Over 30 killed, found dead around Mexico in a day

Thirty two people were reported shot or found dead around Mexico on 28 November, the websites of Milenio and Proceso reported that day, including two policemen. One policeman, reported as kidnapped hours previously, was apparently tortured before he was found hanging from a bridge on the edge of Gómez Palacio in the northern state of Durango. Another police official was shot in his car outside a hospital in the northern city of Chihuahua as he arrived to donate blood to an injured colleague, Milenio reported. In other incidents: in Torreón next to Gómez Palacio the remains of a "mutilated corpse" were found scattered around streets in the city centre. Three men were gunned down in a workshop and a couple shot dead while talking in the street that day, also in Torreón; seven were reported shot dead in different parts of the north-western state of Sinaloa, while a gun fight between gangs killed four participants in the locality of Huitzila north of the western city of Guadalajara. Marines were reported separately to have found on 28 November "at least" nine bodies buried in two ditches near a nature reserve in the west-coast district of Acapulco.

Ecuador's exiled ex-leader not to run in polls

Abdalá Bucaram's return from exile to run for Ecuador's presidency in February 2013 might have been interesting at the very least given his reputed antics and lively personality, but it was not to be. The National Electoral Council (CNE) approved a protestant preacher instead to represent Bucaram's populist PRE (Partido Roldosista Ecuatoriano) party and compete with the incumbent Rafael Correa Delgado. The evangelist Nelson Zavala Avellán would run for the presidency and former legislator Denny Cevallos Capurro would be the PRE's vice-presidential candidate, Agence France-Presse reported on 27 November. The CNE rejected Bucaram's candidacy on 19 November, stating that he was not present at his registration. Bucaram was in Panama, and faced possible prosecution for charges relating to financial malfaisance or embezzlement during his presidency in 1996-7. The CNE also obligated Cevallos to renounce her parliamentary position to confirm her candidacy; she was the substitute legislator for Bucarám's son, Abdalá Bucaram Pulley. She told the Ecuadorean daily El Universo that Zavala had the "same political weight" as Bucaram and expressed confidence the PRE ticket would reach the second round. If elected, she said, she would expand the vice-presidency's current social vocation. The CNE has approved  eight presidential candidacies for elections due on 17 February 2013, AFP reported. These were, aside Zavala, President Correa, the banker Guillermo Lasso Mendoza, former president (2003-5) Lucio Gutiérrez Borbua for the centrist Sociedad Patriótica, the leftist and Correa's former energy minister Alberto Acosta Espinosa, two conservatives - Álvaro Noboa and Mauricio Rodas Espinel - and a jurist running as an independent, Normay Wray Reyes. President Correa was apparently ahead in voting intentions.

Ecuador's president reshuffles cabinet

Several new ministers were sworn into office in Quito on 28 November, amid a partial reshuffle allowing some former ministers to run for positions in general elections scheduled for 2013, agencies and press reported. In the changes the former heritage minister María Fernanda Espinosa Garcés became Defence Minister, her old post going to the deputy-minister for heritage Maria Belén Moncayo. Espinosa replaced Miguel Carvajal Aguirre, Ecuador's El Telégrafo reported. The new Policy Coordination Minister (Ministro coordinador de política) was Betty Tola who returned to the post she left in August 2012 following a disputed legislative initiative over military pensions. Rafael Poveda became the new Minister of Strategic Sectors (Ministro coordinador de Sectores Estratégicos), replacing Jorge Glas Espinel who was to be a vice-presidential candidate in coming elections for the Alianza País (or PAIS) party backing Correa. Other appointments were of Lorena Tapia Núñez as Environment Minister - her predecessor was to run for a parliamentary seat for PAIS - of Lorena Escudero to head the migratory affairs department (Senami) and of Leonardo Berrezueta Carrión as Private Secretary to the Presidency. Tapia Núñez was the acting minister since 12 November, while Berrezueta began working as presidential Secretary on 9 November, and was formally appointed on 16. Born in 1978, he was a deputy-interior minister for security affairs from May 2011 to late January 2012 and an adviser to the Presidency from June or July to November 2012, the government bulletin El Ciudadano reported on 16 November.

