Pubdate: Thu, 09 Sep 2010
Source: Wall Street Journal (US)
Copyright: 2010 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
Contact:  http://www.wsj.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/487
Author: Nicholas Casey and Jose de Cordoba

MEXICO ARRESTS 7 IN MIGRANT KILLINGS

MEXICO CITY-Mexico arrested seven gunmen allegedly involved in the
recent execution-style killings of 72 U.S.-bound undocumented migrants
in the northern border state of Tamaulipas, officials said Wednesday.

The gunmen are believed to belong to the Zetas drug cartel, said
Alejandro Poire, the Mexican government's national-security spokesman.

Earlier Wednesday, officials said they had found the bodies of a
Tamaulipas prosecutor and police chief who had gone missing shortly
after beginning an investigation into the massacre.

The discovery of the bodies of Roberto Suarez, a state detective, and
Juan Carlos Suarez Sanchez, a local police chief, sent a chilling
message to authorities investigating the work of organized crime in
Mexico's troubled north.

The two men had been assigned to solve the mass killing of 72
immigrants-58 men and 14 women-from Central and South America who had
apparently been on their way to the U.S. The immigrants' bodies were
found on Aug. 25.

Tamaulipas, which borders Texas, is caught in a violent turf war
between two former cartel allies turned enemies, the Gulf Cartel and
its former enforcers, the Zetas.

The violence was on display again on Wednesday. Officials said a
shootout between police and gunmen linked to a cartel left five people
dead, and closed down the road between the state capital of Ciudad
Victoria and the Mexican border city of Matamoros, just across from
Brownsville, Texas.

Gunmen in the state of San Luis Potosi, just south of Tamaulipas, shot
and killed the mayor of the town of El Naranjo as he was sitting at
his desk. It was the latest in a string of killings of Mexican mayors,
all believed to have been carried out by cartels.

The Committee to Protect Journalists, a New York-based advocacy group,
issued a report Wednesday saying more than 30 journalists have gone
missing or been killed since 2006 and criticizing the Mexican
government's response to the attacks. As a result, the report said,
news related to drug trafficking hasn't been reported in many areas.
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