The significance of this executive action in Argentina cannot be understated. President Macri and his national security team have done what was once seen as politically impossible in Latin America -- to designate Hezbollah as a terrorist organization -- and make it politically possible.This is good news for two reasons. First, the act itself is useful in empowering LEOs to take action. But perhaps as important, it signals Macri is not as endangered electorally as was once thought.
The designation is just one of a series of actions that the Macri administration has been quietly working on during the past six months to add new tools to combat the convergence of international terrorism with transnational organized crime. This project includes a national registry, known as the Registro Nacional de Personas y Organizaciones Sospechosas de Terrorismo or RENAPOST in its Spanish acronym, of individuals and organizations suspected of having ties to terrorism.
The importance of non-Peronist Macri - or someone of the same ideology - retaining power in Argentina is hard to overstate.
