This report is one of several studies conducted by UNODC on organized crime threats around the world. These studies describe what is known about the mechanics of contraband trafficking - the what, who, how, and how much of illicit flows - and discuss their potential impact on governance and development. Their primary role is diagnostic, but they also explore the implications of these findings for policy. Publisher's note.

In recent years, cases involving Central American migrants, including unaccompanied children (UACs) and families, have inundated the U.S. immigration system. Many of these migrants have expressed a fear of persecution and have applied for asylum, initiating a resource and time-intensive adjudication process with high stakes. Since many of these claims rely on non-legal expertise - often relating to country conditions and/or mental health assessments - the influx of cases presents new opportunities for collaboration between social scientists and legal scholars. In order to foster the collaboration that could inform the equitable adjudication of these cases, a cross-disciplinary team at American University convened an international group of researchers and practitioners with expertise across three areas: 1) country conditions in Central America; 2) psychological assessment of asylum seekers; and 3) asylum adjudication and evolving jurisprudence on asylum law in the U.S. The workshop had multiple goals, including the development of cross-disciplinary professional networks, the articulation of plans for future research, and the identification of other collaborative efforts seeking to address challenges in asylum adjudication.

This book assesses the political, economic and geopolitical dynamics that China’s presence has initiated throughout Latin America and the Caribbean between 2008 and 2020. Written by experts across three continents, contributions to this edited volume explore the bilateral relations that China has developed with almost all Latin American and Caribbean countries, charting both the benefits they have brought and the problems that these relations have created for local actors. The book analyses the emergence of new forms of "dependence", considers issues such as the existence of a deindustrialization phenomenon throughout Latin America and ultimately questions whether China and the United States are engaged in a zero-sum game in the region. It also investigates challenges that the densification of the web of China’s relations and exchanges with Latin America and the Caribbean countries pose; not only to the United States and European countries, as traditional partners of these states, but also to Latin American regionalism. Including an extensive set of case studies and local, regional and global-level analysis, China-Latin America and the Caribbean provides an empirically rich resource for students and scholars of Chinese foreign and economic policy, Latin America, the Caribbean and wider geopolitics.