Pubdate: Sat, 6 Nov 2010
Source: New York Times (NY)
Page: A5
Copyright: 2010 The New York Times Company
Contact: http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/lettertoeditor.html
Website: http://www.nytimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/298
Author: Elisabeth Malkin
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/Mexico

DRUG GANG CHIEF REPORTED KILLED IN MEXICO

MEXICO CITY -- The Mexican authorities said Friday that a leader of 
the Gulf drug gang had been killed in Matamoros during a day marked 
by street fighting between soldiers and gunmen that paralyzed the 
city, which is across the Rio Grande from Brownsville, Tex.

The gang leader, Antonio Ezequiel Cardenas Guillen, who American and 
Mexican officials say took control of the cartel after his brother 
Osiel Cardenas Guillen was arrested in 2003, was killed by Mexican 
marines, according to a statement by Alejandro Poire, the security 
spokesman for the government.

Three other gang members were also killed, the statement said, and 
the Mexican Navy reported that two marines and a soldier died during 
the six-hour gun battle.

There was no official confirmation of any additional deaths. But the 
Matamoros newspaper El Expreso reported on its Web site that one of 
its reporters, Carlos Guajardo Romero, had been killed in the 
cross-fire shortly after noon as he covered the fighting.

Mexican officials shut down all three bridges that link Matamoros 
with Brownsville. They were closed for two hours but reopened on Friday night.

The United States Consulate in Matamoros tightened restrictions for 
its personnel, restricting personal travel from midnight to 6 a.m. 
The consulate recommended that Americans in Matamoros limit their 
travel to the daylight hours and urged them to be "vigilant and aware 
of their surroundings at all times."

With much of the Mexican media silenced in Matamoros and Reynosa, 
which is across from McAllen, Tex., it was left to social networks to 
report what took place on Friday.

On one video posted on YouTube, gunfire and grenade explosions rang 
out across streets that were almost deserted. A battle for control 
between the Gulf gang and its onetime enforcement arm, the Zetas, has 
unleashed fierce fighting this year, and the Mexican authorities have 
stepped up their search for the leaders of both. Mr. Cardenas, 48, 
controlled the Matamoros-Brownsville smuggling corridor for the Gulf 
gang and was responsible for shipping large cargos of marijuana and 
cocaine to the United States, the State Department has said. 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake