And switching gears from crime to border issues - on Saturday the Belize Territorial volunteers boldly set out on their annual flag planting visit to Belize's southern boundary, the Sarstoon Island. We say boldly because since the 10th September, the Guatemalan Navy has drastically escalated the tone and tenor of their engagements not just around the island - but on the Sarstoon itself. So, what happened on Saturday? Organizer Wil Maheia says it started out smoothly until the Guatemalan Navy appeared in numbers:...
Wil Maheia, Belize Territorial Volunteers
"Going into the Sarstoon River, we didn't see much action, but as soon as we entered around the BDF base and headed towards the island, then it was like all of a sudden all these Guatemalans both started to appear out of nowhere."
"But they came aggressively and I must give thanks to the BDF and to the Coast Guard for being close enough to us that the Guatemalans could not have touched us. Last year you will recall that the Guatemalans, they came and they bumped up our boat and they really roughed us up."
"This year they didn't get the chance to do that because the BDF was right there to intercept them."
And while that presence kept the Guatemalan military at bay, it didn't stop them from shouting and using their sirens.
Wil Maheia, Belize Territorial Volunteers
"But the Guatemalans, they were very irate. I mean this one, I guess he was an officer, he was in one of the Guatemalan boats and he was just yelling and saying, get out of here, this river is for Guatemala, the entire river is for Guatemala. And of course, you know, I was telling him no, the river is not for Guatemala, the island is not for Guatemala, it's for us."
Eventually the volunteers had to settle for a compromise, not quite on the island.
Wil Maheia, Belize Territorial Volunteers
"We proceeded close enough to the island where our flagpole could have like got in on the bottom floor of the river, which would have made it closer to the island. And then we pulled up, we pulled the three boats together and sung the national anthem there in front of the Guatemalans."
And while today's mission was symbolically accomplished, Meheia says that the tone and tenor of the Guatemalan military is changing.
Jules Vasquez
"How do you view Saturday's events in the context of previous confrontations on the river?"
Wil Maheia, Belize Territorial Volunteers
"Well, this year the Guatemalans definitely had more boats. They had bigger boats, they had more guns, and I don't think that I have seen before where they had their guns mounted, like real machine guns mounted on the boat."
"This year at least three or four of their boats had their machine guns mounted like they were seriously in for some business. You know, when we first started, they would just come and say, hey, you shouldn't go there. They wasn't aggressive, and every year it gets more and more aggressive. And then... a few years ago they were like, well this is disputed territory and you don't have no right to put no flag there."
"And then now they're saying there's no dispute here. This entire thing belongs to us, the Guatemalan."
And with the ramping up of hardware, manpower and rhetoric, there were concerns for the safety of the volunteers.
Wil Maheia, Belize Territorial Volunteers
"This is really an invasion of Belize. They've violated our sovereignty at least like I would say 10 times in the past 10 days. Yeah, when you go down there, anything can happen."
"We hope that nothing ever happens. But at the same time, we can't be giving up our territory without fighting for it."
About 50 people participated in the expedition.
