Uruguay Faces Rising Threat From Organized Crime

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A series of recent criminal activities suggests that organized crime has set its sights on Uruguay and reveals the vulnerabilities in what has historically been one of the most prosperous and well-governed countries in the region.

On September 25, Uruguayan authorities arrested three suspected members of the Manos gang in Uruguay’s Artigas Department, which border’s the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul. The Manos is one of Rio Grande do Sul’s most powerful criminal groups. Authorities claim the group is expanding across the border to control local drug dealing in Uruguay’s north.

The same day, six people died in an intentionally set fire in a Uruguayan prison. While the incident remains under investigation, authorities say it resulted from insufficient supervision by prison staff. It occurred in the same module of the same prison — and appears to have used the same methods — as a similar deadly attack conducted in late December 2023.

A few days earlier, an operation that seized millions of dollars worth of cocaine confirmed that Uruguay’s role in international cocaine trafficking has expanded.

SEE ALSO: Uruguay Corruption in Spotlight After Ex-Official’s Release From Prison

For decades, Uruguay has boasted functioning institutions, with top scores for democratic institutions, GDP per capita, and perceptions of corruption in Latin America.

But recent years have witnessed rising criminal activity. Homicides have remained high since a spike in 2018, and tons of cocaine have passed through the country unnoticed, only to be detected by authorities in Europe.

Although major criminal groups have yet to gain a solid hold in Uruguay, the country offers several opportunities for organized crime to thrive.

Uruguay’s Prisons Uruguay’s prisons are increasingly overcrowded and unmaintained, characteristics that organized crime has exploited to recruit and expand in neighboring countries.

The number of people imprisoned in Uruguay has risen steadily over the last 15 years, from 8,324 in 2009 to 15,767 in 2024. The penitentiary system is currently at 121% capacity, making Uruguay’s incarceration rate the 10th highest in the world. Meanwhile, per prisoner spending has decreased year after year since 2019, according to government data.

In 2023, 40% of the incarcerated population faced “insufficient conditions for social reintegration,” while 43% experienced “cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.” The percentage of the population falling into the latter category has been rising since 2019.

“We have a situation of deterioration and prison overcrowding that an organization such as the PCC could use to its advantage,” Lucas Silva, an author and journalist focused on Uruguayan organized crime, told InSight Crime.

In neighboring Brazil, the First Capital Command (Primeiro Comando da Capital – PCC) formed in a similarly overcrowded and mismanaged prison in São Paulo after a prison massacre at the hands of authorities. The group built up their numbers in prison, and eventually spilled out into the streets and expanded internationally.

In Paraguay, the PCC fought for control over prisons with rival gangs, such as the Rotela Clan, taking advantage of the overcrowded prisons and the outnumbered and corrupt guards to generate insecurity and recruit new members.

And while the PCC’s incursion into Paraguay caused much bloodshed, a similar move in Uruguay may fly under the radar, due to a lack of major gangs in Uruguay.

“The PCC knows it does not have a rival here, so it does not need to enter in a spectacular or combative manner,” said Nicolás Centurión, Uruguay crime observer and analyst at the Latin American Center for Strategic Analysis (Centro Latinoamericano de Análisis Estratégico – CLAE)

Criminal Networking Behind Bars Well-connected prisoners linked to major organized crime groups in Uruguay’s prisons have likely used the country’s prisons to build their international criminal networks.

Though major gangs have not yet taken over any of Uruguay’s prisons, members of powerful organized crime groups have long been incarcerated in the country. Some experts believe that these connections helped propel Uruguayan drug trafficker Sebastián Marset’s criminal career to the intercontinental level.

“They sent him to a wing of the Libertad prison where the main international drug traffickers who had fallen in Uruguay were. There were people from the PCC, Paraguayan drug traffickers, people from the ‘Ndrangheta, from the Balkan mafias,” said Silva.

SEE ALSO: Uruguay’s Top Trafficker Disappears Yet Again in Bolivia

Marset got his start as a small-time drug dealer, and was arrested for marijuana trafficking in 2013. Although he had no known ties to international cocaine trafficking before prison, he was quick to build an international operation after his release.

According to Centurión, Marset went to Bolivia soon after being released from prison to meet with cocaine producers. He then set up shop in Paraguay and climbed the criminal ladder. “This shows that the key was given to him in prison — he made contacts on the inside and was very smart to be able to survive and then move on to other countries with a clear objective,” he said.

Rocco Morabito, a leader in the ‘Ndrangheta Italian mafia, was imprisoned in Uruguay in 2017, but escaped in 2019 alongside an alleged member of Mexico’s Cuinis criminal organization. Morabito is believed to have built the link between the PCC in South America and the ‘Ndrangheta in Europe, coordinating massive shipments of cocaine between continents.

Uruguay’s Changing Role Uruguay has taken on an increasingly important role in the international cocaine trade, as transnational organized crime groups look to expand in the country.

Uruguay’s capital and main port, Montevideo, has become a major transit point for cocaine headed to Europe and Africa, as cocaine production and consumption rise, and drug trafficking groups adapt and expand their routes.

SEE ALSO: Uruguay’s Microtrafficking Approach Under Question as Homicides Jump

Since at least 2019, shipping containers passing through the country’s waterways were loaded with drugs elsewhere, often in Paraguay, and passed through Montevideo hidden in legitimate shipments of products like flour and soy. Partners in Europe would then unload the drugs to distribute to dealers.

But the recent operation on September 25 uncovered the drug being stored and loaded onto boats in Uruguay’s coastal departments of Montevideo, Canelones, and San José. An earlier operation in August took down a network consisting of Uruguayans and Colombians, who were allegedly storing cocaine in Montevideo to load into shipping containers destined for Europe.

And while Uruguay has a relatively limited consumption market, violence in some of Montevideo’s neighborhoods has risen as small clans fight to control small-scale drug dealing.

“At the national level, we have two very clear phenomena. On the one hand, the advance of trafficking on the borders and the port of Montevideo and, on the other hand, the increase in the levels of violence in the neighborhoods,” said Silva. “What has yet to be investigated is how connected the two phenomena are: large-scale drug trafficking and neighborhood violence.”

Uruguay’s changing role in the international drug trade has raised concerns that the country could experience a similar fate as Ecuador. In 2015, Ecuador had a lower homicide rate than Uruguay and the third-lowest homicide rate in Latin America at 6 per 100,000 people. In 2023, it had the highest rate in South America at 45 per 100,000 people.

The violence has closely followed a sharp uptick in cocaine flowing through Ecuador. As the country’s corrupt penitentiary system became severely overcrowded, gangs took over parts of the prisons, and violence erupted both in and out of prisons as rival groups warred over drug dealing territory and trafficking routes.

However, Emiliano Rojid, a criminologist at Montevideo’s University of the Republic, said that Uruguay is still very different from Ecuador: “Uruguay does not have as attractive a location as Ecuador, and it has much stronger institutions,” he said. But, he added, “[Uruguay is] not exempt as a country from what happens in the region and the power of the resources that drugs move at the international level.”

Featured image: A guard keeps watch outside of Uruguay’s Santiago Vázquez prison Credit: Uruguay’s Ministry of the Interior

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Uruguay Faces Rising Threat From Organized Crime

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