Smugglers are getting rich from the world’s slimiest black market: baby eels. The fragile state of freshwater eel species, like the critically endangered European eel, has driven a multibillion-dollar international trafficking trade. We look at the crackdown on eel crime around the world, including Interpol’s war on smuggling in Europe, and the growing attempts to save a species on the brink.
Tag Archives: black market
Terror and Cocaine in the Peruvian Jungle
The cocaine industry in Peru is outgrowing its traditional region of production—the VRAEM—and expanding into other areas of the country like the Amazon lowlands and the Brazilian border. This is creating a new wave of violence for indigenous tribes who are refusing to work with the cartel.
We embed with local drug traffickers to see the cocaine refinement process firsthand, visit with an autodefensa militia group, and meet a local Amazonian community currently under attack.
The Prison Black Market
The UK prison system has a rich and thriving black market, with its own micro-economy based on tinned fish. Drugs, food, iPhones, and games consoles are everywhere – if you know where to look (and who to ask). We speak to former prisoner and filmmaker Chris Atkins, author of ‘Time After Time’ and ‘A Bit of a Stretch’, about how prisoners get contraband and chicken stew inside their cells.
Pirates of the Danube
In Serbia, we explore how pirates, mostly through deals made with international boat crews, illegally load off oil, ores or fertilizers that they later sell on black market. Such activities are often followed with great risks and violence between rival gangs is quite common.
The Danube flow through Serbia is 600 kilometers long and a lot of international transport goes along the river. Serbia has been blacklisted by a number of international companies because of illegal river trade or, more commonly said, piracy.