Colombians debate land use, to aid peace talks

A three-day meet in Bogotá to gather Colombians' opinions on land use, and planned earlier to complement peace talks between the state and Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) concluded on 19 December with some 400 proposals to be sent to negotiators in Havana. The Forum on Integral Agrarian Development organized by Colombia's National University and the United Nations in Colombia, was attended by some 1,200 delegates from 15 civilian sectors nationwide. Opinions, compilled by UN rapporteurs, were to reach Havana before 8 January when negotiations were to resume. Land ownership is a key theme in negotiations. Spain's ABC newspaper observed on 20 December that a little over one cent of proprietors owned over 50 per cent of Colombian lands, and ownership had been a detonator of the ongoing conflict. One group absent at the forum however was the National Federation of Cattle Farmers (Federación Nacional de Ganaderos, Fedegan), whose president termed unhelpful the airing of numerous "antagonistic" positions on land use, ABC reported on 19 December citing news agencies. Another website cited the Fedegan president as saying that his association refused to condone "executioners," meaning the FARC. Colombia's President Juan Manuel Santos said in a radio interview that Fedegan's absence and failure to "at least send proposals" made "no sense," but admitted cattle farmers had suffered from guerrilla activities in past decades. The Fedegan's president he said, had "very clearly and from the start been critical of a rapprochement with the FARC," a posture he said was "valid."

Nicaragua convicts Mexican "pressmen" on drug charges

A Nicaraguan court convicted on drug-trafficking and related charges on 19 December 18 Mexicans detained on 20 August 2012 after they entered Nicaragua parading as employees of the Mexican broadcaster Televisa. Over nine million USD and cocaine traces were found in some of the six vehicles they drove displaying Televisa logos; Televisa has denied they were employees. The 18 were found guilty of drug trafficking, money laundering and membership of criminal organizations, CNN reported citing Mexico's Notimex. Prosecutors asked for the maximum 30 years sentence envisaged for the charges but the presiding judge Edgard Altamirano was to issue a sentence on 18 January 2013, Nicaragua's La Prensa reported. Toward the close of the trial on 18 December, police testimonies indicated that a woman identified as head of the group had repeatedly telephoned a number identified as belonging to a vice-president of Televisa, Spain's EFE reported. Members of the Economic Investigations Directorate at the Nicaraguan police testified that Raquel Alatorre Correa dialled a Mexican number, said to belong to Televisa's Amador García Estrada, between 25 July and 24 August. The group also carried letters apparently signed by García although Nicaraguan prosecutors were waiting for the executive to send them a sample signature in January for verification. EFE cited a prosecutor as saying that Televisa had formally asked Nicaraguan justice to investigate whether or not someone inside Televisa had signed  letters for the group.

Eight reported killed around Mexico, policemen sacked

Eight were reported killed in presumed criminal incidents around Mexico on 17-19 December, including a "Venezuelan model" and two policemen whose bodies were found in a burned vehicle, Proceso reported. The policemen were found in the district of Salvador Escalante in the western state of Michoacán; one of them it was thought could be the police chief of Santa Clara del Cobre, south-west of the city of Morelia in Michoacán. The brother of a prominent local businesswoman was also found dead in a ditch south of Morelia. On 17 December, four suspected kidnappers shot dead a businessman in the locality of Villa Seca outside Toluca de Lerdo in Estado de México, as he resisted being forced into a car. A 24-year-old girl identified as Venezuelan model Daysi Yeniree Ferrer Arenas, was found dead on 18 December in the western city of Guadalajara; she had been shot in the head three times. Authorities raised to 23 the number of deaths from rioting and a failed attempt on 18 December to break out of a prison in the state of Durango. The state's Public Security chief Jesús Antonio Rosso told Milenio newspaper that nine guards and 14 inmates had died in violence that erupted in the prison in Gómez Palacio. On 19 December, 125 policemen in the northern state of Coahuila were relieved of their duties and banned from working in the security sector after failing "confidence tests" designed to establish their probity and professionalism, the state's Public Security chief told Milenio Televisión. Many Mexican policemen have the worst reputation with the public, for suspected corruption and ties to criminals. Gerardo Villarreal said these could not be recruited elsewhere in Mexico and the state would decide whether or not more policemen would be dismissed in 2013.

