By and large, Central American police lack the skills, technology and resources to combat the maras.

CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Gangs and violence in Central America

FBI, law-enforcement authorities are now trying to use techniques developed against the Sicilian Mafia to fight the maras.

ECONOMIST: Criminal gangs in the Americas

The gangs, or maras, emerged in Los Angeles and spread to Central America when gang members were deported.

BBC: NEWS | Americas | Guatemala gang clash injures 12

There is a suspicion that the maras may be letting businesses recover, the better to extort from them later.

ECONOMIST: Central America��s gangs: A meeting of the maras | The

This idleness feeds the maras: in El Salvador some 800 juveniles languish in jail, more than double the number in 2004.

ECONOMIST: Central America

The maras of Central America, which have close ties to inner-city gangs in el norte, could yet pull off the same trick.

ECONOMIST: Organised crime in Central America

These gangs, or maras, spread through other northern Central American countries, as mara members moved back and forth between the US and El Salvador.

BBC: Central America��s shift in safety

Maras are not widespread in Belize, in Costa Rica, or in Panama.

ECONOMIST: Criminal gangs in the Americas

All are struggling to contain the activities of the maras, which are blamed for a wave of killings and robberies across the region.

BBC: An injured Guatemalan prisoner is taken away by police

Now Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala are struggling to contain the activities of the maras, which are blamed for a wave of killings and robberies across the region.

BBC: NEWS | Americas | Guatemala gang clash injures 12

Kurdish politicians from the BDP told CNN they would accompany the bodies of the three murdered women to their hometowns of Maras, Tunceli, and Adana for burial later this week.

CNN: Mourners in Turkey protest killings of Kurdish activists