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INTRODUCTION
Over the last decade, urban and drug-related violence, also known as other situations of violence, has increased in visibility and impact, becoming one of the most serious forms of violence in the Northern Triangle of Central America (El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras) and Mexico. Conventional distinctions between violence caused by armed conflict or war and that caused by criminal violence has become blurred across the region in terms of its humanitarian impact on the civilian population.
Worsening in recent years, levels of criminal violence in the Northern Triangle of Cen-tral America (NTCA) have been compounded by the area’s heightened significance as a drug trafficking region. The 2006 Mexican war on drugs resulted in altered regional drug trafficking routes and a shift in the balance of power among criminal groups, pro-voking an increase in fighting for territorial control, better organisation of groups, and a greater presence and use of increasingly sophisticated, and better quality weapons. Heavy-handed policies and militarised strategy implemented by the region’s Govern-ments have further contributed to destabilisation and high levels of violence (UNODC 2012, TNI 2012, FESCOL 2011).
The NTCA is considered one of the most violent areas in the world due to skyrocketing rate of homicides. While not experiencing conflict between warring parties, the region has seen epidemic levels of violence, defined by WHO as ten or more homicides per 100,000. Particularly high levels of violence were seen between 2009 and 2011. Hom-icides recorded between 2004 and 2013 in the NTCA numbered 143,5881 (41.9 hom-icides per day), with 15,328 in 2013. These totals, however, do not paint a complete picture and fail to include the as of yet unquantifiable number of violent deaths of un-reported or missing people found in cemeteries or secret graves (UNODC, IUDPAS, IML, INACIF 2014).
High levels of regional poverty, injustice, inequality, and unemployment do not by themselves explain the rise in corruption and violence. Contributing factors range from increased consumer expectations, a lack of local opportunities and resulting social immobility, rapid unplanned urban growth, and changing communities and family units whose roles in some areas are replaced by mobs or gangs, to ineffectual education systems. To these factors are added the use of firearms, high rates of alcohol con-sumption, and drug trafficking (UNDP 2013).
Crime and violence bring with them measurable social and economic costs. Included in these are: reduced human development indicators; negative changes to individual, family, and community behaviour; erosion of social support and capital; and creation of an environment of fear and insecurity which causes people to abandon homes, busi-nesses, and public spaces (UNDP 2013).