Gangs in Honduras: daily terror | M6 | Enquête Exclusive

Honduras is one of the country with the highest murder rate in the world: 90.4 slayings per 100,000 population (source: ONUDC, 2014). In this tiny Central American state they kill a hundred times more than in France, twenty-five times more than in the USA. This plague has a name: Maras. That is the local name for the gangs, such as the Mara Salvatrucha and the Mara 18 (the most famous and the most brutal of the gangs), who have turned ultra violence into their religion. Organized in criminal networks, along the lines of the Mafia, the gangs count thousands of members (mareros), who battle each other for control of the traffic in drugs, arms and racketeering. A merciless war that affects the whole population. The poorest country on the continent of America, just behind Haiti, and extremely corrupt, Honduras has become a drug platform serving the US. And it all goes through the Maras. With backing from the army, the police try to conduct strike operations. But what can you do against these highly armed gangs? How do you fight these mareros, who see no other option than death? After months of investigation, we managed to make contact with these criminals who rule over the country and terrorize the population. We discovered that their brutality knows no limit and that their methods of intimidation have no equal. However, the picture is not entirely dark in Honduras. Despite the death and the terror, some brave Hondurans are fighting daily to give their young people a better future. Some French people have even succeeded in running businesses and creating jobs, especially along the Caribbean coast, on one of the most beautiful beaches in the world. A descent into the heart of Honduras, a paradise lost made rotten by gangs and ravaged by violence.