Mexico

As Mexico’s epidemic of violence rages on, authorities seem powerless to stop it

With more than 26,000 murders this year, it is clear the president’s strategy of using the military to control the crime gangs has failed

The news came almost as fast as the bullets were fired: a judge murdered in cold blood; cartel members attempting a prison break; five people killed at a bar in a popular port city.

The surge in violence over a single weekend in Mexico brought a torrent of headlines that are increasingly familiar as powerful gangs battle for control of the country: shootouts, cars set on fire, bodies lying in the street.

The craziness is spreading into border states.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexican drug cartels, Mexico, Mexico - Failed State

Meanwhile in Mexico …

Dog carrying severed hand leads to discovery of 53 bags of human remains in Mexico’s most violent state

The sight of a dog running through town with a severed hand in its mouth led to a gruesome discovery in Mexico — 53 buried bags filled with human remains.

The sickening cache of decaying bodies was found in late October during a festival called El Cervantino in Guanajato, a violent state ravaged by drug cartel murders, according to Agence French-Presse.

Desperate people rushed to the burial site in the town of Irapuato after seeing the dog with the exhumed hand, and started looking for signs of their lost loved one — even as music from the nearby celebration could be heard in the background.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexican drug cartels, Mexico, Mexico - Failed State, WTF?

3 butchered bodies wash ashore in Acapulco, Mexico — as tourists lounge nearby

The butchered remains of three people washed ashore in Acapulco, Mexico, over the weekend — shocking beachgoers at the once-thriving holiday hotspot.

Gruesome photos show a body lying face-up on sun-soaked Condesa beach as tourists gawk and families wade in the water nearby.

I have no desire to visit Mexico for some reason.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexican drug cartels, Mexico, Mexico - Failed State

Mexico uses footage of homeless people and drug addicts from PHILADELPHIA in ads to scare young people away from substance abuse

The Mexican government is using video of homeless people and open-air drug users in Philadelphia’s troubled Kensington neighborhood in a national ad campaign to try to scare young people away from drugs.

Jesús Ramírez, the spokesman for Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, proudly presented the ad series Tuesday, saying the campaign ‘seeks to inform young people of the damage caused to health by the consumption of chemical drugs.’

Ramírez did not respond to repeated requests for comment as to where the government got the Philadelphia videos or why they used them in ads aimed at a Mexican audience.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexico, USA, WTF?

Padre Pistolas suspended by the Roman Catholic Church in Mexico

Rev. Alfredo Gallegos, better known as Padre Pistolas to many in the Mexican state of Michoacan for his pro-self defense advocacy against cartel violence, has allegedly been suspended by the Roman Catholic Church in Mexico, and though officials have said nothing publicly about the reasons for the suspension, there’s really only one controversial position the pastor has taken; fight back against the drug cartels that are destroying the community.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexican drug cartels, Mexico, Mexico - Failed State

Things Are So Crappy Under Trudeau That Human Smugglers Are Moving Mexicans From Canada To The USA

The Swanton Sector

I bet Trudeau gets a cut.

Shortly before sunset, in the parking lot of a Montreal hotel, the smuggler asked Yazuri Martinez-Alvarez to pay the remaining $3,000 in cash while she sat in the back of a four-door pickup truck with three other men.

Her final payment was due only when the journey ended. But she didn’t argue. Instead, she handed over the money and watched the smuggler count it.

She remained in the truck until the sky darkened and the smuggler told her to leave her backpack behind. She could only carry her passport and cellphone. Baggage would make too much noise when they moved through the brush and might alert border police, the smuggler told her.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inCanada, Human Trafficking, Mexico, USA

Feds Pinpoint Nearly 30K Mexican Passport Holders With Middle Eastern Names in Fraud Investigation

Federal law enforcement officials have identified a high number of individuals with Middle Eastern names traveling with Mexican passports, according to an internal Department of Homeland Security memo obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.

Since the beginning of 2022, nearly 30,000 Mexican passport holders were flagged as part of the investigation into passport fraud, the memo states, adding that each identified individual will be further evaluated. A senior official at DHS who spoke on the condition of anonymity said the agency will likely investigate whether any of the individuals have traveled to the United States and whether there are any other patterns in their travel.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexico, Mexico - Failed State

Mexico Arrests Top Prosecutor in Case of Missing Students and Issues 80 Warrants

MEXICO CITY — Mexico’s former attorney general was arrested Friday in connection with the violent abduction and likely massacre of 43 students in 2014, a significant breakthrough in one of the most notorious atrocities in modern Mexican history.

