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As the Obama administration cracks down on smuggling into Mexico, Jamaicans fear even more firearms will reach the gangs whose turf wars plague the island of 2.8 million people.

Mike Melia, Associated Press

In this photo taken on May 13, 2009, seized handguns are seen inside a weapons depositary in a police station in downtown Kingston, Jamaica. The firearms pour into violent slums in cities across Jamaica, one of the world's deadliest countries, where guns are used in the vast majority of murders. Eighty percent of the weapons seized in the Caribbean island are traced back to the United States. (AP Photo/Ricardo Arduengo)

Ships from Miami steam into Jamaica's main harbor loaded with TV sets and blue jeans. But some of the most popular U.S. imports never appear on the manifests: handguns, rifles and bullets that stoke one of the world's highest murder rates.

The volume is much less than the flow of U.S. guns into Mexico that end up in the hands of drug cartels - Jamaican authorities recover fewer than 1,000 firearms a year. But of those whose origin can be traced, 80 percent come from the U.S., Jamaican law enforcement officials have said in interviews with The Associated Press.

And as the Obama administration cracks down on smuggling into Mexico, Jamaicans fear even more firearms will reach the gangs whose turf wars plague the island of 2.8 million people.

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