Colombia leaves arbitration treaty after court ruling

Reflecting Colombia's anger at a 19 November ruling by the International Court at the Hague that ceded part of its sea territory to Nicaragua, President Juan Manuel Santos announced on 28 November that Colombia would leave the 1948 Bogotá Pact that gave the Court authority to arbitrate in frontier disputes. Santos made the announcement at gathering of coffee growers who cheered him, and said the decision was to prevent a repetition of such a ruling. He said this did not mean Colombia was no longer committed to peacefully resolving such disputes as the Pact demands of signatories, but that in keeping with "the highest national interests" land and sea frontiers should be set by treaties "as has been the juridical tradition in Colombia," RCN Radio reported on 28 November. The ruling had meant to settle a dispute over sea frontiers, but considerably reduced access to rich fishing waters for inhabitants of the San Andrés Archipelago, a range of islands and dependent cays belonging to Colombia, which in some cases would become surrounded by Nicaraguan waters. There was also concern in Colombia that Nicaragua would later explore and drill for oil in some of the waters given it, which are now a protected natural zone. Santos said Colombia "denounced" the treaty before the Organization of American States on 27 November, which effectively meant it was leaving. The pact or American Treaty on Pacific Settlement, which entered into force in 1949 and was ratified by 15 American states, foresees a range of diplomatic and legal means for resolving disputes, including arbitration by The Hague. The decision apparently did not affect Colombia's obligation to respect this ruling and its formal departure would be in a year. But the broadcaster cited Vice-President Marcelino Garzon as saying that "an understanding and agreement" was now needed between Colombia and Nicaragua that would "favour the fishing population." He said the dispute was now "in the hands of the United Nations."

Twenty one reported killed around Mexico in a day

The review Proceso numbered at 21 those reported killed or found dead in Mexico on 26-27 November, mostly victims of drug cartels or of gun fights with security forces. These included a father and his three adult sons shot dead on a road in the Urique district of the northern state of Chihuahua, Proceso reported. In one incident the body parts of three men were left inside and on a car in the northern city of Torreón. In the eastern and western states of Veracruz and Michoacán respectively, the army shot dead eight suspected criminals in gun fights, reportedly responding to gunfire in both cases. Separately, authorities made a public presentation of six policemen held for their presumed role in the execution-style killings on 18 November of eight individuals in the district of Indé in the northern state of Durango, Proceso reported. The victims were relatives of the mayor of Indé Ernesto Núñez Rodríguez and included a pregnant 21-year-old and her four-year-old son. He told investigators that four individuals arrived at his property that day and began shooting at a gathering of 13 people there. Eight of those ran into a cellar where they were shot by two "state policemen" who followed them and who then set fire to the cellar. The mayor said five other relatives including a 15-year-old were still missing after the attack.

Teenagers among recent murdered in Honduras

The bodies of four "young men" were found before dawn on 27 November near the National Stadium in northern Tegucicalpa, hours after they were kidnapped from hostels in the district of Comayagüela north of the city, the daily El Heraldo reported. The victims were apparently strangled to death; one was 14 years old. They were among seven individuals kidnapped by a group of men, some wearing police uniforms. The three other youngsters remained unfound. Police were investigating to determine whether or not the incident was related to the killing of three youngsters in Comayagüela a week before. El Heraldo reported at least eight other violent deaths around Honduras during 21-27 November, including: a Cuban national shot dead outside a mechanical workshop on 26 November near the northern town of El Progreso; a land activist from the MARCA association, shot at the bus station on 25 November in the northern port of Trujillo and three 17 year-old boys stabbed to death in separate incidents in Comayagüela on 24 November, and in the northern port of Cortés on 22 November.

Colombia holds suspected murderers, guerrillas

Colombia was reported to have detained all of three gang members sought for the massacre of 10 peasants in northern Colombia on 7 November, the last being caught at an unspecified location on 24 November. President Juan Manuel Santos said in Santa Marta on Colombia's northern coast that day that the state had honoured its promise to catch the culprits, El Espectador reported. He also thanked neighbouring Panama for arresting or helping catch at an unspecified location, two presumed members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) with 540 kilograms of cocaine. The state separately arrested at an unspecified date in the north-eastern town of Saravena a member of Front 38 of the FARC, described as one of 25 terrorists most sought in the eastern state of Arauca, El Espectador reported on 25 November. The detained - identified by the pseudonym El Culeco - was thought to be in charge of tracking troops and officials in Arauca and to have been involved in an attack in December 2010 that killed two policemen. In separate operations in districts west of the capital Bogotá, police detained nine members of Colombia's Communist Party and of the leftist Marcha Patriótica association, all suspected of being collaborators or members of the FARC, El Espectador reported on 24 November. The detained were described as students, teachers and trade unionists and arrested in Manizales, Pereira, Cali and Palmira; police handed them over to the judiciary in Manizales the capital of the Caldas department, for more investigations. Their defence lawyers reportedly declared that authorities were trying to revive cases and charges for which the suspects had been tried and acquitted. Marcha Patriótica seeks among other goals a negotiated end to the state's conflict with the FARC; it was formed in 2012 in the wake of protests against the policies of the then conservative president Álvaro Uribe Vélez. The Communist Party was founded in 1930.

