Sixteen killed around Mexico, 11 detained

At least 13 were reported killed or found dead in incidents around Mexico on 5-6 February, including nine policemen and a priest, the review Proceso reported. The state policemen of Guerrero were ambushed and killed on 5 February as they patrolled by car the district of Apaxtla de Castrejón, half way between Mexico City and the western coast. A suspected criminal was reportedly killed in a shootout with police before this ambush in nearby Teloloapán, though it was not clear the incidents were related. In the western district of Colima, an elderly priest was severely beaten inside a church on 6 February, later dying in hospital, for motives that were not immediately clear, Proceso reported. The Bishop of Colima urged authorities "not just to investigate" the crime but "punish whoever turns out to be the culprit." In the south-central city of Cuernavaca early on 8 February, police shot dead three bodyguards of the chief prosecutor of the state of Morelos Rodrigo Dorantes Salgado, apparently by mistake, Milenio reported, citing Notimex. Authorities were investigating. In the central state of Guanajuato, authorities presented to the press on 7 February 11 detainees identified as members of the cartel Jalisco Nueva Generación, and suspected as involved in crimes including several killings since 2012, Proceso reported.

Mexican, Honduran cities top homicides ranking

The Citizens' Council for Public Security and Penal Justice (Consejo Ciudadano para la Seguridad Pública y Justicia Penal), an independent crime-and-rights observer body in Mexico, published its 2012 list of cities with the highest murder rates; as in previous years, Latin American cities retained their preeminence in spite of "jostling" among them. San Pedro Sula in northern Honduras remained, according to figures obtained, the most murderous city in the world in 2012 with a homicide rate of 169.3 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants. Acapulco on Mexico's western coast was the second city for homicides, with a rate of just under 143/100,000 inhabitants, the Council found. Its ranking for 2012 included:

3 - Caracas, Venezuela with 118.89 homicides/100,000 inhabitants,
4 - Tegucicalpa/capital district of Honduras, 101.99/100,000
5 - Torreón in northern Mexico 94.72
6 - Maceió in Brazil 85.88
7 - Cali, Colombia 79.27
8 - Nuevo Laredo in north-eastern Mexico 72.85
9 - Barquisimeto, Venezuela 71.74
12 - Guatemala City, 67.36
15 - Culiacán in north-western Mexico, 62.06
18 - Cuernavaca, central Mexico, 56.08
19 - Ciudad Juárez, northern Mexico, 55.91
20 - Ciudad Guyana, Venezuela, 55.03
21 - Detroit, United States, 54.63
22 - Cúcuta, north-eastern Colombia, 54.29
24 - Medellín, Colombia, 49.1
32 - Chihuahua in northern Mexico, 43.49
33 - San Juan, Puerto Rico, 43.25
35 - Port au Prince, Haiti, 40.1
36 - Ciudad Victoria in north-eastern Mexico, 37.78
44 - San Salvador, El Salvador, 32.48
47 - Monterrey, northern Mexico, 30.85
50 - Barranquilla, northern Colombia, 29.41.

The Consejo observed that several cities had lowered murder rates enough to drop out of the top 50, including Tijuana in northern Mexico and the eastern Mexican port of Veracruz, but also Panama City. Ciudad Juárez dropped almost 20 positions from its position near the top in 2011, and San Salvador had also improved from a rate of 59/100,000 in 2011 to a little over 32 - all these based on official or available figures used to compile the table as the Consejo cautioned. Its website stated that authorities in San Pedro Sula had complained about the negative image the ranking was giving the city and alleged the figures cited were mistaken, but it responded that the ranking was based "on official figures and regarding the effect of the ranking, which merely recognize reality, that is not what harms the city's image but its violence and rulers' inability to contain and reduce it. Hiding problems never solves them." The mayor of Acapulco, which came second in 2012, said "it is quite deplorable that we should be in this stituation...I've seen the note. It pains me that it should be so," Proceso reported on 7 February.

El Salvador officials say murders continue to fall

Officials declared on 6 February that El Salvador's homicide figures were in January 2013 less than half those of January 2012, even as they admitted that a ceasefire between gangs that helped reduce murders had yet to end violent crime in El Salvador. The Security and Justice Minister David Mungía Payés told a San Salvador press conference that authorities counted 190 homicides in January 2013, 54 per cent less than the 413 for January 2012. He attributed this as on previous occasions to police action and the ceasefire between the Mara street gangs. Extortions reported in January dropped 18 per cent year-on-year, he said. Munguía admitted there had been a slight rise in violent acts recently in spite of the ceasefire and that "purges" were going in the gangs including in districts selected as crime-free zones; "we have entered a process that has helped us reduce violence, but this has not finished. The ceasefire is not a perfect process," he said. He attributed the killings of four on 1 February in the city of San Miguel east of San Salvador to gang rivalries. The latest victims of crime in El Salvador were two cousins aged 15 and 16 years, earlier reported as kidnapped and found dead on 5 or 6 February in Apopa, a district north of San Salvador, elsalvador.com reported. Most or all readers' comments left on various websites reporting such crimes indicated that the public was entirely skeptical, and often contemptuous, of official declarations on improving crime figures.

Guerrilla bomb kills two in south-western Colombia

Two were killed on 5 February as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) exploded a car bomb near the village or town of El Palo in the Cauca department, Europa Press reported, citing Colombian media. The FARC reportedly intended to detonate the artefact inside the town but were foiled by the arrival of troops and shooting that followed. The victims were provisionally identified as a soldier and a civilian. Colombia's police chief José Roberto León Riaño ordered the security of police stations boosted on 6 February in response to a recent resurgence of FARC activities. He said 14 policemen had died in January for FARC attacks, Europa Press and El Espectador reported. A priest was also reported killed at home on 3 January in the district of Riosucio in the western department of Caldas, Europa Press reported, citing the Catholic agency MISNA. Father José Ancízar Mejía Palomino, aged 84, was the third priest to have been killed in the preceding 20 days, Europa Press reported.

Mexican community policemen said kidnapped child

Masked individuals identifying themselves as members of a self-styled community police briefly kidnapped a child in the Ayutla district of the western Mexican state of Guerrero on 4 February, prompting community police chiefs to order their policemen to work unmasked. The masks were very likely intended to help community policemen avoid identification by the criminals they have vowed to fight. Residents of at least four districts in Guerrero have formed the militias to police their part of the state, in response to the authorities' inability to curb violent crime. State authorities and civil observers have already expressed concern about the legalit of such armed groups, but locals have in turn denounced the state's failure to assure security. After the kidnapping, three local community police chiefs decided their policemen would only bear masks during "operations" or patrols, La Crónica de Hoy reported on 5 February. Community forces detained dozens of suspected criminals during January at road blocks set up around relevant districts; they recently announced relatives of 54 detainees held in the locality of El Mesón could visit on Sundays. Separately in the resort of Acapulco in Guerrero masked men raped six or seven female tourists lodged in bungalows on the edge of the city on the night of 4-5 February, media reported. Six were Spanish and one Mexican, and seven Spanish men who were with them were tied up; their belongings were robbed. The group later received medical assistance and counselling, Europa Press reported on 5 February.

Missing policeman's body found in Bogotá

The body of Jairo Alberto Díaz, a 24-year-old policeman who disappeared on 27 January in Bogotá's north-eastern district of Usaquén was found on 4 February, and police were unsure if he had died by accident or been killed as he was found in a spot that had already been searched. Dozens of police agents had searched for him in Usaquén and surrounding areas and the city's police chief initially suspected he had been kidnapped by a gang. A red plastic bag found over him may have hidden him, it was speculated. Coroners were examining the body to determine possible causes of death, the broadcaster Caracol reported. His father told Caracol radio on 5 February that he was convinced "he was killed," as indicated he said by the fact that the body had not decomposed after an absence of nine days. After days of hoping to find his son alive, "what are we going to do now?" he asked in grief.

Troops kill three Colombian rebels, hostages to be freed

Colombian troops shot dead three fighters of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) during operations on 3 February in the district of La Macarena in the south-central department Meta, while a fourth guerrilla, aged 15 years, was caught and handed over to child welfare authorities. The army stated that two other guerrillas surrendered or left the FARC that day, Europa Press reported, citing the Cali newspaper El Tiempo. A rifle, machine gun and mortar were confiscated. The FARC stated in a communiqué on 1 February that they held two policemen kidnapped on 25 January and a soldier kidnapped on 30 January during fighting in the department of Nariño, and intended to release them, the broadcaster Caracol reported on 2 February. The communiqué declared the servicemen to be in good condition and specified that Colombianos y Colombianas por la Paz, a political formation sympathetic to the FARC, must participate in the release, to be "accompanied" it added by the International Committee of the Red Cross. Colombianos is headed by the former senator Piedad Córdoba who has intermittently acted as a mediator between the FARC and the Colombian state. She said on 2 February that she was waiting for the government's permission before meeting with the Red Cross to begin the hostages' release, Caracol reported.

