Children exploited by drug gangs face the same plight as “child soldiers” forced into killing and maiming people for criminals and cartels, the EU has said, as it launched a series of initiatives to crack down on cocaine smuggling.
The European commissioner for home affairs, Ylva Johansson, said young people were becoming caught up in an increasingly booming and brutal trade that was one of Europe’s biggest security threats.
“They are being radicalised and groomed to become killers. They are the drug gang equivalent of child soldiers,” she said. “The drugs trade orchestrated by organised crime is one of the most serious security threats facing Europe today, and the situation is escalating.”
Johansson, who is Swedish, cited the arrest last week in a Stockholm suburb of a 16-year-old in connection with the killing of two women, one in her 20s and one in her 60s, while children were in the house. He was arrested in possession of an automatic weapon and was linked to another murder.
“This is only the latest in a series of murders carried out by children,” she said, unveiling a plan to combat drug trafficking.
The EU wants to strengthen strategies to disrupt the recruitment of children, including the identification of early signs such as children caught involved in shoplifting or dropping out of school.
Brussels also wants to develop a European drug alert system to quickly let national authorities and drug users know when new dangerous substances enter the market. A new alliance between the ports of Europe will see intelligence shared more effectively, it said.
The crackdown comes as figures show that 50% of all homicides in the EU are now drug-related, and fears are growing over synthetic drugs made in laboratories as well as cocaine.
A record 303 tonnes of cocaine was seized in the EU in 2021, the most recent year for which full data is available, five times more than a decade ago. Three-quarters of all seizures took place in three countries: the Netherlands, Belgium and Spain.
The consequences are spiralling corruption, as cartels bid to coopt port logistics firms, local union officials and politicians, and a dramatic increase in violent crime.
But cocaine is not the only problem. The EU is keen to show it has learned the lessons from the US’s fentanyl crisis, which is believed to have caused 100,000 deaths. Earlier this year, Johansson raised concerns about potential fentanyl use in the bloc after police raided a laboratory in Latvia and seized 5kg of the painkiller, which is 50 times stronger than heroin on the streets.
The EU also plans to work with Latin and Central American countries to share intelligence and strategies to combat the criminals’ networks. The European Commission has said it is negotiating international agreements with Ecuador, Brazil, Bolivia, Peru and Mexico to exchange personal data with Europol. It is also working with the US on an initiative launched by the secretary of state, Antony Blinken, to address the threat of synthetic drugs and to close down safe havens for drug cartels.