He is the first high-level official to be detained in connection to the case, and the authorities said Friday that they had also issued more than 80 arrest warrants related to it, including for military officers, police officers and cartel members.

It was not immediately clear if any of those warrants had led to other arrests, but their sudden announcement came just a day after the Mexican government said an official inquiry had found the disappearance of the students to be a “crime of the state” involving every layer of government.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexican drug cartels, Mexico, Mexico - Failed State

Oxxos burning: Cartel terrorists demonstrate their firepower

For many, last week’s narco-terror hit close to home—literally. What’s next?

If I go out my front door in San Luis Potosí and walk in any direction — north, south, east or west — I’ll hit an Oxxo convenience store in five minutes,10 max. According to Google maps, there are 15 Oxxos within a 1.5-kilometer radius of my address. It may be I live in an especially Oxxo-rich corner of the country, but with more than 20,000 of them nationwide, I’m no outlier.

Interesting slice of life.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexican drug cartels, Mexico

Mexico prison cartel clash spills on to streets of border city leaving 11 dead

A prison confrontation between members of two rival cartels spilled on to the streets of the border city Ciudad Juárez, where alleged gang members have killed nine more people, including four employees of a radio station.

The violence began on Thursday, when Los Chapos, members of the infamous Sinaloa cartel formerly led by Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, clashed with the local group Los Mexicles, in a Juárez prison, the deputy security minister, Ricardo Mejía, said.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexican drug cartels, Mexico, Mexico - Failed State

Two Canadians hiding out in Mexico, one an Interpol fugitive, killed at Playa del Carmen resort

MEXICO CITY, June 21 (Reuters) – Two Canadian citizens, a man and a woman, have been killed at the beach resort of Playa del Carmen on Mexico’s Caribbean coast, authorities said on Tuesday.

The killings in the state of Quintana Roo follow the fatal shooting in January of two Canadians with criminal records in nearby Cancun.

A senior state official told Reuters the man, whose identity has not been made public, was wanted by Interpol.

Had their throats cut. I wonder what flavour of Canadian they were.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inCanada, Crime, Mexico, WTF?

Mexico: The Venezuela Next Door?

COULD MEXICO under the leadership of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador plunge into the political and economic tailspin which we associate with Venezuela under Hugo Chávez, Nicaragua under Daniel Ortega, or Argentina under the Kirchners? Over three years into his six-year term, Lopez Obrador—universally known by his initials as AMLO—has displayed many similar statist and authoritarian instincts. But sufficient countervailing forces may exist so that Mexico avoids the worst, and with it, collateral damage to the United States.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexico, Mexico - Failed State

Fighting Pancho Villa’s Ghost

Remembering a time when common criminals gained dominion over Mexico, and the Americans who failed to chase them out.

There are all kinds of Mexican food in the United States. Arizona features Sonoran-style cooking. New Mexico debates red and green chilies. Cal-Mex mastered Baja’s seafood. My favorite, Tex-Mex, contributes chili con carne and more than one helping of beef and cheese. Wherever it may be, and whatever variation of Mexico’s cuisine is on the menu, patrons will encounter a portrait of Pancho Villa on the restaurant’s wall.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexico

Mexico’s fight to sue US gun manufacturers for $10bn

Mexico claims that half a million guns flow south from the US every year. Can a lawsuit against American gun manufacturers stem the tide?

Just before sunrise on a warm Friday morning in June 2020, gunmen were waiting for Omar Garcia Harfuch, the city’s then 38-year-old security head, in Mexico City’s upscale Lomas de Chapultepec neighbourhood.

What happened next would be captured on CCTV and the mobile phone cameras of terrified onlookers: the rat-a-tat-tat of bullets as dozens of heavily armed gunmen, some dressed as road workers, blocked his path with a truck and opened fire.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexican drug cartels, Mexico, Mexico - Failed State

Mexican football match descends into BLOODBATH: ‘Up to 17’ fans killed

At least 22 people were brutally injured – two of them seriously – after a football match descended into carnage in central Mexico yesterday.

Unconfirmed reports are circulating that up to 17 people could have died attending the game between the host Queretaro and Atlas from Guadalajara – the reigning league champion.

The match was suspended in the 62nd minute when multiple fights suddenly broke out in the stands – with men seen tearing off the jerseys of their rivals.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted inMexico, WTF?