Rebels ambush policemen in northern Colombia

Three policemen were reported killed in northern Colombia  on 1 February in an ambush attributed to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), press and agencies reported. Suspected guerrillas attacked a patrol car in the Maicao district in the department of Guajira, close to the border with Venezuela, Europa Press reported. The attack seemed to closely follow officials' declarations on troops killing six guerrillas including a FARC chief during bombardments. In the east-coast department of Chocó the departmental ombudsman spoke of local concerns over the FARC imposing an "armed strike" - curfews and restrictions on circulation - on several districts. Luis Enrique Abadía told Colombia's national radio on 1 February that pamphlets were found in districts along the highway leading to the department of Risaralda east of Chocó, announcing an "armed strike" from 1 to 20 February. He said this meant restrictions on movements of the local population and on deliveries to the districts of Mistrató, Pueblo Rico, Condoto and Atrato.

Mexican villagers put crime suspects on trial

Some 500 residents of various districts of the western state of Guerrero began on 31 January their own trial of over 50 suspects held in preceding weeks for alleged criminal activities in the surrounding Costa Chica sector, the review Proceso reported. The trial, which state authorities have more or less denounced as illegal, was organized by "community authorities" of the ethnic population of the districts of Florencio Villarreal, Ayutla de los Libres, Tecoanapa and San Marcos, and fruit of a self-defence movement that emerged in early January as residents armed themselves to fight rampant crime. About 250 people attending the first session were armed. They listened to the presentation of the purported defendants in a three-hour event held in hills outside the town of Ayutla; a second session was to be held on 22 February in the district of Tecoanapa, Proceso reported. The gathering also heard members of the Community Police explain the recent history of popular mobilization locally; a founder of the Community Police the priest Mario Campos Hernández, explained that the people was restoring order where the state had failed. He alluded to suspected collusion between some authorities and criminals, which was presented as a cause of this virtual uprising. The head of the Union of Peoples and Organizations of the State of Guerrero (UPOEG) Bruno Plácido Valerio separately denied that state authorities had retaken control of the district of Ayutla and insisted locals would not disarm until they had eliminated crime locally. It is by no means exceptional in Mexico to suspect collusion between authorities and criminals. Most recently the former mayoress of Lerdo in the northern state of Durango placed a notice in a daily accusing a local leader of her party - the conservative National Action Party (PAN) - of associating with criminals. Maria del Rosario Castro Lozano published her charges in El Sol de Durango against the PAN coordinator in Lerdo, Raúl Villegas Morales. She declared she informed the party's National Executive Committee of this in October 2012 but was ignored, Proceso reported on 30 January. How she asked can "we demand that the...governor" of Durango to "clean the state of traffickers when the head of...the PAN in Lerdo has links?"

Colombian hostages freed, six guerrillas killed

Three oil-sector contractors kidnapped in southern Colombia on 30 January were abandoned by their captors the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) on 31 January after these were pursued by the army and plain-clothes agents, Caracol radio reported, citing army declarations. The head of the Army's Sixth Brigade General Germán Giraldo told Caracol on 31 January that the FARC left the two engineers and a topographer in the locality of Fragüita in the southern Caquetá department, apparently to maintain their own mobility. President Juan Manuel Santos said that day speaking in Cartagena de Indias, that authorities had information that two policemen believed kidnapped by the FARC on 25 January were alive, and efforts were underway to rescue them. He said the FARC were mistaken if they believed they could pressure the state into ending its military actions with kidnappings, and vowed Colombia would end its war with the FARC "one way or another," the broadcaster Caracol reported. He thus rejected again the FARC's calls for a bilateral ceasefire; Colombia did not accept he said, proposals to "regulate this war or humanize it," or any "transaction." The Defence Ministry also confirmed an earlier Air-Force communiqué on the deaths at an unspecified date of a FARC chieftain and five guerrillas during bombardments in north-western Colombia. The Defence Minister Juan Carlos Pinzón told Caracol radio that one of the dead was identified as Juan Carlos Arango - Jacobo Arango - the commander of the FARC's Fifth Front and Northwestern Block. He was killed when the Air Force bombarded a camp in the Nudo de Paramillo locality in the department of Antióquia. Police and navy personnel separately caught on 31 January two suspects provisionally identified as extortionists for the FARC; they were found with explosives in the south-western district of Tumaco, the Defence Ministry stated.

Mexican parties reach registration deadline

January 31 was the deadline for political groups to inform Mexico's Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) of their intention to become formal political parties, and this was reportedly done by an unprecedented 26 groupings including MORENA, the formation led by the veteran Leftist Andrés Manuel López Obrador. The IFE was now to consider their applications over a year and a half on the basis of legal requisites including having or mustering in that period at least 220,000 party militants and organizing at least 20 state gatherings with 3,000 participants or 200 district assemblies with 300 attending, La Jornada reported. Another requirement was that from January or February all expenses must be reported, presumably to the IFE. The daily observed that several parties were struck off the parties register this year for their inability to meet legal requisites, including the Social Democratic Party and the Authentic Party of the Mexican Revolution.

Four Colombian soldiers killed fighting rebels

Four soldiers were reported killed and two wounded in a gun fight with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in the south-eastern department of Nariño late on 30 January, while the FARC and state representatives were to resume peace talks in Havana on 31 January. The soldiers were killed when rebels fired on a patrol in the Puerto Sánchez locality of the district of Policarpa, amid ongoing army operations in southern Colombia, El Espectador and the broadcaster Caracol reported. The same day the FARC were thought to have kidnapped three oil-sector contractors in the district of Piamonte in the southern Cauca department, although this had yet to be verified. This followed the FARC's kidnapping of two policemen on 25 January and their recent declaration that they would resume hostage-taking. The engineers were stopped on a road by armed elements outside the district capital, Caracol reported. The National Association of the Kidnapped and Disappeared (Asociación Nacional de Secuestrados y Desaparecidos), a civic body, has stated its conviction that the FARC retained as captives "at least" 20 soldiers and policemen in spite of declaring in February 2012 that it had freed all servicemen. The broadcaster RCN La Radio cited its spokesman Rafael Mora as saying "we are certain that about 20 members of the military remain in the FARC's hands...we have documented data with the complaints and all the information needed in this case to show that the FARC still hold them." That is if they had not been murdered or had not died: RCN cited the mother of the sergent William Gómez Cabrera, reported as kidnapped in 2004 in the southern district of Teteyé, as saying that she had been "told" he was a killed a year later but had no reliable news. "I need to be told the truth. If they murdered him, they should tell me where they left him, where his remains are," she was cited as saying.

Locals form own police in western Mexico

Disgusted with crime and the apparent impotence of authorities, communities in Mexico's crime-ridden western coast are increasingly arming themselves and turning to "community policing," with the implicit approval of local mayors but prompting concern among state officials. The daily Crónica reported on 31 January on 150 members of a "community police" force being "sworn in" before municipal representatives in Florencio Villarreal in the state of Guerrero; these were to patrol 20 nearby localities or districts considered crime hot spots. The local force consisted of local residents and affiliates of the Union of Peoples and Organisations of the State of Guerrero (Unión de Pueblos y Organizaciones del Estado de Guerrero, UPOEG), elected in village assemblies. Organizers said such militias were legal pursuant to Article 39 of the Constitution; they were in any case a measure of public fear and anger at how extortion or kidnapping seemed to continue unchecked in Guerrero and especially in this area, called the Costa Chica. A municipal official attending the ceremony said the mayor of Florencio Villarreal was in favour of such self-defence initiatives, Crónica reported. In another village in Guerrero, Ayutla de los Libres, the community was reportedly to "put on trial" on 31 January 30 individuals held in preceding weeks for suspected ties to organized crime. The Governor of Guerrero Ángel Aguirre Rivero urged the local groups on 29 January to respect the law while appreciating their desire "to help" with security; the head of UPOEG Bruno Plácido Valerio declared in response that crime had "overwhelmed" authorities in Guerrero and society was now "replacing" them for it, "assuming that sovereignty resides in the people not the representatives of institutions," Proceso reported on 30 January. Plácido said self-defence was not illegal, while authorities had failed to assure citizens' security; "it is they who should be judged and sanctioned for being indolent and negligent in the face of crime," he said.

