to the report, Central America and the Caribbean are at a "near-crisis point." Drug-trafficking cartels from Colombia and Mexico have now taken a strong foothold in the region. The Mara Salvatrucha gang, better know as the maras, a notorious juvenile street gang, is also gaining power in several nations. EL PAÍS focuses on the problems some of these countries are facing.
EL SALVADOR Homicide rate matches civil war casualties In El Salvador, 12 people, mostly young, are killed every day in a whirlwind of social and criminal violence that seems to be unstoppable.
GUATEMALA Death on the doorstep With an average of 16 to 17 killings a day, crime is the number-one concern among Guatemalans.
NICARAGUA The official story masks realityOfficial statistics from the National Police show an alarming increase in violence. Crimes against persons (aggravated robberies, rapes and homicides) accounted for 68,447 cases in 2010, while in the year 2000, there were 26,645 such cases.
COSTA RICA An oasis in the middle of a battlefield The fear of crime is rife in a country that has less personal security problems than in the rest of Central America. only 10 years ago, the number of murders was a third of what it is now.Its homicide rate is 11 murders per 100,000 inhabitants - one-eighth of that of Honduras
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