Officials see fewer murders, crimes in Bogotá

Murders and "high impact" crimes were said to be continuing a downward trend in Bogotá, with a reported 29 per cent drop in homicides in November 2012 year-on-year, city officials declared on 13 December. There appeared to be 104 homicides in Bogotá in November 2012 - compared to 147 in November 211 - and this was the lowest figure in 10 years, the capital's police chief General Luis Eduardo Martínez Guzmán stated, while speaking at a presentation with the Bogotá Government Secretary or security chief Guillermo Asprilla Coronado. Martínez gave 1,143 as the number of homicides registered so far in 2012, 22 per cent below 1,460 homicides for either the same period in 2011 or all of 2011. Homicides registered for the first 13 days of December were reported to have dropped 59 per cent compared to same time in 2011, December being termed "historically" the most violent month. Asprilla said "we have the homicide phenomenon under control in Bogotá. Our objective is to take the figure to a single digit." Other figures given for the first third of December 2012 were: a 46-per-cent drop in car thefts compared to the same time in 2011, a 30-per-cent fall in personal thefts or muggings and a 47-per-cent drop in shop thefts. On 18 December the prosecutor-general's office ruled that Asprilla be dismissed from his post and banned from public office for 12 years after investigations indicated a conflict of his private interests and public duties, the broadcaster Caracol reported. As Bogotá Government Secretary Asprilla is in charge of security and justice policies among other duties and is effectively a deputy-mayor; he was the acting mayor in in June 2012 when Mayor Gustavo Petro fell ill. But apparently he remained to date an attorney to plaintiffs who have taken the municipality to court after the explosion of a trash heap in 1997; damages could be paid for that. He has said he did not hide his legal activities and withdrew from the case after entering the city council, El Tiempo reported. Asprilla was reportedly to continue working while appealing the ruling.

Two FARC rebels killed in southern Colombia

The Colombian army killed two rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) during gun battles in the southern department of Caquetá, at an unspecified date, the daily El Espectador reported on 18 December. The guerrillas were killed in a rural part of the Solano district; the army declared operations were continuing in the zone. One of Colombia's senators was separately reported as urging the states guaranteeing the current peace talks between the FARC and the state to press the FARC to release child soldiers, whom she described as "kidnapped for the war." Norway and Cuba are acting as guarantors of the talks and Venezuela and Chile are "accompanying" them, though Venezuela and Cuba's socialist regimes likely enjoy greater influence with the FARC. Gilma Jiménez Gómez a senator of the Green Party, recently said that "if the FARC do not return underage recruits, which means kidnapped for the war, the process will be illegal...and immoral," El Espectador reported on 18 December without dating her remarks. She said "recruiting" children in the FARC was a euphemism for kidnapping. It was not clear if the subject was to be specifically discussed during talks in Havana, while no figures were given for the number of children in the FARC's ranks. Jiménez formerly headed the social welfare department at the Bogotá municipality; she was elected to the Senate for four years in 2010, El Espectador reported.

