Threat of Narco Infiltration Keeps Belizean Officials Up at Night

Foreign Affairs Minister Francis Fonseca says protecting Belize’s borders must rise above party politics, and he is welcoming the Opposition’s recommendations. While several of the proposals are already being pursued, Fonseca admits one threat remains deeply troubling: the possible infiltration of Belize by powerful players in the drug trade. He says the country cannot confront that danger alone and will need stronger support from its international allies.

 

Francis Fonseca, Minister of Foreign Affairs

“ You mentioned, I think six points or six recommendations or priorities that you identified and I think they’re all good fit recommendations. We certainly are prepared, you know, to take them on board. I think many of them, as you would appreciate, are things that we’ve been working on. Coordinated border security plan, the National Security Council has been trying to address that assessment of urgent needs. Yes, we walk around with that really, to every meeting we have with our friends. What are our urgent needs, priority needs? So we’ve, you know, as shortly after we got into office, we asked for that assessment of our urgent priority needs. Some of them have been met, many others remain unfulfilled. That’s ongoing work. We wish we could do more but we are making significant investments in the security forces.  The budget has gone up. We’ve increased the budget significantly. We’ve had new intakes into the BDF, new intakes into the Coast Guard, new intakes into the Belize Police Department so we’re expanding these security forces. Hundreds of new officers have been brought in. The Prime Minister, he and I often when we go to these meetings in Washington and other places, the Prime Minister makes it very clear to them, we need your help. We need real tangible help. We need helicopters. We need planes. We need things like that if we’re going to effectively manage the border, monitor the border, patrol the border. So there’s a lot of work to do and we’re far from where we want to be but we have a very firm, strong commitment to protecting the border area.”

 

Cartel activities and threats near Belize’s northern border brought trade to a freeze in March of this year. The Mexican government eventually deployed additional troops in the area to ease tension. 

 

Attention readers: This online newscast is a direct transcript of our evening television broadcast. When speakers use Kriol, we have carefully rendered their words using a standard spelling system.

 

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