Colombian rebels vow to pursue kidnapping

Politicians in Colombia were indignant at the declaration by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) that they "reserved the right" to kidnap members of the armed forces as before, in spite of ongoing peace talks with the Colombian state. The FARC's negotiating team in Havana issued a communiqué or posted one on the website Twitter, referring to hostages as "prisoners of war" who had surrendered to them, though apparently they stated they would not kidnap for ransom, El Espectador and the broadcaster Caracol reported on 30 January. The FARC's announcement apparently did not mention the two policemen kidnapped by them on 25 January. Colombia's Vice-President Angelino Garzón said the FARC were "challenging" the talks with their announcement and said the government should consider the conditions in which it was talking to the FARC. He said Colombia was able in any case to end the insurgency by military means, Caracol reported. The state's chief negotiator at the talks Humberto de la Calle Lombana likewise urged the FARC "to say once and for all at the conversations table if they want peace, but do not waste the government's and Colombians' time," qualifying the two policemen as hostages, not prisoners, El Espectador reported on 30 January. Colombia's former conservative president Álvaro Uribe Vélez, a critic of the peace talks from the start, accused the government of effectively legitimizing the FARC by talking to them. He told a radio program that "what the government is doing with this policy is to authorise kidnapping," RCN La Radio reported. It was nonsense he said to discuss land tenure with the FARC when these he alleged were the main agents depriving people of their lands; "they validate the FARC as prophets of the land," he said. "Fierce fighting" was separately reported on 29 January between troops and the FARC, in the southern districts of La Unión Peneya and Puerto Asís; the army killed three guerrillas and captured four while four soldiers were injured, Caracol television reported.

Deputy-mayor, city official shot dead in Honduras

Gunmen shot dead the deputy-mayor of La Ceiba on the Caribbean coast of Honduras on 29 January, the police reported. Authorities were investigating the motives for the killing of Ángel Salinas, Guatemala's Prensa Libre reported. Dailies noted that three mayors were killed before Salinas in the period from June 2012. These were the mayor of La Labor in the western Ocotepeque department, killed on 18 June, the mayor of Dolores in Ocotepeque, killed on 4 December and the mayor of the central town of Esquías, gunned down with three others on 19 January, Proceso Digital reported  Another municipal official gunned down on 28 January was identified as the head of Purchases and Supplies for the municipality of El Progreso in the department of Yoro. José Rolando Girón Mirada was executed apparently soon after he left his home to go to work, in spite of pleading for mercy while clutching a Bible, Tiempo reported, citing witnesses. Three people including a 12-year-old were separately shot dead on 29 January in the districts of Choloma and Villanueva in the northern department of Cortés, La Prensa reported, while three were reported killed in Tegucicalpa on the night of 28-29 January. One was a taxi driver who had failed to pay extortion money, Tiempo reported.

Over 20 reported killed, found dead in Mexico

The review Proceso put the death toll from presumed criminal incidents in Mexico from late 28 January through 29 January at 16; the dead included suspected criminals, policemen, unidentified civilians and an 11-year-old girl, earlier reported as kidnapped and found dead in the district of Tecomán in the western state of Colima. Five others were found in ditches or makeshift graves that day in the north-central state of Zacatecas, in the districts of Noria de Ángeles and Sombrerete, Proceso reported on 29 January. The number excluded the group of musicians kidnapped early on 25 January in the northern state of Nuevo León and whose bodies were found days later on an estate. Seventeen members of Kombo Kolombia were now believed to have been massacred, while police were interrogating one survivor to find out about the conditions and motives of the killings, Proceso reported. Separately authorities arrested on 29 January 24 people including 14 foreign nationals, described as forming an extortion and kidnapping gang that operated in northern Mexico; the gang called itself Defenders of Christ, Proceso reported. The group, headed by a Venezuelan who arrived in Mexico as a tourist in 2006, reportedly operated in the northern district of Torreón and the north-eastern district of Nuevo Laredo near the US frontier. The suspects were detained on a road between Nuevo Laredo and Monterrey, after relatives of their victims gave information to police.

Pacific block to lift tariffs on most goods

Chile, Peru, Colombia and Mexico, member states of the Pacific Alliance trading block, were to agree before 31 March on removing tariffs on 90 per cent of their traded products and gradually reduce tariffs on remaining goods and services after that, Chile's President Sebastian Piñera announced in Santiago de Chile on 27 January. The four states' presidents were attending the summit of Latin American States and the EU (Cumbre Celac-EU) concluding that day. The states were also to set rules to define the origins of traded products and regulate access to their markets and investment flows. Piñera said the block was the "most important and profound integration process in Latin American history." The annual value of exportations was placed at USD 500 billion and the four countries currently provided a market of some 215 million people, the website peru21 reported. The Alliance formed in 2011, is to hold a summit in Cali in 2014. Beside the four members several states have the status of Observers; Costa Rica was reportedly to become the next member. Separately Colombia and Peru signed a free trade agreement with the European Union expected to enter into force in the first half of 2013, Peru21 reported. This has been ratified in Peru and is to be ratified in Colombia.

Musicians' bodies found in northern Mexico

Four or five of 12 bodies found "so far" in a ditch or well on an estate near Mina in the northern state of Nuevo León were reported on 28 January as belonging to the musical band Kombo Kolombia, whose 18 or 20 members were likely kidnapped by criminals early on 25 January, the state's security affairs spokesman Jorge Domene Zambrano declared. One of the victims was Colombian. Police were investigating the motives for the killing, although media were already speculating this could have been a punishment meted out to the band by one gang or cartel for having performed for a rival gang, Milenio reported. The bodies indicated the victims had been stripped, tortured and shot. Separately, two unidentified "civilians" were killed on 28 January in a shootout between soldiers and gunmen in the district of Lagunillas in Michoacán, west of Mexico City; firing began when troops arrived at the locality of El Correo after residents had called authorities to report the presence of armed men, Milenio reported. Three suspected criminals were killed the same day in the north-central city of Zacatecas when presumed rivals stopped their car and shot them, Milenio reported.

Colombian ministry reports drug arrests, equipment found

The Colombian Defence Ministry reported on 28 January arrests and confiscation of equipment it said were significant blows against regional drug trafficking. Three leading members of a trafficking ring active in the San Andrés Archipelago and thought to have sent drugs to Central America, Mexico and the United States were held on or after 20 January, the Ministry stated. They were believed to have ties with one of the country's big gangs, the Rastrojos, and faced possible trafficking and murder charges. The navy also found and confiscated at an unspecified date, communication equipment thought to belong to another gang, the Urabeños, in two sites in the western department of Chocó. These included radios, GPS equipment and related items used to direct boats on the high seas, as well as guns and bullets, found under houses in Charambirá and Togoromá in the Litoral de San Juan district, the Defence Ministry stated on 28 January.

Mexico to change ambassadors in Cuba, Canada

Mexico was to recall two ambassadors sent to Cuba and Canada by the previous conservative government and replace them with appointees closer to the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) and its foreign policy postures that included better ties with Cuba's communist regime. The Leftist former governor of the state of Michoacán Lázaro Cárdenas Batel was to become ambassador in Cuba, replacing Gabriel Jiménez Remus, while a veteran diplomatist and former deputy-foreign minister Julián Ventura Valero would replace Francisco Barrio as ambassador in Canada, La Jornada reported on 28 January. The daily observed that good ties with Cuba characterised the foreign policy of PRI governments and that these deteriorated in the presidencies of Vicente Fox and Felipe Calderón of the National Action Party. Cárdenas is a member of the Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD) and son of its founder, the former Mexico City mayor Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas Solórzano; his grandfather was Lázaro Cárdenas del Río, President in 1934-40. In spite of initial protests against the 2012 general-election results and allegations of fraud against the PRI, the PRD has moved closer to the new government and signed the Pact for Mexico proposed by the PRI, designed to ease legislation. La Jornada cited unnamed foreign ministry sources as describing the appointment as a "gesture of friendship" to Cuba. Media carried pictures of a meeting in Santiago de Chile on 27 January between President Enrique Peña Nieto and Cuba's Raul Castro Ruz, on the sidelines of the summit of Latin American states and the EU. Unspecified sources cited by La Jornada stated that Mr Castro congratulated President Peña at the meeting on the PRI's return to power in 2012 and observed Cuba had had better relations with Mexico when the PRI governed; the PRI and Cuba's current regime coincided from the 1960s to 2000.