Over 30 killed in crimes, found dead around Mexico

Crime-related violence continued in Mexico as its president was announcing a planned overhaul of the state's response to organized crime. As if in a country at war, over 35 were killed or found dead around Mexico on 16-18 December, including 17 in a collective bid to break out of a jail. Fifteen of the victims were killed or found dead on or around 18 December, Proceso reported. Among these: a child of seven was one of three - perhaps a family - shot dead while driving on a road near Las Peñitas in the eastern state of Veracruz; two were killed and a child of 13 shot and badly injured in an attack on a house in San Martín Cuauatlalpan in Estado de México outside the capital; the child was taken to hospital. The Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) representative in Salvador Escalante in the western state of Michoacán was shot dead late on 17 December, at a roadside petrol station. Identified by the state prosecutor's office as Miguel Ángel Farfán Ortega, he became the PRI's mayoral candidate for Salvador Escalante in 2011 after his predecessor was found with guns in his car and presumably dismissed. A "cartel grave" (narcofosa) was found on 17 December outside the northern city of Saltillo; it yielded six bodies described as in advanced state of decomposition, Proceso reported on 18 December. One of the bodies was identified as belonging to an electoral official. The website separately reported a gun and grenade attack in Saltillo late on 17 December, launched on the house of an employee of the state prosecutor's office. Nobody was killed. In Tlalpán south of Mexico City, a man identified as the head of a gang called Los Rojos was killed while confined in a hospital late on 16 December, Proceso reported on 18 December; it added he had fled there from another hospital to which he had been admitted after being injured in an attack. Two gunmen dressed as doctors entered his room and shot him in the chest. A shootout on 18 December between prison guards and inmates - in what appeared to be an attempted mass flight - killed 11 prisoners and six guards in a prison in the northern city of Gómez Palacio. Inmates began shooting at guards in watch-towers in a possible signal to start rioting and allow a subsequent breakout, Proceso and Milenio reported. Proceso observed it was unclear where the inmates' weapons had come from.

President presents security plan for Mexico

President Enrique Peña Nieto presented on 17 December a plan to restore "peace" to crime-ridden Mexico, urging a systematic crime policy devoid of "improvisations," based on shared responsibilities and eschewing party political interests, Agence France-Presse reported. Peña Nieto was speaking in the capital to members of the Public Security National Council (CNSP), and state governors, representatives of government branches and rights activists. Peña Nieto cited homicides, kidnappings and extortions as priority targets of reduction. A 10,000-member gendarmerie was to be formed and the national territory divided into five operational zones. The agency cited the plan's six broad outlines as planning a policy with clear objectives, crime prevention through social security programmes to be financed with funds in 2013, respect for human rights, coordination between and reform of security institutions and evaluation of objectives. The armed forces would continue fighting cartels for now he said, while new police were being trained. State governors and officials at the session signed 12 agreements on implementing the plan, El Universal reported. These included measures such as a national training programme for police, drafting police action protocols and including rights activists in the CNSP. On 18 December, Mexico's Prosecutor-General Jesús Murillo Karam spoke in an interview of some of the problems the state has faced in recent years in fighting organized crime, including he said an ill-prepared judiciary and institutions. He said it was "not a problem of government, the judiciary was made for a country at peace," El Universal reported. The judiciary he said had to face the "juncture" of rising cartel violence "as it emerged." He was particularly critical of almost 4,000 preventive or provisional arrests he described as unfair and inefficient; very few of those he said had led to the imprisonment of criminals. Murillo estimated 70,000 people died in drug-related violence under Felipe Calderón Hinojosa (2006-12), the president who began to wage war on the cartels. Murillo said these had broken up with the capture or killing of cartel bosses and prompted the rise of 60 to 80 new gangs or smaller cartels.

