Uruguay: At least 10 minors killed in 'settling of scores' in drug wars

At least 10 minors were killed for "settling of scores" during 2024 following drug wars and vendettas in Uruguay. Most of the cases remain unpunished in the judicial arena.

According to a report by local newspaper El País, this is the year with the most such deaths since 2021. In 2020, there were 12 drug-related homicides of minors, although the all-time high occurred in 2018, when there were 13.

"The reality offers cases of all types. Children murdered for being children of drug leaders, relatives of criminals who pay the price for acts they did not commit and adolescents who at their young age are already more than steeped in how the machine of violence works," said El País, which reported on the 10 children killed in cases identified as "settling of scores."

Authorities are working on an early warning system. El País detailed that Uruguay's Institute for Children and Adolescents plans to implement a program in which each state agency will eventually dump the information it has on the cases and then, if there are conditions that indicate that there may become a danger, the algorithm will detect it and issue an alert.

"Before the death of any of these adolescents and children there was a comprehensive response. Each state institution took care of its work and, although the technicians make an effort to coordinate among themselves, there is no system that makes a complete analysis of the trajectory of the deceased and what could be done differently so that something like this does not happen again," the Uruguayan media outlet reported.