More Troops to Quell Mexico Drug Violence Richard Reynolds - ABC News go to original June 22, 2009
| In this June 5, 2009 photo, federal police officers stand guard near a crime scene where two bodies where found in Tijuana, Mexico, Friday. (AP/Guillermo Arias) | | The Mexican Government is deploying 1,500 extra troops to the northern city of Ciudad Juarez in the latest attempt to quell the growing drug-related violence.
Juarez is one of the most dangerous cities in Mexico.
Last year nearly 2,000 people were murdered in the city of about 1 million, in violence relating to the drug trade.
More than 5,000 troops were deployed in the town in March, leading to a brief lull in the violence, but it has since peaked again to an average of eight or nine murders a day.
The cartels have taken to beheading some of their victims and leaving the heads at the side of the road.
Critics say that government policies simply are not working, largely because of endemic corruption amongst police, the army and political officials. |