NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF FORMER BORDER PATROL OFFICERS
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Foreign News Report
Posted
May 9, 2008 by American Patrol
The National Association of Former Border Patrol Officers (NAFBPO) extracts and condenses the material that follows from Mexican and Central and South American on-line media sources on a daily basis. You are free to disseminate this information, but we request that you credit NAFBPO as being the provider.
Narcos execute yet another ranking official in Mexico
El Financiero
, Milenio , El Universal (all from Mexico City) 5/8/08
Millan's murder marks the third execution of high
ranking "PFP" officers in one week in Mexico City.
In the state of Sinaloa fourteen police officers have
been killed in one week; in Culiacan, the state capital, six "narco-message" signs
were hung in public areas threatening others in slangy, profanity-laden terms.
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La Cronica (Mexicali, Baja Calif.) , La Prensa Grafica (San
Salvador, El Salvador) 5/8/08
Op/column by Sergio Munoz Bata titled "The Invisible Frontier"
As if it weren't about a phenomenon in which the protagonists are human beings
(and) have to leave their families behind to attempt to build a better future
for all, the news that the Latin American immigrants' money remittances to their
impoverished families are declining has been a cause for celebration in
xenophobic circles of the United States.
For instance, for the leaders of the Migratory Studies Center, an organization which advocates the expulsion of undocumented immigrants to their countries of origin, the suffering and the penuries of the immigrants do nothing but confirm the success of the severe federal and state immigration policies. According to the last poll by the Inter American Development Bank the spectacular growth in the flow of monetary remittances seen between 2001 and 2006, when they went from 15 billion to 45 billion dollars, has stopped in 2007. Last year, Latin American immigrants sent barely 1% more than what they sent in 2006, that is, some 500 million more than the year before.
The poll also found that the number of immigrants who send money decreased from 73% in 2006 to 50% now; that 81% of those interviewed report that this year it has been more difficult to find well paying employment; that 61% of Latins who have already become citizens and 66% of Latins who are legal residents feel that discrimination against them is on the rise and that the main reason they have stopped the remittances is because they fear being jobless at any moment.
The places with the largest drops in remittances were Pennsylvania(28%), Georgia(17%), Maryland(11%), some of the states which have toughened their laws against the immigrants.
One of the few positive poll figures reveals that many who send remittances have been able to increase the amounts and this contributes to having the total amount of money sent to the region to remain very high. In any event, the drop means bad news for Latin America and terrible ones for approximately 3.2 million families who will stop receiving remittances in 2008. This means that some 2 million families, that is some 10 million persons, could return to be below the poverty line. And it does not necessarily imply, as the anti-immigrant groups have said, good news for those who seek to restrict the migration flows because if the deterioration of the American economy continues, which has nothing to do with the migratory flows, its effects will be felt throughout the whole region with various degrees of intensity. And when the economies of the countries which rely largely on the American economic performance enter into a major crisis, (then) the escape valve historically preferred by those persons who are not resigned to be idle will once again be immigration.
And on this subject it's worth remembering that although a third of those polled said they were thinking about returning to their country of origin, which would mean an increase compared to last year when only 20% thought about that possibility, 69% of those polled said that despite everything they consider their present situation as between good and excellent in comparison to what they would find if they actually had to return home.
If the economic situation worsens in Latin America, one could not ignore the
possibility that instead of thinking about returning, the ones who are already
here will seek to bring their brothers, their cousins, their friends so that
among all of them they would keep the remittances at an acceptable level. Let us
not forget that the remittances are Mexico's second largest source of foreign
currency, just under petroleum and above that of tourism. In Colombia, they come
up to 84% of the country's oil exports; in Ecuador they are the second source of
income from abroad, after petroleum; in Peru, the income from remittances
surpassed that from tourism and of the total of its agricultural exports.
That's how things are, (and) the most regrettable is that there are people who
rejoice about the penuries which millions of poor suffer in the western
hemisphere.
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Diario de Coahuila (Saltillo, Coahuila) 5/8/08
In Villa de Cos, Zacatecas, an armed confrontation ensued after a convoy of
vehicles refused to stop at a highway checkpoint run by the military. The result
was that four "Zetas" were arrested but also three local civilians were killed
in the crossfire, including a nine year old girl.
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Excelsior (Mexico City) 5/8/08
Mexican federal agents arrested nine members of the Arturo Beltran Leyva (aka
"El Barbas") criminal group after an armed confrontation Wednesday which also
cost the lives of two thugs and two federal police. The affray took place on the
Cuernavaca to Acapulco highway. An arsenal including G-3, M-16 and AK47 rifles,
an M203M-16 grenade launcher, a "FIVE--Seven" handgun, 42 loaded clips for the
G-3 rifle, seven for AR15 & AK47, six for handguns, plus "also three grenades
for automatic assault rifle M-203M-16, five fragmentation grenades, a drum
loader, 300 rounds of 5.7X2.8, nine tactical vests and four matra radios."
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Milenio (Mexico City) 5/8/08
In Los Reyes, Michoacan, three other subjects were caught transporting a small
arsenal at a highway checkpoint. The items included a couple of grenades.
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Norte (Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua) 5/8/08
Seventeen law enforcement personnel have been executed so far this year in the
state of Chihuahua. Eleven of them were city police officers, four belonged to
the state's investigation agency and two were "CIPOL" (a police intelligence
agency). One military has also been killed.