Some 30 reported killed around Mexico

At least 29 people were reported killed or found dead around Mexico on 14-16 December in presumed criminal executions or gun battles with state forces. Eight suspected gangsters were shot dead in a gun battle with police on 15 December in Genaro Codina in the north-central state of Zacatecas; police said shooting began when the suspects fired on a patrol. Five suspects were also arrested and arms and equipment confiscated, the dailies Proceso and Imagen reported. On 16 December, soldiers shot dead five suspected gangsters or cartel operatives in the north-eastern city of Tamaulipas, Proceso reported. Four women earlier reported as missing in the northern state of Chihuahua were found dead there in the district of Guachochi on 14 December, their bodies indicating they were "tortured" then shot dead, Proceso reported. The women were apparently last seen on 12 December when they drove out of Creel further to the north, and may have been murdered at a road block set up by criminals in the countryside area known as Sierra Tarahumara. Proceso observed that people had repeatedly reported the presence of road blocks in the Sierra to Guachochi's municipal police as well as the prosecutor's office for western Chihuahua, and no measures were taken. There were nine victims on 14 December alone in the north-western state of Sinaloa, six of these in the form of headless bodies found near the neighbouring state of Chihuahua, Proceso reported. Other victims were: a local politician and a female companion shot dead in the north-eastern city of Ciudad Valles late on 14 December, and a police detective shot dead by suspected car thieves, early on 16 December in the Nezahualcóyotl district of Estado de México. He was apparently stopped while driving and asked to get out of his BMW but refused, Proceso reported.

Socialists retain most regions in Venezuelan polls

The United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), the party of President Hugo Chávez Frías, and allies collaborating in its Comando Campaña Carabobo kept 20 of the 23 states for which they competed in regional polls on 16 December, opposition parties holding onto three in elections marked by a relatively low turnout. The former presidential candidate Henrique Capriles remained governor of the state of Miranda next to the capital, while his allies retained the states of Lara and Amazonas, El Nacional reported. The daily reported a turnout of 53.9 per cent of eligible voters, down from about 80 per cent for the October presidential elections, according to initial figures released by the electoral authority (CNE). This was reportedly the lowest turnout since the regional elections of 2004. But Venezuela's Vice-President and provisional ruler Nicolás Maduro was triumphant on 16 December, stating that the people had ratified the socialist regime and "dissolved" the opposition Democratic Unity Table (MUD, Mesa de Unidad Demócratica). He told state television by telephone that voters had "liberated" five of the eight states governed by MUD politicians, which was a "great victory we must accept with wisdom, with humility," the broadcaster Globovisión reported. Earlier Maduro advised the defeated MUD candidate in the state of Bolívar "not to go crazy" after he challenged the results and alleged the existence of "a manoeuvre" to ensure his defeat. The results were close in that state. The leading opposition figure Henrique Capriles Radonsky said he was "immensely happy" for people in Miranda, Lara and Amazonas, but "I cannot feel happy for our Venezuela," El Nacional reported. He said officialist parties had presented no programs but allegedly capitalized on the sympathies or concerns generated by the president's current illness. He asserted however that "change is quite, quite close, you can feel it," and "Venezuelans want answers to their problems," including he said that of insecurity. The regime he declared "wanted to be done with me but the people responded."

FARC rebels attack police station in Colombia

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) were reported twice so far to have violated the two-month ceasefire they declared from 20 November while negotiating an end to their conflict with the Colombian state; an attack on a police station on 15 December, attributed to Front 34 of the FARC, further reduced the credibility of their pledge. Police in the district of Murindó in the north-western department of Antioquia repelled a 45-minute gunfire attack or shelling of their offices, El Espectador reported, citing EFE and the broadcaster Caracol. A deputy-governor of Antioquia Santiago Londoño Uribe, told Caracol that the FARC had "harrassed" Murindó with gunfire or shelling some 10 times in the past two years. There were no reported casualties in this attack. On 14 December a former president Ernesto Samper Pizano wrote a letter to Colombia's negotiators in Havana urging them to reach an agreement during the ceasefire on "minimal humanitarian" norms to reduce harm to civilians from fighting, RCN Radio reported. Samper was president in 1993-98 although his reputation was tarnished by allegations that a drug cartel contributed funds to his election campaign. Samper wrote that it was "indispensable to protect the civilian population" before peace was attained. The chief negotiator Humberto de la Calle, who was Samper's vice-president in 1994-6, was earlier cited as saying that the aim of talks was not to "humanize" the decades-long conflict with the FARC but end it. Samper wrote that the "humanisation of the conflict whose termination is being negotiated is not an option but an ethical obligation, born of clear constitutional and legal mandates."

