(MENAFN- The Rio Times) Key Points

• Peru's main airport has become a hub for forged documents and drug routes run by global mafias.
  
• Visa-free access to Europe for Peruvians is being exploited by criminal networks using fake Peruvian identities for other nationalities.
  
• Investigations reveal collusion by specialized police units, raising doubts about Peru's ability to secure its borders and institutions.
  

For many travelers, Lima's Jorge Chávez International Airport is just a transit point between South America and Europe. Investigators say it has quietly turned into a highway for mafias selling false identities and moving cocaine across the Atlantic.

The scandal shows what happens when open doors are not backed by strong, reliable institutions. The scheme feeds on a simple incentive. Peruvians can enter most of Europe's Schengen area without a visa.

For migrants from Bolivia, Ecuador, the Dominican Republic and beyond, that privilege can be bought. Gangs offer“packages” that include forged Peruvian passports, fake European residence cards and airline tickets.



One Bolivian traveller admitted paying about 13,000 for flights and 34,000 for documents, plus coaching on how to handle interviews in Madrid or Paris. This is not improvisation by street forgers.
Weak Institutions Fuel Visa-Free Abus
It is an industrial service built over years of lax controls, slow reform and governments that liked promises more than enforcement. While officials argued about migration, organized crime quietly learned to exploit every loophole in visa rules and airport procedures.

Drug trafficking networks saw the same opportunity. Jorge Chávez also became a launchpad for couriers carrying cocaine to Europe.

A special intelligence unit, Lleta, created with foreign support to fight narcotics, now appears to have had some of its own officers helping the smugglers they were meant to stop.

For expats, investors and ordinary travelers, this story matters well beyond Peru. If Europe concludes that its visa-free deal with Peru is being abused, tougher entry rules will follow.

For Peruvians who play by the rules, that would mean more checks, more suspicion and fewer chances. In the end, the cost of weak, politicised institutions falls on citizens who try to do things the lawful way.

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