Over 50 killed, found dead in Mexico in week

At least 53 were reported killed or found dead around Mexico in the period 19-24 November, likely all or most the victims of criminal incidents and mostly in the northern state of Chihuahua; these ranged from most recent shooting deaths to skeletal remains found in clandestine graves. The latter included three ditches found on the periphery of Juárez in Chihuahua, which police observed contained "at least" 11 remains of victims of whom some may have been killed two years before, Proceso reported on 24 November. Eight half-naked bodies were also found that day by a road in the Rosales district near Ciudad Juárez, Proceso reported, citing the local Diario de Juárez. Signs indicated the victims had been tortured then shot to death. In total 13 were reported killed or found dead in the northern states of Chihuahua and Sonora on 20-22 November, Proceso reported separately. In what is now a custom among cartels and gangs in Mexico, several victims were decapitated, dismembered and "bagged," as with two dismembered bodies found in black plastic bags at the back a car in the south-central state of Oaxaca on 20 November. Other victims included a 22-year-old beauty queen and two soldiers, among five killed in a shootout between suspected criminals and troops in the north-western state of Sinaloa on 24 November. Susana Florez - titled Sinaloa Woman 2012 - died in a gun battle that began when suspects fired on an army patrol in El Palmar de los Leal in the Mocorito district; her boyfriend was one of gunmen and also died, Proceso reported on 26 November.

International court issues ruling in Caribbean dispute

The International Court at the Hague issued its ruling on 19 November to settle a maritime frontier dispute between Colombia and Nicaragua, recognizing some of each country's territorial demands but disappointing Colombia by giving Nicaragua portions of the Caribbean it had hitherto administered. The ruling was to settle a dispute over territory thought rich in oil and fishing resources. Nicaragua was given two chunks of water east of the vertical Meridian 82 line, while Colombia retained sovereignty over seven disputed islets dependent on the San Andrés Archipelago including two now surrounded by Nicaraguan waters, El Colombiano reported on 19 November, showing also a map of the delineation. The area conceded to Nicaragua was 531 square kilometres while only 65 were given to Colombia, Spain's El País reported. Colombia had sought all waters east of Meridian 82 and its president said the court should have confirmed texts signed in 1928 and 1930 that set that as the frontier. Nicaragua had in turn sought a frontier line more to the east, running north-eastward and including Colombian waters as well as the disputed cays. While Nicaragua hailed the ruling as a victory, Colombian politicians expressed grief and there was no immediate consensus on how to respond. President Juan Manuel Santos said on 20 November that Colombia would do all it could to defend its rights, while Colombia's representative before the Court, Julio Londoño, said the government would study the ruling before deciding on a course of action. Foreign Minister María Ángela Holguín, apparently faced with considerable criticisms, said in San Andrés on 20 November that she was ready to resign if that "appeased" the people of the San Andrés department, but that this was no time to be looking for scapegoats, El Espectador reported.

Over 27 killed, found dead in Mexico over weekend

Mexico's investigative review Proceso counted 27 presumed victims of crime, either shot or found dead around Mexico on 18 and 19 November, including a five-year-old killed by accident. These included "at least" ten bodies found in two clandestine graves in Zumpango in the western state of Guerrero; police found the graves after they detained and interrogated on 18 November five presumed members of a gang called Los Rojos, in the district of Chilpancingo in Guerrero. A five-year-old boy was shot and killed while travelling in his father's car, caught in crossfire between police and criminals in the northern city of Gómez Palacio. Separately the state government of Nuevo León in northern Mexico announced on 19 November the arrest of a criminal "cell" of 19 or 24 members associated with The Zetas cartel, led by a man and a woman and including five working policemen and five teenagers. Investigators linked the group to "at least" 16 kidnappings, 12 killings and unspecified acts of extortion. Police confiscated items from them including cash, arms, cars, drugs and "planks for torture," Proceso reported, citing the state security spokesman Jorge Domene Zambrano.

Over a dozen killed in Mexico in a day

Gun fights between state forces and presumed criminals in two districts of Mexico killed nine including a soldier on 18 November, while 10 policemen were arrested for suspected collusion with organized crime, Proceso reported. The shootouts occurred in the northern district of Indé and in Ocampo in the north-western state of Michoacán; in Ocampo 10 local policemen were arrested after the shootout, including the district police chief and deputy-head. A gang boss or perhaps local representative of one of the cartels - dubbed El Constans - was killed in this shootout. Three men were separately shot dead on a road near Ciudad Juárez by the US frontier; 150 bullets were fired into them from AK-47 assault rifles, Proceso reported. The three were identified as from the nearby district of Guadalupe, and were driving a car without a licence plate. A university lecturer was separately shot dead in the district of Chihuahua on 18 November; he was named as Adolfo Zuñiga de la Torre, a member of the chemistry department at the Autonomous University of Chihuahua, Proceso reported. A policeman died in hospital in the northern city of Saltillo, after he was injured in a car chase and shootout with suspects in that city, Milenio reported on 19 November, citing Notimex.