Forty killed in violence around Mexico

At least 40 were reported killed or found dead in violent incidents around Mexico on 24-28 January, including armed criminals, cartel operatives, policemen and eight folk singers who were apparently "tortured" then shot. Six victims were reported as gunned down in the central state of Hidalgo on 25-26 January in two killings police provisionally attributed to the cartel Caballeros Templarios, Proceso reported. The review reported 11 killings in several states on 24-25 January, including of a policeman shot while eating by a food stall and a member of the Sinaloa drug cartel. The gangster was killed by municipal police during response to a car theft in Juárez in the northern state of Chihuahua; he was identified as number 11 in the cartel's hierarchy, Proceso reported on 25 January. The policeman was identified as police chief of the village of Tlajomulco de Zúñiga in the western state of Jalisco. Five at least were reported shot dead on 26 January in or near the districts of Ocampo and Ciudad Juárez in Chihuahua. One was a 19-year-old gunman killed by soldiers during an attempted highway robbery and another a policeman of Ciudad Juárez, Proceso reported. Seven suspected criminals were killed on 25 or 26 January as gunmen in cars traded fire on the road between Magdalena and Tequila in the western state of Jalisco, Proceso reported, citing Notimex. Troops shot dead three presumed gangsters early on 27 January, apparently responding to firing from a house in Fresnillo in the north-central state of Zacatecas; the patrol had arrived after authorities received calls there were armed men in the house. The bodies of eight members of the musical group Kombo Kolombia kidnapped days before were found on 28 January on an estate in the district of Mina in the northern state of Nuevo León; The group, whose members were numbered in reports at 16 or 20, was thought to have been kidnapped on the night of 24-25 January in the nearby district of Hidalgo as it prepared to play a concert, Milenio reported on 28 January.

Seventeen reported killed around Colombia

Four were reported shot dead on a road in the northern department of Antioquia on 27 January, while 10 people were reported killed in brawls or criminal incidents in Bogotá on 26-27 January. Police were investigating to find out if the four, found shot outside El Bagre in the district of Zaragoza, had been killed by criminals or guerrillas, RCN La Radio reported. Coroners in Bogotá separately reported 10 violent deaths in the capital on the night of 26-27 January, which apparently belied the city's declining trend in violent crime. Seven of these were killed by gunfire and three with knives or similar implements, RCN radio reported. The mayor of Bogotá Gustavo Petro said on 25 January that homicides decreased in January 2013 compared to January 2012 - from 16 to 12 per 100,000 inhabitants. Bogotá would become a "peaceful space" he said if the trend continues, Caracol radio reported. In the northern district of Sincelejo, three were shot dead at a family gathering on 26 or 27 January, when gunmen entered a house and began to "shoot indiscriminately," Caracol television reported. Police were separately reported to have detained dozens of suspected criminals in northern Colombia; the national police chief José Roberto León Riaño declared that 27 suspected drug traffickers were detained in Riohacha and Cartagena de Indias on the Caribbean coast, Caracol radio reported on 26 January. This followed the recent discovery in Cartagena of just under four tonnes of cocaine hidden in a container. León separately announced the arrests of 22 suspected extortionists in Cartagena; the suspects presented themselves to local businesses as members of major criminal gangs - presumably to frighten their victims - Caracol reported on 26 January.

Two policemen kidnapped in Colombia

Two policemen were kidnapped on 25 or 26 January by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in a district in the Valle del Cauca department east of the city of Cali, media reported. The two were kidnapped while investigating reports of extortion and criminal activity in the locality of La Granja between the districts of Florida and Pradera; apparently they unexpectedly met with members of the Gabriel Galvis Mobile Column of the FARC's Sixth Front, El Espectador reported on 26 January, citing the Cali newspaper El País. The broadcaster Caracol reported the policemen to be alive; the FARC kidnapped an engineer in the same area that day, though he was released hours later. On 26 January President Juan Manuel Santos urged the international community to maintain support for ongoing peace talks with the FARC, speaking after meeting with the French Prime Minister in Santiago de Chile. They met on the sidelines of the summit of Latin American and the EU. He said the state would maintain "pressures" on the FARC before an agreement was signed.

Gang members surrender to troops in Colombia

Fifteen members of the Urabeños, one of Colombia's main criminal gangs, surrendered at an unspecified date to the navy in the district of Pilizá on Colombia's Pacific coast, El Espectador reported on 25 January. The group, led by a gangster dubbed El Tigre, apparently decided to surrender together, arriving at a meeting point in two boats that also carried seven women and 13 children or teenagers; these were perhaps relatives being taken under protection. The group was taken to Quibdó, capital of the Chocó department; arms and ammunition were also confiscated. The navy has stated that some 40 members of criminal gangs were detained on Colombia's Pacific coast in January 2013.

Thirteen killed around Mexico, six found in pieces

Thirteen people were reported killed or found dead on 24 January in criminal executions and shootouts with police around Mexico. Six of these were found dismembered in 15 plastic bags left in a car in the city of Toluca in the State of Mexico, a day after five bodies were found there in similar conditions, Proceso reported. A message was left apparently addressed to the authorities, and reportedly signed by one of the cartels the Familia Michoacana. Other victims included: two suspected drug dealers shot in a gun fight with police in the west-coast resort of Acapulco, and a police officer from the western district of Quitupan, shot by gangsters who pursued his car on a road near the frontier between the states of Jalisco and Michoacán. Separately the northern districts of Gómez Palacio and Lerdo were apparently without preventive or uniformed policemen after 81 resigned following their temporary detention and interrogation over suspected ties to criminals, CNN reported on 24 January, citing declarations by the Prosecutor's office of the state of Durango wherein are the districts. Other media had reported 91 resignations; this was in any case for the policemen's refusal to sit confidence or probity tests and undergo re-training ordered by the chief prosecutor of Durango, Sonia de la Garza. Nine policemen agreed to sit the tests, CNNMéxico reported.

Over 40 gangsters held in El Salvador over murders

State prosecutors in El Salvador announced on 23 January the arrests of 33 members of the M-18 gang for their suspected roles in beheading three youngsters in the eastern Izalco district last October, while eight other members of M-18 were arrested for their suspected roles in killing five rivals in the southern port of La Libertad in September. The head of the homicides office at the state prosecution service (Unidad Especial Antihomicidios Fiscalía General de la República) Óscar Torres said that the arrests had netted half or more of the members of the M-18's "Southern" line or faction, thought responsible for multiple crimes in Izalco in the Sonsonate department north-east of San Salvador. The 33 were suspected of taking part in the kidnapping, interrogation and murder with machetes of three youngsters aged between 17 and 21, on an estate on 11 October, the website elsalvador.com reported on 24 January. The daily El Mundo noted that the victims were suspected of being members of a rival gang, though state investigators later dismissed this. Eight other members of M-18's Southern line were also arrested for the murder on 18 September of five rivals in the Pacific port of La Libertad; officials have reportedly arrested more than 20 in relation with that incident. The victims, purported members of a rival faction in M-18, were aged between 13 and 18 and included a 16-year-old girl. The gang chief who ordered the killing first phoned to ask permission from his boss, currently serving a sentence in a prison west of the capital, elsalvador.com reported on 24 Januuary. He called from the home of a policeman who was also a member of the M-18 and was arrested in early October. Gang violence has reportedly declined in El Salvador since a ceasefire began in March 2012; instructions given out by imprisoned gang chiefs that violence stop among members may have been the reason for seeking approval before this killing.

European officials visit Peru for business

Peru's President Ollanta Humala Tasso received European delegations in Lima on 24 January including Spain's Prime Minister, presenting his increasingly prosperous country as a stable setting for more investments, El Peruano reported. The newspaper noted that Spain is the premier foreign investor in Peru with investments worth some USD five billion, but was also a market in 2011 that received over USD two billion's worth of Peruvian exports. Spain was currently in recession with just under six million Spaniards unemployed. At a press conference Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy urged Peruvian businessmen to "explore" Spain for business opportunities, Europa Press reported. El Peruano cited a study by the Andean Parliament indicating that currently 40 per cent of Peruvians living in Madrid wished to return home and 36 per cent were unemployed, without specifying how many they were. The study estimated 130,000 Peruvians lived in Spain. The European Commission's Vice-President for Industry and Enterprise Antonio Tajani was also in Lima that day, heading a delegation of representatives of some 40 EU firms visiting Peru and Chile on 22-26 January. The trip was to help EU firms expand their activities into emerging markets like Peru. After a meeting at the foreign ministry, Tajani said the EU considered Peru as "one of the most important" of countries for its lack of protectionism and the legal security of investments.

