Murder rates in and around Latin America and the Caribbean have negative consequences and have already affected a number of economies especially Guyana, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago, said Minister of Public Security Khemraj Ramjattan.
Delivering the main address yesterday at the opening of a two-day Regional Seminar for National Drug Observa-tories in the Caribbean at the Ramada Georgetown Princess Hotel, Providence, Ramjattan noted that the magazine Foreign Affairs in its 2017 March edition, in an article, Latin America’s Murder Epidemic – How to Stop the Killing, reported that Caracas’ homicide rate is closing in on 120 for every 100,000 people.
The average global rate of murders is pegged at about six to 100,000, he said. On Guyana’s borders, he said, Venezuela was not Guyana’s only neighbour negatively affected by murders but Brazil was registering the world highest numbers of homicide with more than 56,000 a year.