Nineteen or more reported killed in Mexico

At least 19 people were reported shot or found dead around Mexico on 13-14 December in incidents mostly thought related to organized crime and cartels, Proceso reported. These included: two bodies found in the northern city of Coahuila, covered by blankets and with an unspecified message by them signed by Z-40 the head of The Zetas cartel, a policeman shot dead in the north-western district of Otáez in the state of Durango, and three people killed in a shootout in a residential building in the north-central city of Celaya. Nine of the dead were from the north-eastern state of Nuevo León, five of these being shot dead in and at the entrance of a house in the city of Monterrey, Proceso reported. A convict was stabbed to death on 14 December in a prison in the district of Iztapalapa outside Mexico City. This occurred hours before Mexico's Primate Archbishop Cardinal Norberto Rivera was to hold mass at the prison, but apparently did not interrupt preparations for the service held annually in this prison, Milenio reported. A man arrested for killing his wife on 13 December told police he shot her during a row after she would not let him sleep; it was not immediately clear if the shooting had been accidental, Proceso reported on 14 December. Neighbours in the Tláhuac district in Mexico City said the couple were drug users; both apparently had been prosecuted for violent thefts and the victim was on prison leave, the Mexico City chief prosecutor was reported as saying. They argued after returning from a party, when she "turned up the music" and prevented him from going to bed. After her death he fired shots into the air and took a woman and her three children hostage for an unspecified time, before being arrested.

Police detain 16 suspects around Guatemala City

Police detained 16 suspected criminals on 13 December during raids and interventions in the department of Guatemala surrounding the capital; the suspects were sought for presumed involvement in a range of crimes including robbing minibuses, extortion and killings, the daily Prensa Libre reported on 14 December. The daily reported at least six violent deaths on 12-14 December. Four of the victims were found on 12 and 13 December as decapitated bodies in the district of Sanarate north of the capital; one body was identified as belonging to an 18-year-old girl, Prensa Libre reported.

Venezuelan officials cautious on president's health

Venezuela's acting president Nicolás Maduro told a gathering outside Caracas on 13 December that President Hugo Chávez had gone from a "stable to favourable" state as he recovered in Cuba from his fourth operation for a cancer first diagnosed in 2011; he stated however that Chávez previously instructed officials to prepare Venezuelans for "any circumstance." Both he and Venezuela's information minister have spoken of the operation's complexity and of unforeseen bleeding that had required "corrective measures," partly divulging the relevant medical reports. Maduro was speaking at a rally to close the campaign of Tareck El-Aissami, the socialist candidate to become governor of the northern state of Aragua west of the capital, Venezuela's El Universal reported. Venezuela was holding elections state governments on 16 December. He praised Chávez who he said had made Venezuelans better people than they were "five years ago or 10, and our country is infinitely better than 15, 20" or 100 years before. Individualism he said had given way to "humanism" under Chávez, and "when humanity lives socialism, it will live in the Kingdom of Heaven as Chávez has said...we are living a miracle right in the 21st century." Allusions to the other world may have been disconcerting to some, given the uncertainty over the president's health. El Universal cited the country's Information Minister Ernesto Villegas Poljak as commenting that given complications, a "time of caution" was needed before the president could be described as recovering. The former liberal presidential candidate and governor of the state of Miranda Henrique Capriles was reported on 14 December as objecting to what he said was Venezuelan officials' electoral usage of "a person's pain," while expressing sympathy for Chávez. Elections for state governors he said, had "nothing to do with the president's health, so enough of manipulating our people," for whom he asked for more "respect," the Colombian broadcaster Caracol reported.