Venezuelan officials discern plotting by "Far Right"

The Venezuelan Interior Minister warned vaguely on 24 January that the country's "extreme Right" and foreign accomplices were plotting against senior state officials and that security agencies had been alerted; he was one of several officials who echoed allegations made the day before by the Vice-President Nicolás Maduro Moros that "infiltrators" were plotting possibly to kill him and the parliamentary Speaker Diosdado Cabello Rondón. The country's director of public prosecutions (Fiscal-general) warned that the state would take "necessary actions" against elements who would "destabilize" Venezuela in the absence of the President Hugo Chávez Frías. Chávez is said to be recovering from cancer surgery in Havana, although Liberal and conservative opponents have criticized his prolonged absence and the Maduro government's refusal to provide information on his state. The Interior Minister Néstor Reverol denounced the "plotters" for calling Maduro and Cabello "bus driver" and "little lieutenant," presumably in a bid to discredit them publicly or on the Internet. Cabello was in the army and Maduro a bus driver as a young man, though it was not clear if the nicknames were a part of the plots. "Yesterday it was necessary to report another destabilizing plan by the Venezuelan extreme Right in complicity with actors of the far Right abroad," El Universal cited Reverol as saying. He told the Governor of the state of Miranda, the former presidential aspirant Henrique Capriles, to stop talking about crime in the country seeing as "Miranda is the entity with most criminal incidents in all the country...homicides increased 65 per cent in your administration, robbery increased 35 per cent...kidnapping 480 per cent. And you are talking about security policies?" Capriles is the governor of Miranda since 2008. The higher-education minister Yadira Córdova suggested on state television that day that "destabilizing plans" may take the form of student protests. The head of the Public Ministry - the state prosecution service - Luisa Ortega Díaz in turn told radio that the Ministry had named a prosecutor to investigate the plot against the "physical integrity" of Maduro and Cabello by "sectors" she said "disrespect" officials and "seek to destabilize" Venezuela, the broadcaster Globovisión reported. Vice-President Maduro arrived in Havana on 24 January to visit the President and seek "decisions" on unspecified issues, Europa Press reported.

Army shoots gunmen, dozens killed around Mexico

Mexican troops shot dead five gunmen or gang suspects near Ciudad Victoria in the north-eastern state of Tamaulipas on 22 or 23 January, Proceso reported on 23 January; these were among at least 28 fatalities related to crime and related incidents reported for 21-23 January. The shootout occurred in the district of Lleras or Llera de Canales south of Victoria where the suspects were said to have set fire to several houses. Early on 23 January five bodies were found "in 10 plastic bags" in the district of Toluca, capital of the central Estado de México, Proceso reported. Messages were left beside them for the state governor Eruviel Ávila and the police. Police also found the bodies of two women shot dead in the northern district of Coahuila on 23 January, with an unharmed baby next to them, and those of two women and a man in a flat in Sinaloa in the state of Sinaloa, Proceso reported on 23 January. The review reported six killings including of two policemen on 22 January. The two were a female member of the roads police shot dead in the northern district of Chihuahua, and a police detective shot dead in the southern state of Oaxaca, Proceso reported. Three men were also reported shot dead in the northern district of Torreón late on 21 January. Marines were meanwhile sent to the district of La Laguna in the northern state of Durango, to help police curb crime in several districts of that state and the neighbouring state of Coahuila where Torreón is located. Also, 91 of 158 policemen detained earlier and questioned in the state of Durango over suspected links to crime were released 72 hours later for lack of evidence against them, while 64 or 65 were to be questioned further, the chief prosecutor of Durango declared on 22 January. Milenio reported that the 91 later resigned their positions and were negotiating their severance pays with their respective municipalities. Four unspecified "public servants" were formally ordered arrested, the prosecutor's office stated, though it was not clear if these were among the 158, while a court prolonged the provisional detention of 64 or 65, Proceso reported.

Police find tonnes of US-bound Colombian cocaine

Colombian police found at an unspecified date just under four tonnes of cocaine hidden in one or more containers in the Caribbean port of Cartagena and described as ultimately bound for the United States, the Defence Ministry and El Espectador reported on 22 January. The daily cited Colombia's police chief as saying that port inspectors became suspicious of one or more containers after noting discrepancies in their documentation, which prompted a close inspection. The containers were described as carrying a liquid pharmaceutical product inside "flexitanks" - large, resistant bags - which scrutiny and scanning revealed as containing also 3,826 packets of cocaine chlorhydrate, a refined substance. The Defence Ministry stated that investigations indicated these were being shipped by the Colombian gang Los Urabeños and destined for the Mexican cartel The Zetas; it observed the Urabeños likely lost some USD 95 million with the confiscation while the load would have become 10 million doses sold by street dealers in the United States.

Homicides continued unchecked in Honduras in 2012

Honduras remained one of the world's most murderous countries in 2012 as its homicide rate remained steady and very high over 2011-12, a university-related body found; observers expressed disappointment at the government's apparent failure to curb violent crime. Expressed as a rate per 100,000 inhabitants, homicides declined slightly from 86.5 in 2011 to 85.5 in 2012, according to a table compiled on 16 January by the Observatorio de la Violencia, a body affiliated to the National Autonomous University of Honduras (UNAH). This may have been for a population increase, for homicides increased in this period from 7,014 to 7,172, El Heraldo reported, citing the Observatorio. There were slight differences with figures earlier reported for 2011. El Heraldo observed that the rate rose some 20 points in the presidency of Porfirio Lobo Sosa, a conservative who took office on 27 January 2010, from a rate then of 66.8/100,000. Presumably based on the Observatorio's accumulated figures, it counted 20,513 violent deaths over 1,095 days of the current presidency. Cited in terms of its daily frequency, the homicide rate in 2012 was 19.65 - meaning almost 20 people were killed around Honduras each day - compared to 19.47 for 2011. The daily also noted: the vast majority of such fatalities in 2012 - 6,565 - was among men while more than a quarter of all reported homicides since January 2010 occurred in the northern department of Cortés. The departmental capital San Pedro Sula is reported as one of the most violent cities in the world. The government's anti-crime measures have included placing security cameras around the capital, and moves to purge the police force of corrupt or criminal members.

Travel increased in Colombia in 2012

The flow of travel in and out of Colombia increased 17.7 per cent in 2012 compared to 2011, with over 1.4 million more people legally entering and leaving the country at all entry points, El Espectador reported on 19 January, citing figures given by the state migration office. Travellers were numbered at a little over 9.44 million in 2012, just over 1.42 million more than in 2011 and representing the largest number in decades, the Foreign Ministry's Migración Colombia declared. Its head Sergio Bueno Aguirre was reported as saying that just over six million of the travellers were Colombians, and their favoured destinations in numerical terms were the United States (979,230 went there in 2012) Venezuela (475,007), Panama, Ecuador, Spain (187,469) and Mexico (134,748). Migración stated that just under 1.7 million foreigners entered Colombia in 2012, 65.4 per cent of them being tourists. The main groups among these consisted of citizens of the United States (327,721), followed by those of Venezuela (251,475), Ecuador, Argentina, Spain (94,910) and Peru. The capital Bogotá hosted most foreign visitors (907,815) in 2012, followed by the Caribbean resort of Cartagena de Indias (206,846), Medellín (166,407) and Cali (112,313). If travel were an indicator of Colombia's increasing security and prosperity, rising property prices in the capital were another. Colombia's Central Bank observed a 5.1 per-cent year-on-year rise in property prices in Bogotá in the third quarter of 2012, La República reported on 21 January. Observers of the housing market told the daily that while the capital was not for now the setting of a speculative housing bubble, demand for housing currently exceeded supply.

Colombian guerrillas renew attacks, end ceasefire

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) ended their two-month ceasefire on 20 January by bombing power installations in the southern department of Putumayo and exchanging fire with police in several parts of the country. The ceasefire, declared but not strictly respected by the FARC, was intended to act as a fillip to ongoing peace talks with the Colombian government. The broadcaster Caracol reported attacks on a pipeline and a power pole that provoked an oil spill in the former case and a temporary blackout in the latter in three districts of western Putumayo. The police also said they exchanged fire with the FARC that day in the locality of El Placer in that department, Europa Press reported. A police helicopter was fired on by suspected FARC guerrillas just before the end of the ceasefire on 19 January, in the south-western district of Jambaló in the Cauca department. Caracol television showed police firing back with a machine gun from the helicopter, which was taking police reinforcements to the district of Jambaló. The Cauca's police chief Ricardo Alarcón told Caracol that police were re-trained and "exhaustively" prepared for renewed guerrilla actions at the end of the ceasefire; the broadcaster reported that more than 250 policemen were sent to reinforce security in districts in northern Cauca threatened by the FARC, namely Toribío, Jambaló, Caldono. In the northern department of Nariño, the FARC attacked a police station in the district of Tumaco, Caracol reported. Separately, state forces reportedly caught three suspects thought involved in the kidnapping of five mining employees in the department of Bolívar; the action was attributed to the National Liberation Army, the other communist guerrilla force in Colombia. President Juan Manuel Santos announced the captures at a Bogotá press conference on 20 January, observing that two of the detained were minors of unspecified age. He was speaking after an extraordinary security meeting to discuss the response to the end of the FARC ceasefire with the defence minister and army and police chiefs, the broadcaster Caracol reported.

