Central America US$950.0M security plan to benefit the country

Santo Domingo.- Dominican Republic will benefit from a US$950 million security plan managed by the Central American Integration System (SICA), to be implemented in seven other countries starting January, announced SICA Secretary General Juan Daniel Aleman Wednesday.

Interviewed by news source listin.com.do, the Central American official said the security plan contains 22 regional projects to deal with criminality and drug trafficking, and includes Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama.

To benefit from the plan Dominican Republic must adhere to the Central America Democratic Security Treaty, which is in a legal formalization process, according to the Dominican Foreign Relations vice minister Clara Quiñones.

Aleman said the plan will be carried out with the cooperation of the United States, Spain, Germany, Canada, Mexico, Colombia, Italy, Korea, the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, the Central American Economic Integration Bank and agencies of the United Nations.

He said the four-point plan seeks to fight crime via police and judicial actions, crime prevention, bolster the penitentiary system and reintegrate the people who serve their sentences to society.

Aleman, speaking yesterday in the 4th Ministerial Meeting “Pathways to Prosperity in the Americas” said the regional organization aims to implement three programs to “surmount border porosities, such as trafficking with people, with organs, weapons and historical relics.”