Fifteen reported killed around Mexico

Some 15 people were reported shot or found dead in incidents around Mexico on 11-13 December, including a pregnant woman shot with four others in a restaurant in northern Mexico. Gunmen were said to have entered a restaurant in Nuevo Laredo on the US frontier, and shot dead five employees including the woman, Proceso reported on 13 December. Four gunmen were shot dead by the army in the western state of Guerrero, reportedly after they began shooting at troops who ordered them stop on a motorway early on 13 December, the commander of the Ninth Military Region Guillermo Moreno Serrano was reported as saying. Police separately shot dead a suspect and arrested two after a shootout on 13 December in the district of Calera in the north-central state of Zacatecas, Milenio reported. The suspects began shooting at one or more police cars driving toward Fresnillo, a city north of Calera, the Zacatecas Public Security chief declared. Soldiers freed a kidnapped woman in Fresnillo on 12 December and arrested four presumed kidnappers, after another woman they held held escaped and informed the police, Milenio reported on 14 December. On 13 December police freed a 20-year-old man held by a gang of three in the western district of Tequila, Milenio and Notimex reported. Also on 13 December, the governor of the state of Chihuahua César Duarte Jáquez ruled out that troops could help police patrol the streets of Ciudad Juárez in his state as announced earlier by a local army commander. Duarte said troops in the city "only provoke tensions in society" and the last time soldiers patrolled Juárez the city lived a "war siege," Proceso reported. It was up to state and municipal authorities to fight crime, he said, using intelligence work and the "clear" pursuit of crimes.

Honduran magistrates denounce "illegal" destitution

Four members of the Constitutional Court of Honduras dismissed by parliament on 12 December denounced the move as "totally illegitimate, illegal and unjust" and violating the separation of powers, adding they would consider their legal options, the Honduran daily El Heraldo reported. The four read out a joint communiqué to the press in Tegucicalpa on the afternoon of 12 December declaring that their dismissal "obviously follows political not juridical reasons," and defended their earlier rulings as legal and reasoned. Parliament and the government made a ruling issued in November by the magistrates, which declared unconstitutional parts of the government's drive to purge the police force of corrupt officers, the basis of moves to dismiss the judges. The Speaker of the National Congress or parliament Juan Orlando Hernández said the destitution had been "traumatic" but not politically motivated; the move he added was with the backing of the President Porfirio Lobo Sosa and the head of the judiciary and president of the Supreme Court Jorge Rivera Avilés, El Heraldo reported. He said "we discussed it with the President...and reached the consensus that it was necessary for the good of the country," while Rivera began to contact possible successors before the destitution process. President Lobo was separately reported as saying on 12 December that he would in following days convene the heads of the legislature and judiciary and other key political figures to initiate an "ample and open" dialogue intended to find a collaborative solution to the crisis.

Lawyers among four executed in Mexico's Chiapas

Two lawyers were gunned down while driving in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas on 10 December, it was suspected by organized crime, Proceso reported on 12 December. The website observed they had left a prison that day near the site of their assassination, on the road between the districts of Chiapa de Corzo and Acala; it reported two other execuctions on 9 December in the state capital, Tuxtla Gutierrez. In northern Mexico, the army announced it would once again patrol the streets of Ciudad Juárez to back the police, two years after a similar measure was ended for its apparent unpopularity. The last government headed by Felipe Calderón withdrew troops from the city in 2010 after reports of abuse and rights violations by soldiers, with Federal Police taking over their duties, Proceso reported on 12 December. The head of the military guarrison in Juárez General Salvador Gutiérrez Plascencia, said military patrols would be temporary and confined to the city's periphery. He added troops would particularly look for military weaponry used by criminal gangs and seek to find how they obtained them.