Over 160 suspect policemen held in Mexico

Two police chiefs were among 158 policemen and police employees detained on 18 January in two districts of the north-central state of Durango, all suspected of aiding organized crime, the chief prosecutor of Durango announced. Sonia Yadira de la Garza Fragoso said 110 of the detained were district policemen of Lerdo and 48 of Gómez Palacio, Proceso reported. She said that initial questioning indicated the suspects had assisted criminals by means including providing information and protection or directly participating in criminal acts. In the eastern state of Veracruz, state and federal police detained at an unspecified date a gang of six suspected kidnappers including three policemen, involved in crimes in a zone that included Carlos A. Carrillo and Cosamaloapan, the districts where the policemen worked, Proceso reported on 18 January. A Public Security spokesman for Veracruz Ernesto González Quiroz said the public presentation of the criminal policemen showed "there is no space for impunity in Veracruz, and less so for those public servants obligated to protect citizens." The gang reportedly admitted when questioned to taking part in six kidnappings and acts of extortion and drug dealing. The website cited the Veracruz Public Security Secretary, who heads policing in the state, Arturo Bermúdez Zurita as saying on 18 January that some 2,500 policemen had been dismissed in the state since 2010 for failing "confidence" tests. Another official who vowed to crack down on police corruption on 18 January was Mexico's deputy-interior minister for Planning, Manuel Mondragón y Kalb, who appeared that day before the Senate Public Security Committee, Proceso reported. Mondragón, a former police chief of Mexico City, later told the press he would apply "zero tolerance for corruption, however far it goes, whatever the means and whenever it has to happen. I don't care what is said about this. When I fight corruption I will not tolerate or permit it." Mondragón said three "fundamental" sectors - Mexico's 15 federal prisons, the Federal Police and the police data gathering system (Plataforma México) - were currently undergoing operational scrutiny. Mondragón would head the National Public Security Council (CNSP), a policy-making organ, once approved by the Senate.

Over 20 shot, found dead around Mexico

Some 20 people were reported killed in executions or gun fights with state forces, or found dead around Mexico on 18-19 January, Proceso reported. These included: five suspected criminals killed in a shootout with police and the army on the night of 18-19 January in the north-western district of Mochis in the state of Sinaloa, and six shot dead by troops and police in the district of Puente Nacional in the east-coast state of Veracruz. Thousands of troops and federal policemen have been sent to Veracruz within the Veracruz Seguro operation, in a bid to curb a surge in organized crime there. The operation was recently extended to the Sotavento zone in the state that includes Puente Nacional, the district where troops reportedly came under fire late on 18 January, Proceso reported. The website reported the discovery in Estado de México of the bodies of three men apparently shot to death; they were found on 19 January by a road linking Toluca and Temascaltepec. In addition six bodies were discovered on 18 January in the states of Estado de México, Puebla and Morelos; one of the victims here was found cut into bits, and three in a state of "advanced" putrefaction in the district of Tochimilco in the state of Puebla. Six skeletons or the bones of six people, were found in a house in the west-coast district of Acapulco on 18 or 19 January, the daily El Universal reported.

El Salvador gangs to avoid violence in four districts

Mediators announced the start on 18 January of the second phase of a ceasefire between El Salvador's main criminal gangs, naming four districts as "sanctuary municipalities" that were to be gradually rid of violent crime in following days, Europa Press reported. The ceasefire began in March 2012 and officials believe it has significantly reduced violent crime in El Salvador. The municipalities were named by the army bishop and the former leftist guerrilla Raul Mijango who have been acting as mediators between the state and several gangs. In a communiqué issued on 19 January five gangs promised to respect the four sanctuaries and qualified this as part of a process "whose objective is to fully abandon all criminal activity." They also stated that they would continue to "disarm" and hand over weapons to "facilitators" of the Organization of American States, which is assisting the pacification process in El Salvador, Europa Press reported. They asked the government to design a legal framework for this disarmament. The statement was signed by the gangs MSX3, Barrio 19, Mao-Mao, Máquina and Mirada Locos, while the four districts due to become sanctuaries from violence were named as Santa Tecla, Sonsonate, Llopango and Quezaltepeque, the latter a reputed crime hot-spot, Europa Press reported. El Salvador's La Prensa Gráfica reported on 20 January that the gangs were prepared to extend the ceasefire to 18 other districts, adding however that they had made no commitment to discontinue extortion.

Guerrillas kidnap five in northern Colombia

Five or more people were reported kidnapped in northern Colombia early on 18 January, it was suspected by guerrillas of the left-wing National Liberation Army (ELN), Europa Press reported citing army declarations. The five were employees of a mining or energy company and apparently kidnapped by a group of 25 guerrillas in the southern part of Bolívar, a department whose territory reaches the Caribbean coast. President Juan Manuel Santos was reported as having written on the website Twitter that the army had reacted and the guerrillas were already "within its range." Colombian troops were reported earlier as fighting the ELN in the Boyacá department south of Bolívar, and Europa Press observed the kidnapping followed by a day a gunfight there that killed an ELN guerrilla. Separately Colombia's police chief José Roberto León Riaño was reported as declaring the same day that police thwarted a suspected bid by guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) to strike at targets in and outside Bogotá when a two-month ceasefire is to end on 20 January. The FARC declared the unilateral ceasefire last November to coincide with ongoing negotiations with Colombian representatives in Havana. Police discovered grenades and 250 kilograms of explosives as well as diagrams of several installations - the suspected targets - in an unspecified location in the district of La Palma north of Bogotá. León said the find indicated the FARC were planning to blow up three police and military academies in Bogotá and in the district of Sibaté south-west of Bogotá, the broadcaster Caracol reported.

Nineteen reported killed around Mexico

Nineteen people or perhaps more including children were reported killed or found dead, in cases dismembered or beheaded, in incidents around Mexico on 16-17 January, Proceso reported. Two of these were identified as aged 15 and 17 and found shot dead late on 16 January in the northern district of Torreón. The bodies of three other young men were found very late on 17 January in Estado de México, by a road linking Mexico City and Puebla. They had been shot dead, La Jornada reported on 18 January, the daily observed that in total 33 were reported killed in that state during 14-17 January. In the south-eastern state of Tabasco a body was found in a burned car and provisionally identified as belonging to the missing former mayor of the district of Paraíso, Cristóbal Javier Ángulo. A member of the left-wing Democratic Revolutionary Party, Ángulo was mayor from 2010 to 2012 and apparently last seen on 16 January when he drove out of Paraíso toward the city of Villahermosa, Proceso reported. Three suspected criminals were reported gunned down by troops and police in the eastern port of Veracruz. A conservative politician, his wife and three-year-old son were gunned down late on 17 January in the central state of Morelos. Ignacio Domínguez Carranza had been a mayoral candidate of the National Action Party for the district of Tlalquiltenango where he died when armed men fired "hundreds of times" on his home from a convoy of cars, Proceso reported. The state governor deplored the crime and wrote on the website Twitter that the culprits would be punished. The daily El Universal separately reported that a man was killed in Mexico City on 16 January as he resisted a car theft.

