By MARK LORENZANA An alleged criminal leader accused of working for the Los Zetas Cartel in the central Mexican state of San Luis Potosí was arrested on the night of Thursday, Sept. 22, in García, Nuevo León. Members of the Mexican Army, the Attorney General’s Office (FGR) and the National Guard (GN) carried out the arrest of Alfredo Alemán Narváez,
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By MARK LORENZANA At least for the time being, the proposal to extend the presence of the Armed Forces on the streets for public security tasks until 2028 has been suspended by the Mexican Senate. During the discussion, Ricardo Monreal, leader of the leftist National Regeneration Movement (Morena) majority bloc in the Senate, took the stand on Wednesday, Sept. 21,
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By MARK LORENZANA Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) on the night of Thursday, Sept. 15, led the reenactment of Mexico’s Cry of Dolores, which marked the 212th year of Mexican independence — and the first time in two years that the event was staged at the Zócalo main plaza in downtown Mexico City due to the covid-19 pandemic.
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By MARK LORENZANA Mexico’s Chamber of Deputies — whose majority bloc consists of members of the leftist National Regeneration Movement (Morena) of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) — approved on the afternoon of Wednesday, Sept. 14, a proposal to use the Armed Forces for public security tasks until 2028. Yolanda de la Torre, a deputy of the centralist Institutional
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By MARK LORENZANA The military has long been on the list of untouchables in Mexico. The Mexican National Guard (GN) might soon be added to that list. On Friday, Sept. 9, the Mexican Senate approved a legislation transferring control of the GN to the Secretariat of National Defense (Sedena), a contentious move that has sparked outrage from human rights groups
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By MARK LORENZANA According to the results of a survey released by Mexican daily newspaper El Universal, which was carried out from Aug. 18 to 23 of this year by the survey firm Buendía and Márquez, the majority of Mexicans support the move to use the armed forces in the fight against organized crime, despite the increased militarization of the
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By JESSICA GUERRERO MORELIA, Michoacán — During the last two weeks, the country has faced a serious security crisis, after several violent incidents took place across cities located in the states of Baja California, Chihuahua and Guanajuato, where different organized crime groups directly attacked civilians and set fires to dozens of businesses and private vehicles. The aforementioned resulted, in the first
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By MARK LORENZANA For Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), the recent acts of violence in the Mexican states of Baja California, Chihuahua, Guanajuato and Jalisco that left hundreds of people dead and property destroyed is but “an act of propaganda by criminal groups that my political opponents are taking advantage of.” In his daily morning press conference on
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By MARK LORENZANA The visit of Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) to the collapsed El Pintabete coal mine in Mexico’s northern state of Coahuila — where, on Wednesday, Aug. 3, 10 miners were trapped by the collapse and flooding of a well, and who are yet to be rescued — has added more despair, instead of comfort, to
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By THÉRÈSE MARGOLIS It’s August, already, and it seems that the last easy-breezy days of summer are quickly slipping away. Soon, vacations will be over and schools will reopen (which means much worse traffic), and all those lazy afternoons of sitting around the pool or sipping coffee with friends at your favorite café will come to an end, and you
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