Tijuanna Paper and Media

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A gunman killed a top federal police official and his bodyguard Thursday as they ate lunch in Tijuanna, the latest attack against authorities waging a nationwide battle against organized crime.

Insp. Igor Labastida was among officers in charge of combatting contraband, said Public Safety Department spokesman Eduardo Cano.

Labastida's two other bodyguards and a woman who was a Public Safety administrative employee were injured, Cano said. Preliminary investigations indicated a lone gunman opened fire on Labastida and his companions before fleeing.

The assault was the latest against Mexican officials involved in the nationwide fight against drugs and organized crime.

The motive for the attack was unclear and police officials had made no arrests.

Follows police chief's slaying
But Cano said authorities were investigating a possible link to the assassination of Edgar Millan Gomez, Mexico's acting federal police chief. Millan Gomez was shot dead in May at his Tijuanna apartment. Police blamed the Sinaloa drug cartel and arrested five people, including the alleged gunman.

"It's part of what's been happening," said Cano, referring to a series of attacks against federal officials
President Felipe Calderon has sent more than 20,000 troops across Mexico to take back territory controlled by some of the world's most powerful drug gangs.

The cartels have responded with unprecedented violence, killing more than 4,000 people since Calderon took office in December 2006. More than 450 have been police, soldiers, prosecutors or investigators.

The homicides also have become more gruesome, with hit men beheading their enemies and leaving threatening messages with the victims' bodies.

Violence against police worst in north
Worst hit has been the north of the country, where police have been killed and others have resigned after their names appeared on hit lists.

At least two small towns have seen their entire police force disintegrate, with officers either killed or resigning for fear of being targeted.

The administration of U.S. President George W. Bush has cited the attacks on police in urging Congress to approve a plan that would give Mexico and other Latin American countries US$1.4 billion over several years to fight drug trafficking.

But U.S. lawmakers have sought to add conditions that have angered Mexican officials, including performance evaluations and guarantees that civilian investigators will be allowed to look into allegations of abuse by the Mexican military.

MEXICO CITY -- Mexican President Felipe Calderon on Friday welcomed U.S. congressional approval of a $400 million anti-drug aid package that drops restrictive conditions he had opposed.

The bill contains another $65 million for Central America.

Calderon said the bill "was an important step in the fight against international organized crime." He said its passage was due in part to Mexico's insistence that the United States share the burden in the fight against drug trafficking.

The few remaining conditions on the aid, known as the Merida Initiative, are respectful of Mexican sovereignty and don't require any legal changes, Mexican Interior Secretary Juan Camilo Mourino said.

"The approval by the U.S. Congress of funds for the Merida initiative is a testament to the mature dialogue between Mexico and the United States, and the mutual trust we have achieved," Mourino told reporters.

He said the aid showed that the U.S. was willing to help Mexico in the fight against drugs.

"What appears to me to be most important, in the end, is that the U.S. government has finally recognized that this is a shared problem, a bilateral one," Mourino said.

An earlier version of the bill would have required Mexico to change the way it handles allegations of human rights abuses by the military, as well as other oversight measures. Calderon and others had opposed those restrictions, saying they intruded on Mexico's sovereignty.

As passed by the U.S. Senate on Thursday in a 92-6 vote, the program would condition just 15 percent of the aid on Mexico's efforts to make police more transparent, accountable and responsive to complaints, and ensure investigation of reports of abuse by police or soldiers.

Mexico currently has mechanisms in place to do all those things, but some have questioned their effectiveness.

U.S. Sen. Chris Dodd, a Democrat and senior member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, praised the bill's passage.

"I am confident that this language will be acceptable to both the American and Mexican Governments," Dodd wrote in a statement. "The United States and Mexico must continue to work together to tackle our common security challenges and reduce drug trafficking and violence on both sides of our border."

The Bush administration oginally requested $500 million for Mexico and $50 million for Central America, as part of a three-year, $1.5 billion plan. Congress reduced the amount destined for Mexico this year, however.

Both Mourino and Foreign Relations Secretary Patricia Espinosa stressed the anti-drug aid would include equipment, systems and training, not cash, and that no U.S. soldiers would be allowed to operate in Mexico as part of the plan.

"Mexico will not accept the presence of U.S. military personnel in Mexico," Espinosa said.

Mourino said the plan would include "training programs intended to ensure that all the equipment received will be operated by Mexican personnel."

He said Mexico wants aircraft, computer and surveillance gear, and inspection equipment such as gamma and X-ray units used to inspect trucks for drug shipments.

Some frictions remain, but compared to the 1980s and early 1990s - when Mexico and the United States frequently sniped at each other's perceived failures in the anti-drug effort - the current atmosphere is one of cooperation.

The United States has implemented new programs to prevent and punish the trafficking of U.S. weapons that largely fuel bloody drug-turf battles in Mexico, a frequent complaint of Calderon's.

The increasingly violent conflicts have claimed the lives of thousands - including police officers, soldiers and civilians - this year alone.

"Are we totally satisfied with what is being done? No," Mourino said, referring to weapons trafficking.

"But we are satisfied with having made the U.S. government conscious of the dimensions of this problem."

TIJUANA – Baja California detectives are investigating the death of a 64-year-old U.S. citizen who was killed at his residence in southern Tijuana.

A friend found Ken Stuart's body lying by his front door at 10:40 a.m. Thursday, according to a Tijuana municipal police report. He had been stabbed several times in the chest.
Stuart lived in San Antonio del Mar, a coastal community of some 800 U.S. and Mexican homeowners at Tijuana's southern end.
“There's no evidence of forced entry or robbery or random vandalism in the house,” said Al Rosen, president of the homeowners association. “It appears that whoever entered the house, entered with the knowledge of the victim.”

The U.S. Consulate in Tijuana has been in touch with Stuart's family. According to the consulate, he was born in Virginia.

A spokeswoman for the Baja California Attorney General's Office said the investigation was ongoing.

TIJUANA, Mexico – Mexican soldiers captured one of the top leaders of the notorious Tijuana cartel at a childrens' party in this northern border city, police said Sunday.
Filiberto Parra Ramos, nicknamed “The Bitch”, was arrested along with 58 other men Saturday by soldiers who raided the party in a neighborhood of Tijuana across the U.S. border from San Diego, California.
When they identified him they separated him from the group,” said a spokesman for the Baja California state police.
Parra Ramos is considered one of top leaders of the Tijuana cartel, which is headed by the Arellano Felix family.

President Felipe Calderón has deployed 25,000 troops and federal police to fight the well-armed cartels that smuggle cocaine, marijuana and amphetamines to the United States.

About 1,550 people have died this year as drug gangs battle each other and security forces.

LAst night the Redlight district was filled with the rattle of gun fire. A know pimp named Jose De Lawago, and his crew was found dead in an alley. After what police are calling a turf war. the investigation was breif and the police left the scene after gathering up the bodies