President insists security improving in Honduras

President Porfirio Lobo Sosa has insisted that security in Honduras, one of the world's most violent countries, had improved in spite of assertions to the contrary by domestic and foreign observers, the daily La Prensa reported on 16 January. He told pressmen in the capital Tegucicalpa that "everyone feels" security had improved in Honduras even if "there will always be problems," adding that curbing crime was not in any case the task of government. He said he hoped the next government would "keep going, keep working on the security theme and the citizenry has to participate too, everyone must make an effort." He contradicted comments made earlier by his Security Minister Pompeyo Bonilla Reyes who told a local radio station that 800 security cameras placed around the capital had stopped working as authorities owed the equivalent of some five million USD to the firm operating the cameras. Bonilla reportedly declared that the police radio-communication system was also about to be cut off; Lobo dismissed his comments as "a bit dramatic" and said the relevant firm had not "turned off" the capital's security cameras. The government was seeking ways to pay the firm's money, Lobo said. Some of Bonilla's comments were reported by the daily La Tribuna; he was cited as saying that cameras stopped working in early January, and blamed this on the government's cash shortage. According to La Prensa the government had a shortfall in revenues and state employees or some state employees in the health and education ministries but also the armed forces were not paid last December. It reported on 3 January that only about one tenth of a security tax imposed in 2012 to finance policing and security had been spent. The state collected some 857 million Honduran Lempiras (HNL), a little under USD 43 million, between April and 27 December 2012 but only about HNL 80 million had been spent so far, this by the Security Ministry. The tax brought in HNL 90 million in December alone, La Prensa reported. It cited the compaints of members of the business community dissatisfied with paying the tax as well as considerable amounts on private security.

Colombian troops kill guerrilla, arrest two

Troops shot dead a member of the National Liberation Army (ELN) in a gunfight on 15 or 16 January in the district of Pajarito north-east of the capital Bogotá, El Espectador reported. The daily stated that army operations were continuing in the area, in the department of Boyacá. One of the detained was described as a child or teenager of unspecified age, wearing a Colombian army uniform; he was handed over to child welfare authorities. Arms and ammunition were later confiscated.

Ten killed in Mexico, states to boost security

Ten were reported as found dead or gunned down in shootouts and executions around Mexico on 15-16 January. Five of these were killed in the north-eastern state of Tamaulipas, including two cartel suspects shot by the army in Ciudad Victoria. Two others found dead in that city had a written message by them presumably placed by their assassins, alleging they had earlier kidnapped and murdered an army captain. The army confirmed the officer was buried in Ciudad Victoria on 13 January. A message left by the body of another victim found in Ciudad Victoria on 16 January alleged that he had been killed for thieving; authorities suspected he was killed by the Zetas cartel. Other killings that day occurred in the states of Durango and Estado de México and in the west-coast district of Acapulco, Proceso reported. One of the dead was a 16-year-old found with his throat slit in the Valle de Chalco district in Estado de México. A recent surge in killings in Estado de México in central Mexico, prompted authorities to consider deploying troops in its more crime-ridden districts. On 16 January the state's chief prosecutor Miguel Ángel Contreras Nieto blamed the recent surge on a fight between two criminal groups the Familia Michoacana and Guerreros Unidos; their turf war had killed 25 in the preceding 72 hours he said. While there was no "security crisis" in the state he declared, state and federal authorities were discussing the option of deploying troops, Proceso reported. Separately the governor of the eastern state of Veracruz Javier Duarte de Ochoa said state police would take over security in the Sotavento region in the state and specifically the district of Úrsulo Galván following the disappearance of eight municipal policemen there, Proceso reported on 16 January. He was apparently speaking in Úrsulo Galván, whose authorities have asked the state to take over its security. Duarte said state police would be acting in the framework of the Veracruz Seguro operation that has boosted the presence of state forces including troops around the state of Veracruz. He called on residents in the Sotavento zone to remain calm, while citing the operation's possible expansion to more districts. The Veracruz Seguro plan has so far seen increased police and military presence principally in the Veracruz-Boca del Río conurbation on the coast and in several districts with greater criminal activity.

Six women killed in Guatemala

Six women including two girls aged six and 12 were killed or found dead in Ciudad de Guatemala and in the department of Zacapa north-east of the capital on 16 January, the daily Prensa Libre reported. The girls had apparently been strangled to death and were left on a street in their pyjamas at one in the morning. These were some of the victims of the steady trickle of crimes daily reported in Guatemala. On 15 January the mayor of the town of Jutiapa near the frontier with El Salvador was shot dead inside a barber's shop, Prensa Libre reported. The Interior Minister later declared he suspected the assassination to be the work of organized crime. Prensa Libre also reported on 15 January the shooting death of a businessman in the San Miguel Petapa district south of the capital; he was the brother of Rafael Eduardo González Rosales, mayor of San Miguel Petapa in 2008-12. The same day a bus passenger was shot dead by thieves who boarded a bus travelling between Guatemala City and Quezaltenango, Prensa Libre reported. The passenger had refused to hand over his belongings as asked.

Catholicism reported in decline in Nicaragua

A survey carried out in Nicaragua in December 2012 showed the relentless decline of Roman Catholicism in that country between 1991 and 2012 and rise of Protestant Christianity, even if Catholics remained the largest religious community, El Nuevo Diario reported on 16 January. The Nicaraguan firm M & R Consultores carried out the survey for the Public Opinion Monitoring System (Sistema de Monitoreo de Opinión Pública, Sismo), interviewing 1,600 Nicaraguans between 17 and 28 December; the results were said to have a 95-per-cent confidence level and a margin of error of +/- 2.5 per cent. Just over 52 per cent of respondents described themselves as Catholics, compared to the 90 per cent figure for 1991. The survey indicated 30 per cent of Nicaraguans to be Evangelical, while 14.1 per cent said simply that they were "believers" and 0.3 per cent, atheists. A comparative table of the figures obtained in 1991, 1995 and 2005 indicated that the four per cent of Nicaraguans who said they were Protestant Evangelicals in 1991 increased to 15.1 per cent in 1995, a year when Catholics had declined to just under 80 per cent of the population. The latest survey indicated there were more Catholics in cities and in the western part of Nicaragua, El Nuevo Diario reported.

Tourism, trade growing between Cuba and Peru

Cuba's ambassador in Peru put at 19,000 the number of Peruvians who visited her country in 2012, 34 per cent more she said than in 2011, Peru's official paper El Peruano reported on 16 January. Juana Martínez said she hoped some 25,000 Peruvians would visit in 2013. Bilateral trade however remained "reduced" she said, worth 16 million USD that year and consisting mostly of trade in pharmaceutical products, unspecified services and rhum. She added that the legal framework for increased exchanges and cooperation now existed within documents signed in Cuba during an undated but "recent" visit by President Ollanta Humala. She blamed the limited bilateral trade on sanctions the United States has imposed on Cuba. Peru's growing economy was increasingly creating a prosperous middle class with potentially the spending and travel habits of Europeans or North Americans. The economy was reportedly growing at a rate of six per cent or more; the investment firm BlackRock recently termed it the second Latin American country in terms of investment security, after Chile, El Peruano reported on 16 January.

Venezuela has a new foreign minister

Venezuela's bed-ridden President Hugo Chávez Frías appointed the former vice-president Elías Jaua Milano foreign minister on 15 January; the appointment was announced in parliament by the outgoing minister and acting president Nicolás Maduro, the state news agency AVN reported. Jaua who was also made vice-president for political affairs, told Venezuelan television that his "fundamental task" would be to defend and maintain Venezuela's "political stability and unity as well as Venezuela's independence, both on the internal front and the international front," AVN reported. The foreign ministers of Ecuador and Brazil were the first to congratulate him by telephone. The foreign ministry thanked them in a statement also confirming scheduled meeting in coming days between Jaua and the foreign ministers of Colombia and Ecuador, El Universal reported. The nomination was said to have been made by Chávez himself, whose signature was shown on the appointment published in the official gazette the next day, El Nacional reported. This seemed to corroborate declarations that his health was improving; the daily cited the Information Minister Ernesto Villegas as saying that he was "climbing back up the hill." The president underwent surgery for cancer the previous December.

General suspects Colombia's FARC arming amid talks

While negotiating peace with the Colombian government in Cuba, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) were thought to have "increased" arms purchases "since the peace process began," Spain's EFE reported on 13 January, citing remarks by the Ecuadorean general commanding troops on the frontier with Colombia. Brigadier-General Fernando Proaño Daza, commander of some 12,000 troops in northern Ecuador, told EFE by telephone that a makeshift "arms workshop" was found in a house on 9 January in the Salado district in the northern province of Imbabura, yielding handguns, ammunition, pieces and related fabrication tools. Proaño said that "since the peace process began, trafficking has increased. We have caught a large quantity of ammunition, armaments and what we can determine is that they made use of this situation to strengthen their situation anticipating what could happen in the future." The FARC declared a two-month ceasefire due to end on 20 January, and Colombian officials were expecting a resurgence of attacks after that. The arms found on 9 January were described as destined for illegal groups, which could include drug traffickers. Separately a former provincial legislator was cited on 10 January as saying that Colombia seemed to be negotiating with no more than 30 per cent of the FARC and that judging by recent clashes, certain FARC military "blocks" were absent at the talks. Sigifredo López, a former hostage of the FARC, said the "so-called south-western blocks" formerly led by the late FARC chiefs dubbed Alfonso Cano and Mono Jojoy were not participating "and the proof is that every day there are clashes in south-eastern and south-western Colombia," El Espectador reported. He did not elaborate. The FARC and government negotiators resumed peace talks in Havana on 14 January.

