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 News Around the Republic of Mexico | February 2007 
Violence Continues in Acapulco
 Reuters
A man's chopped up body was discovered in the Mexican city of Acapulco dumped in plastic garbage bags, police said on Sunday, in the latest grisly killing to mar the once glamorous Pacific resort.
Acapulco, famed for its cliff divers and sweeping bay, has been hit by a brutal war between rival drug gangs who have staged shootouts in broad daylight near tourist areas. It was not clear if the latest slaying was drug related.
"It's one body, of a male," a police official said by telephone, but declined to give further details.
A Reuters photographer in Acapulco said the body parts were discovered on a patch of wasteland on Saturday afternoon after a dog tore open the black plastic bags.
There were 190 drug gang-related deaths in Mexico in January, only a handful less than a year ago, despite an army crackdown on feuding cartels ordered by new President Felipe Calderon.
The Acapulco killing came nine months after the decapitated heads of two policemen were dumped on the wall of a government building in the city in a warning to authorities from drug hitmen.
Mexican media quoted Public Security Minister Genaro Garcia on Sunday as saying he would add 8,000 highly trained police to a new division dedicated to fighting drug crime.
Faced with a surge in drug violence that saw more than 2,000 gangland killings across Mexico last year, Calderon moved swiftly after taking office on December 1 to send out troops to hunt down cartels.
Thousands of soldiers, working with federal and state police, are manning road blocks in the states of Michoacan, Baja California, Nuevo Leon and Guerrero, home to Acapulco.
Four major traffickers have been extradited to the United States to face trial there.
Acapulco has lost much of its 1950s glamour but remains popular with U.S. students during spring break. No tourists have been killed in the Acapulco violence. |
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