Honduran parliament sacks four judges

Doubts were publicly voiced in Honduras about the legality of a parliamentary vote on 12 December dismissing four members of the Constitutional Court, a part of the Supreme Court of Honduras. The move was related to the court's ruling on 27 November that "confidence" tests being carried out on police personnel were unconstitutional, although the entire Supreme Court was to meet on 12 December to deliberate on that ruling. The jurists dismissed were those who had ruled against the tests, while a fifth member who had not remained in his position. The ruling had angered President Porfirio Lobo and his allies who have defended a government decree to purge police of corrupt elements as a key component of the state's drive against crime. The daily El Heraldo observed that Lobo had reportedly consulted with the parliamentary speaker Juan Orlando Hernández Alvarado and members of the presidium before parliament debated the dismissal. On 10 December parliament voted that an eight-member committee examine the "administrative conduct" of the four jurists and these, apparently very swiftly, drafted a report justifying a second motion to dismiss them. Parliament debated that after one in the morning on 12 December, and the motion was approved by 97 legislators with 31 votes against. The Speaker defended the motion at the pre-dawn session: "Security is the Honduran people's main concern. What we have detected is worrying, it is practically a conspiracy and we are obliged to debate the subject...this wave of crime cannot continue; while some are working others are conspiring." He did not elaborate on the conspirators but they were presumably those obstructing the president's anti-crime measures. To those who said parliament was meddling with the judiciary's prerogatives, he said parliament had already voted to dimiss magistrates before, as it had in 2009 the president of Honduras. Four new magistrates were appointed after the vote, for a term running to 2018. They were on a list of 45 nominees for membership of the Supreme Court drawn up in 2009, El Heraldo reported.

Venezuela's Chávez recovering from surgery

Venezuela's acting president Nicolás Maduro announced on state television that President Hugo Chávez had successfully received cancer surgery in Havana on 11 December and was in recovery; Venezuelans would be informed of his physical progress in coming days, Venezuela's state news agency cited him as saying. He said doctors had informed officials who accompanied Chávez to Havana of the "complex" six-hour surgery carried out; these included the speaker of Venezuela's parliament, the prosecutor-general and the science and oil ministers who Maduro said "are like daughters and sons to Chávez more than politicians." He thanked Latin American leaders and officials who had sent expressions of support, but apparently said nothing about a similar statement by the US State Department in recent days. Maduro also urged the "adversaries, opponents and even enemies of our fatherland, and above all those who are Venezuelans, who exude their hate and venom every day: stop it, stop this poison, stop the hate against" Chávez. Maduro urged an extensive voter participation in regional elections scheduled for 16 December.

Former policeman among six killed in Mexico

A former police chief from the north-western state of Sinaloa reported kidnapped on 10 December was found dead the next day with "his face destroyed;" he was one of six people reported killed by suspected criminals in Mexico on 10-11 December. The body of Alfredo Mejía Pérez, the former head of Sinaloa's state Preventive Police was found in the district of El Limón de los Ramos north of the city of Culiacán. Victims that day included three men gunned down in a bar in the northern city of Torreón; armed men entered the bar, and lined the three up behind the drinks bar to execute them, Proceso reported.

Hugo Chávez stirs emotions, sympathies in illness

Moved to tears by his own words or by circumstances, Venezuela's acting president Nicolás Maduro reiterated in public on 10 December the enduring loyalty of Venezuelans to President Hugo Chávez, who was in Cuba for treatment of a resurgent cancer. Maduro was shown speaking to a crowd of supporters, many also in tears, at the inauguration of a cable-car line in Caracas; on 8 December Chávez handed him his powers for his "temporary absence," though opposition politicians were demanding by 10 December that the public be told of the president's state of health. Certain opposition members, and the US State Department, urged that constitutional provisions be respected in case of a power transition, Globovisión reported on 10 December. This meant general elections must be called if Chávez were unable to return to work. Vice-President Maduro prayed for recovery however and said "Chávez has a people, he has us and will have us for ever in this battle from victory to victory," EFE reported. Messages of encouragement and sympathy were emitted by American governments of all persuasions; Ecuador's Rafael Correa was visiting him in Cuba. In Argentina, President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner recalled speaking in Buenos Aires in 9 December that Chávez had helped "Argentina when nobody was helping it," and asked God to "give him back" his health, Venezuela's El Universal reported. The daily observed on 11 December that the illness was of particular concern to Nicaragua's Sandinista regime, a recipient of generous financial help from Venezuela since 2007.