In days, over 70 reported killed around Mexico

Eight were reported killed or found dead on 15 January in separate incidents in the Mexican states of Coahuila, Estado de México and Chihuahua. Three of these were employees of the Mexican transport ministry reported as missing on 14 January in the northern city of Torreón in Coahuila; they were found dead the next day, apparently "tortured" before being killed, Proceso reported. The review reported the deaths of 41 people around Mexico between 11 and 14 January, including 19 killed in the capital in the 12-14 period. These apparently were distinct from 21 reported killed on 13-14 January in the northern states of Chihuahua and Nuevo León and Estado de México in central Mexico. Five of the dead here were suspected criminals shot by the army in the district of Cadereyta in Nuevo León, Proceso reported on 14 January. On 13 January two were gunned down while driving in the Caribbean island resort of Cozumel, in the state of Quintana Roo; the local governor promised an immediate inquiry and "zero tolerance" for crime on the island, Proceso reported. The same day a mother and her daugher of unspecified age were found shot dead in the district of Tlahualilo in the northern state of Durango, Proceso reported observing that the incident was amid two days of "extreme" violence in that part of the state. Mexico City's mayor reportedly declared on 13 or 14 January that the 19 killings registered in the capital on 12-14 January were unusual but unrelated to drug cartels, and overall security was "assured" in the city. Miguel Ángel Mancera, speaking in the capital, said authorities were investigating and "the instruction I have given very clearly is that there be no impunity...the important point here is that there will be no impunity." Some of the killings occurred in the districts of Iztapalapa and Gustavo A. Madero, where authorities have pursued a disarmament programme intended to reduce killings, Proceso observed.

Almost 40 killed, found dead around Mexico

Some 38 people were reported to have been killed or found dead in presumed criminal incidents around Mexico in the 9-11 January period, Proceso reported on 10 and 11 January, describing the 11th as one of the most violent days since Enrique Peña Nieto's presidency began in December 2012. Eight victims were killed in the northern state of Chihuahua on the night of 10-11 January, while five were found in a mine shaft in the north-central district of Noria de Angeles. Two men and a woman were also shot early on 11 January in a house in Mexico City, considered one of the country's less crime-ridden areas. Late on 9 January, four men aged 18 to 25 were killed in and outside a house in the northern city of Monterrey. Three policemen were among the dead: one was shot dead in the northern city of Tijuana as he left work at six in the morning on 10 January and two the same day in Chihuahua, the capital of the northern state of Chihuahua, Proceso reported.

Mexico has new law to compensate crime victims

President Enrique Peña Nieto promulgated on 8 January a law to establish a system of state assistence and compensation for victims of crime in Mexico, agencies reported. The Victims Law or General Victims Law was ratified in April 2012 but blocked by the last president, Felipe Calderón; Peña Nieto promised when elected in 2012 to bring it to fruition. The law, due to enter into force 30 days after its promulgation, required local, state and federal authorities to aid crime victims by various means including with financial assistance for legal action taken by victims. Authorities assisting victims were to adjust their regulations and codes of practice to the law within seven months of its promulgation. The law's provisions would constitute a new National System of Attention to Victims, CNNMéxico reported on 10 January. This it added would likely replace the existing prosecutor's office attending to crime victims created in 2011 by the Calderón government, known as Províctima (Procuraduría Social de Atención a Víctimas de Delito). The broadcaster observed however that the system's challenge was to ensure its provisions were implemented by local authorities Mexicans often distrust when they do not suspect them of conniving with criminals. Jurists speaking to CNN welcomed the law as a first step toward better justice for crime victims.

Ten killed around Mexico, locals arm against criminals

Ten people were reported killed in presumed criminal incidents around Mexico on 8-9 January, including three gunned down in the northern district of Saltillo and four in the north-western district of Tijuana. Another victim was an employee of the baking firm Bimbo, shot dead while driving a delivery van in the north-western city of Culiacán, Proceso reported on 9 January. On 8 January, police found 10 tonnes of marijuana in a mechanical workshop in Tijuana in the state of Baja California, although stamps on the sealed packets indicated these had previously been confiscated by police or the army. Nobody was arrested and it was not immediately clear why the load was seemingly abandoned or stolen. A police revision that day apparently indicated the load had been confiscated days before in three parts. The drugs formerly owned by the Sinaloa cartel, were handed over to state prosecutors, Proceso reported. The review separately reported that 200 residents of the western district of Ayutla de los Libres have been armed since 5 January and set up road blocks in response to persistent crime. The locals were controlling circulation in and out of Ayutla and declared they would not disarm until criminals had left the area. The governor of Guerrero where Ayutla is located, Ángel Aguirre Rivero reportedly told local media on 8 January that the measure indicated "the citizenry's desperation before organized crime and the lack of response by authorities," Proceso reported. Residents of Ayutla and two nearby districts mobilized on 5 January when a local policeman was kidnapped; the official was rescued and the kidnappers reportedly fled.

Murder rate in Bogotá reported lowest in decades

Bogotá's police revealed on 5 January that there had been 1,281 registered homicides in the Colombian capital in 2012 compared to 1,654 in 2011, and the city now had the lowest homicide rate in decades, RCN La Radio reported. The 23-per-cent reduction corroborated other figures recently given out by authorities. Bogotá's police chief Luis Eduardo Martínez Guzmán said the homicide rate for the city of some seven million residents was now 16.9 per 100,000 inhabitants. This was one of the lowest in Latin America. By comparison Greater Caracas was recently found to have a homicide rate of 122/100,000 inhabitants. Bogotá's security affairs chief Guillermo Asprilla said the "figures show the most successful year" in security terms since 1985, and attributed this to police action and the mayor's policies to curb possession of arms. A measure of the significance of this figure was perhaps in its comparison with Bogotá's homicide rate in 1993 - at a time when communist guerrillas and drug cartels were most active and potent - which was 80.9 per 100,000 inhabitants. Separately President Juan Manuel Santos was to discuss the state of crime in Bogotá with cabinet ministers and members of the Bogotá municipality, at a security council to be held in the north-eastern district of Usaquén. The residential area, described in reports as usually quiet, was recently the setting of gun fights between members of a local drug gang. The security council would examine the homicide figures given by police, and issues including drug trafficking, extortion, and bullying and drug abuse in schools, RCN La Radio reported on 10 January. It was not immediately clear when the council would meet.

Colombian guerrillas say will not renew ceasefire

A spokesman for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) declared on 9 January that the guerrilla army would not renew a 60-day unilateral ceasefire due to end on 20 January, intended to facilitate ongoing peace talks with the government in Havana. The head of the FARC's negotiating team in Havana, the guerrilla dubbed Iván Márquez, said "there will be no extension of the unilateral ceasefire. So far we have not contemplated the possibility. The only possibility would be to sign a bilateral ceasefire," which the Colombian government has so far ruled out, El Espectador reported. He also expressed hope that Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez would soon recover from the cancer for which he was operated last December, so he could "continue to contribute to this peace process as he has done." Chávez was in hospital in Havana. Márquez said that thanks to the president's help "it was possible for this peace table to be held in Havana." Venezuela is thought to have considerable influence with the FARC.

Venezuelan court allows delayed presidential oath

The Constitutional Hall of the Supreme Court of Venezuela ruled on 9 January that the ailing President Hugo Chávez did not have to take the oath of office for another presidential term on 10 January as required - given his physical incapacity - and this was a formality not affecting the "administrative continuity" in the country. Chávez was re-elected as president last October but remains in hospital in Cuba following surgery for cancer last December; the country was being run by a cabinet headed by his vice-president and foreign minister, Nicolás Maduro. Parliament voted on 8 January to allow his absence during treatment, while opponents urged the Supreme Court to declare whether or not this was legal. The court's President Luisa Estella Morales Lamuño declared that while a new constitutional period began on 10 January, "another swearing-in as President-elect is not necessary as there is no interruption in exercising his office...this is a re-elected president, the...re-election is to do with approval of his management," El Universal reported. She said he was outside Venezuela "for his health," with parliament's permission and in keeping with Article 235 of the constitution; that article stipulates that parliament must authorise a presidential absence in Venezuela if this is for more than five days. She said there could be no date now for when Hugo Chávez would be sworn into office, but this would surely happen once he was cured of cancer.