The San Luis Potosi state government said in a statement, citing witness testimony, that four hooded assailants burst into the town hall in the municipality of El Naranjo at around 1:30 p.m. Wednesday.Two of the gunmen made their way to the offices of Alexander Lopez Garcia, the 35-year-old mayor, and opened fire, the statement said.
The slain mayor had been in office since October 2009, while the area where El Naranjo is located – a highland town of some 20,000 inhabitants – has seen much of the violence affecting San Luis Potosi, blamed on turf battles between rival drug gangs.
The Mexican president’s office issued a statement condemning the attack and expressing its condolences to the victim’s family.
A spokesperson for the main opposition Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, to which Lopez Garcia belonged, called the murder “regrettable” and denounced the growing number of attacks of this type “at city halls nationwide.”
Lopez Garcia was the third mayor slain in less than a month. The body of the mayor of the northern town of Santiago, conservative Edelmiro Cavazos, was found in the state of Nuevo Leon on Aug. 18, while the PRI mayor of the northeastern town of Hidalgo, Marco Antonio Leal Garcia, was killed 11 days later.
Shootouts among rival drug cartels and the security forces’ operations against the gangs have claimed more than 28,000 lives in Mexico since December 2006, when President Felipe Calderon took office.
Vowing to crush the cartels, Calderon has deployed tens of thousands of army soldiers and federal police officers to the country’s most crime-plagued areas, yet the pace of drug-related killings has only accelerated, surging from 2,700 people in 2007 to 7,724 fatalities last year.
The 2010 death toll, according to officials, already stands at more than 7,000.
By now one would expect high security for everybody dog catcher to governor,at least arm yourself and take out at least one or two perps as you exit the world.These thugs are like a pack of wolves in a heard of sheep.
ReplyDeleteWell said" Sept. 10 2010 7:40am ;; Under the circumstances. The right to bear arms is a must, otherwise you don't have a chance. Also total reform of the justice system just to start. I find some of the comments made by some of the highest officials in Mexico and the USA to be out of touch with the people that live in the areas plagued with violence. Sad to say,,Its a joke :(
ReplyDeleteThe Ruling Class must go to the people and say, 'We have a problem', explain that 'we are all in a battle for the heart and soul of Mexico'. Then lay it out and make the case for everyone to join the fight and how to do it.
ReplyDeleteOf course the Ruling Class will not do that.
They are the Ruling Class and they would rather
die than join with "the people".
This is a very top down leadership decision; revolutionary.
Hillary was correct, Obama was lame in trying to walk back her precision in analyzing the conditions in MX. But as anyone who views the extent of the violence from the reporting on this site alone can see, Hillary underestimated it. MX is in an advanced stage of "insurgency", apparently without a central political credo.
ReplyDeleteTo me the Mexican insurgency is most comparable to warlordism, with money gained thru the illegal drug trade replacing the pursuit of gold, silver, precious stones, and profits gained in commercial trade of hi-value commodities of ancient times like silk. The game objective is and was all about m-o-n-e-y. And now tens of billions of dollars are involved. That means there are inexhaustible number of people to constantly replace those gangsters who are imprisoned or killed.
I wish good luck to those authorities who are charged with trying to even control this fire let alone eliminate it. A multi-national, multi-point, sophisticated strategy will be required which the State actors involved (primarily USA) are not even willing to consider seriously for the foreseeable future.
amen to that ..the 'ruling class' in Mexcio are about the most assinine , arrogant hijo de putas on the planet...no way will the evr bend to mingle with the common mexican, beside they are making the profit from all this shit anyway
ReplyDeleteIt is both the ruling class and its 'people' that have gotten Mexico in this mess. They, the ruling class, have continuously subjugated its citizens from the day the Spanish arrived. First by installing 'encomiendas', essentialy concentratino camps for the Indian slave/workers, in which whole communities were up-rooted and destabalized. The various tribes were arbitrarily grouped into what are now known as 'barrios'. Next, by intermixing with each other, producing what we now refer to as 'mestizos', the Spanish whites and the natives in effect lost both their Indian and Spanish identities and culture, creating a bastardized people who have no clue who they are as a whole, where they come from, or where they are going. All cultural traditions are forgotten along with the moral framework that held communities together. Historians say it is the mestizos who took over after the Revolution but what good is a revolution if they continue to subjugate its own people no matter who they are, white, indian, or mixed? I believe this is the origin of their problems. From their way of government-rule to their faith, Mexicans have never been able to work for the common-good because the people cannot come to any consensus as to what exactly is the common man. Seeing what's happening to Mexico is like seeing a man being eaten by a lion who has time and time again refused to acknowledge that the lion is even there.
ReplyDelete@2:32 PM
ReplyDelete"Hillary was correct, Obama was lame in trying to walk back her precision in analyzing the conditions in MX."
She was correct but do not assume this observation will in any way cause her to help/be a friend to Mexico.
She has political ambitions and is beginning to stake (she can drive a steak) out a position that will show her more in line with "the commoners" and to remind them that she is the one with a spine.