MEXICO: Drug violence increasing in wealthy region of Mexico as some 25 people are killed in 24-hour spree in the northern state of Nuevo Leon, where Monterrey, Mexico's richest city, is located

Record ID: 301411

  • Title: MEXICO: Drug violence increasing in wealthy region of Mexico as some 25 people are killed in 24-hour spree in the northern state of Nuevo Leon, where Monterrey, Mexico's richest city, is located
  • Date: 16th September 2011
  • Summary: MONTERREY, MEXICO (SEPTEMBER 14, 2011) (REUTERS) (NIGHT SCENES) POLICEMEN GUARDING AREA WHERE YOUNGSTERS WERE MURDERED
  • Embargoed: 1st October 2011 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Mexico
  • Country: Mexico
  • Reuters ID: LVAB5FDPBW03K3HFKHG6RV149RGL
  • Story Text: Mexico's northern Nuevo Leon state succumbed to more bloody violence on Thursday (September 15) as drug-related violence claimed some 25 people in a 24-hour-period, local media reported.
    According to the daily El Norte newspaper, an explosion at a police station in Mexico's richest city of Monterrey during the night left one officer fighting for her life in a hospital. A fortified wall built to fend off attacks from powerful cartels in the city had proved no deterrence to the armed men, with the concrete barrier riddled with bullets and the windows of a police car blown out from the force of the explosion. The brazen assault follows a grenade attack in June on the same police station.
    In the neighbouring city of Apodaca, three members of the traffic police were executed by armed men at a popular freeway during peak hour. Alleged drug traffickers traveling in two vehicles opened fire on the group of four policeman. One transit officer who had survived the attack has been moved to hospital with serious injuries.
    Nuevo Leon's embattled state governor Roberto Medina is under huge pressure from citizens to put an end to the spiraling drug violence following increasingly bold attacks by powerful drug cartels, including an arson attack on a casino that killed dozens of civilians in August.
    "The violent acts we suffered yesterday are from warring drug cartels who continue to leave banners threatening revenge," said security spokesman for Nuevo Leon state.
    Capping off the bloody day were the murders of six men with alleged ties to drug traffickers. At a Monterrey exchange point for illicit drugs, the victims were surprised by heavily armed men who opened fire on the group. One survivor who managed to escape the scene was taken to hospital by his mother and remains in grave condition.
    Home to some of Latin America's biggest companies and where annual income per capita is double the national average at $17,000, Monterrey has become one of Mexico's most violent cities, with more than 650 drug war deaths so far this year, more than in all of 2010.
    Once considered a model city, the manufacturing centre of 4 million people 140 miles (230 km) from Texas has witnessed a rapid increase in drug violence since President Felipe Calderon launched his fight against the cartels in late 2006. Some 40,000 people have died across Mexico since then.
    The Zetas are fighting an alliance of the Gulf and Sinaloa cartel for control of Nuevo Leon and its smuggling routes into the United States.
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