Central American police chiefs visit Belize
If crime takes a nosedive this week it may be due to the presence of the region’s top police brass. The two-day tour by the Central American Commission of Chiefs of Police is the first leg of a junket that includes Panama, Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Honduras and Costa Rica. The focus of the trip is to study how each country approaches the problems of organised crime, juvenile delinquency, and gang related violence. Superintendent Noel Leal is the liaison officer for the group, which this morning stopped in at the Raccoon Street station.
Supt. Noel Leal, Liaison, Commission of Chiefs of Police
“So right now the working tour is in Belize and have been in Belize since yesterday meeting, and will continue today looking at the various police operations in respect to these matters and also getting first hand presentations from different people, from the social services to hear what they’re situation is and how we are addressing the situation. From here on they will be moving on to Guatemala and other Central American countries.”
“What we intend to achieve first from foremost from the entire tour in Central America is to develop a regional plan so that we can combat these problems on a united effort for the entire Central American region. What Belize intends to accomplish is so that we can also develop a plan for ourselves to, one, either prevent the infestation of these problems into Belize; because you know we are very close to our Central American neighbours and there’s a lot of influence that can come from them, so we want prevent first. And secondly, if we does come around then we want to be able to have some kind of plan in place to address the problems.”
It is the first time that the commission has paid an official visit to Belize.
And while we’re on the subject of Central America, we must note the results of Sunday’s national elections in Guatemala. While the vote count is not final, it is certain that no single candidate will win fifty percent of the vote. This means that a runoff election will be held between the two top candidates, conservative Oscar Berger and left of centre Alvaro Colom. Berger leads the balloting with thirty-eight percent of the vote while Colom maintains twenty-eight percent after two thirds of the ballots have been counted. General Rios Montt, whose candidacy generated most of the election’s controversy, is running out of the money with a seventeen percent share. Trying to analyse which of the two candidates would be more friendly to Belize’s interests invariably puts the kiss of electoral death on our choice, so we’ll take a pass on that question except to say that whoever is inaugurated on January fourteenth, the revival of the O.A.S. facilitator’s recommendations and the accompanying referendum is not going to be high on the new president’s agenda.
