US Sanctions Argentine Drug Company for Trafficking, Money Laundering

"The US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) identified the Argentina-based Goldpharma Drug Trafficking and Money Laundering Organization (Goldpharma DTO/MLO) as a significant foreign narcotics trafficker pursuant to the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act (Kingpin Act)", a press release announcing the action stated.

In addition, OFAC designated eight Argentine nationals for their work with Goldpharma, as well as nine entities located in Argentina, Colombia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, the release said.

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Argentina has been going through a tough economic crisis since 2018. The inflation rate reached 4.7 percent in Argentina in March alone, coming to 11.8 percent in the first quarter of 2019. The country's national currency, peso, significantly fell against the dollar in 2018. Over the past few weeks, its rate decreased dramatically, with one US dollar now costing almost 47 pesos. Meanwhile, this level should have been reached by the end of 2019 only, according to the estimates of the Central Bank of Argentina. The International Monetary Fund has predicted that Argentinian GDP will fall by 1.2 percent in 2019.

In a bid to counter the crisis, the Argentinian government has implemented a set of measures, including freezing prices for 60 food items and introducing different discounts for senior citizens, unemployed citizens, families entitled to children allowances and a range of other categories of citizens.