It is essential to end the impunity of the criminal group called Socialism of the 21st Century

By: Carlos Sánchez Berzaín - 31/08/2026

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For over a quarter of a century, all forms of corruption, narco-terrorism, judicial violations of human rights, massacres, torture, assassinations, the persecution of innocent people for the crimes of their accusers, forced migrations, human trafficking, child abuse, state terrorism, treason, and the commission of every possible crime are characteristic features of the “organized criminal group” called 21st-century socialism or Castro-Chavismo. Ending the impunity of those who hold power in Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Bolivia, and their satellite states is essential for the freedom and security of the peoples of the Americas.

The United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime or “Palermo Convention” defines in its article 2 paragraph a that by “organized criminal group shall mean a structured group of three or more persons which exists for a certain period of time and which acts in concert with the purpose of committing one or more serious crimes or crimes established in accordance with this Convention with a view to obtaining, directly or indirectly, a financial or other material benefit.”

This definition precisely encompasses the group organized by Hugo Chávez, Fidel Castro, and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, which they developed and expanded publicly starting in 1999, until they came to control virtually all of Latin America. They installed dictatorships as an extension of Cuba's Castroist model in Venezuela with Chávez and Maduro, Nicaragua with Ortega and Murillo, Bolivia with Morales and Arce, and Ecuador with Correa. In the rest of the region, they established para-dictatorial regimes such as those of the Kirchners in Argentina, Toledo in Peru, Lugo in Paraguay, Boric in Chile, Lula and Rousseff in Brazil, López Obrador and Sheinbaum in Mexico, Petro in Colombia, and others.

They supplanted politics with transnational organized crime and labeled it 21st-century socialism, which the State Department has recently called "21st-century communism," which the press recognizes as the Latin American left.

In more than two decades, they changed political constitutions, laws, codes, procedures, and institutions, and installed in public, judicial, and institutional positions those who were either perpetrators or accomplices in the perpetration and cover-up of all kinds of crimes. They spearheaded a cultural shift in national and Latin American societies, promoting the substitution of freedom with submission, of merit with expediency, and of respect for principles and values ​​with tolerance of crime or participation in it as a means of survival and/or economic success.

A concise summary of the evidence of organized crime holding power in Latin America can be seen in: the situation of narco-states in Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Bolivia, and Ecuador, which are in advanced stages of dismantling; the existence of narco-states as territories, states, or provinces in Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Brazil, and more; the criminal system known as “Lava Jato,” operated with Brazilian federal funds and managed by the Havana-Caracas-Brasilia axis, which has so far gone unpunished or been “laundered” in most of the affected countries; the unjustifiable and publicly displayed wealth of those in power and the circles of 21st-century socialists; the political prisoners and exiles who are victims of judicial human rights violations; the assassinations, such as presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio in Ecuador, Lieutenant Ronald Ojeda in Chile, and other targeted killings; the hundreds of deaths in repressive massacres; and the dozens of deaths in prisons in Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Nicaragua. Those expropriated, usurped and deprived of their legitimate property, businesses and resources….

With the recent geopolitical shift, there have been very important advances such as the capture of Nicolas Maduro, the growing attack on narcoterrorism, the pressure on para-dictatorial governments to extradite criminals, the increasing coordination for the dismantling of narco-states and their common criminal operators, the return of international cooperation against crime, and the public identification of the “organized criminal group”.

However, there is public distress, a mixture of hope and anxiety, because the leadership of this “organized criminal group” remains intact. This group is based in Cuba, operates freely in Nicaragua, maintains its structure in Bolivia, and resists in Venezuela. The leaders of this organized criminal group, known as 21st-century socialism, Castro-Chavismo, 21st-century communism, or the Latin American left, enjoy impunity. They are the heads of the dictatorships in Cuba and Nicaragua, and members of their system operate within Bolivia and Venezuela.

There is no democracy with impunity. As long as impunity persists for the criminals who hold power in Cuba and Nicaragua, who maintain power structures in Bolivia and Venezuela, and who have positioned themselves as political actors in Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, and elsewhere, there will be neither freedom nor security in any country in the Americas.

* Lawyer and Political Scientist. Director of the Interamerican Institute for Democracy

«The opinions published herein are the sole responsibility of its author».