Colombian negotiators set to resume talks with rebels

Colombian negotiators left Bogotá for Havana in Cuba on 18 November, and were set to resume on 19 November talks to end decades of fighting with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), although this round of talks was initially planned for 15 November, El Espectador reported. Colombia's chief negotiator Humberto de la Calle Lombana told the press at Bogota's airport that Colombia knew "clearly and without ambiguities" what it wanted from talks and reminded the FARC that the polity and economics of Colombia were not being discussed. "the Government and the guerrillas have separately said what we both agree on: we are not arriving in Havana to negotiate Colombia's model of development nor government policies, likewise we are not asking the FARC to abandon or negotiate their ideas," he said. He reiterated the government's position that there would be no ceasefire nor any concession to the guerrillas during talks, as he said this had given the FARC advantages in previous parleys. De la Calle said the talks were to last months not years and should yield "practical, possible" results, not "disappointments." He boarded a Colombian airforce plane accompanied by other "plenipotentiary" negotiators, the Colombian High Commissioner for Peace Sergio Jaramillo, the former armed forces chief Jorge Enrique Mora, former Peace Commissioner Frank Pearl and the industrialist Luis Carlos Villegas. Former police chief Oscar Naranjo, another plenipotentiary negotiator, was expected in Havana on 20 November. Meanwhile the FARC and the other leftist guerrillas of the National Liberation Army (ELN), continued their violent activities inside Colombia. The FARC were attributed a bomb explosion on 11 November near a police station in Suárez in the southern Cauca department, which  injured 25 people. On 17 they were suspected to have blown up a part of the Transandino pipeline in the southern Nariño department, causing crude oil to pour into the nearby Sucio river, which flows into the larger Putumayo, El Colombiano reported. The ELN were separately the suspected authors of a bomb attack that killed one person and injured two on 17 November, in the district of El Tarra in northern Colombia, El Espectador reported.

Mexican anti-crime coordinator removed from post

Mexican dailies reported on 16 November the resignation "for strictly personal reasons" of the head of the prosecutor's office dealing with organized crime - SEIDO - while indicating that the departure came at the request of Mexico's Prosecutor-General Marisela Morales Ibañez. She was said to have sought the removal of José Cuitláhuac Salinas Martínez as well as the deputy-prosecutor in charge of assaults and car thefts, for "anomalies" found within that office and "possible indications" of criminal conduct by members of its staff, the dailies El Informador and El Universal reported on 16 November. According to CNN Salinas Martínez had resigned weeks before but was provisionally kept in his post. His office, like other public institutions in Mexico, was feared infiltrated and corrupted by drug cartels. Salinas, who took office on 1 November 2011, was also reported to have refused to dismiss officials as requested by the Prosecutor-General. The prosecutor-general's office appointed Rodrigo Archundia Barrientos as acting head of SEIDO (Procuraduría Especializada en Investigación de Delincuencia Organizada).

About 30 killed, found dead in Mexico over three days

More than 30 people were reported killed or found dead from apparent criminal incidents around Mexico on 14-16 November, including gangsters, civil servants and policemen and children, Proceso reported on 15 and on 16 November. The victims included: an official of the state prosecutor's office gunned down while driving in the north-central district of Guanajuato, seven shot dead in the western resort of Acapulco, and two policemen shot dead, in the south-central state of Morelos and in Piedras Negras near the US frontier. The decomposing body of a 12-year-old boy was found on 15 November in Madera in the north-western state of Chihuahua; police believed he was strangled or suffocated to death 30 days earlier. Eleven or 12 of the dead were suspected gangsters shot dead in gun battles with troops in different parts of the country. In one incident gunmen in a convoy of 10 cars began firing on a military patrol in the north-eastern district of Tamaulipas; in another late on 16 November troops shot dead four suspected gangsters on a road in the northern state of Zacatecas, El Universal reported on 17 November. The troops were said to have fired after coming under attack. The former mayoress of Tiquicheo in the western state of Michoacán was found dead on 15 November, in Cuitzeo in the same state, El Universal reported on 17 November. María Santos Gorrestieta Salazar was twice the target of attempted assassinations when she was mayoress in 2008-11, in 2009 when a gun attack killed her husband and in 2010.

Mexican president blames crime for thousands of deaths

Mexico's outgoing president, Felipe Calderón Hinojosa, defended his six-year administration's war on drug cartels and said it was "irresponsible" to blame the state or himself for the thousands of violent deaths reported since 2006. He was responding in an interview with the daily Milenio published online on 15 November, to critics who have blamed some 50-60,000 deaths on his decision to fight crime using federal police and the armed forces. One of these was his predecessor Vicente Fox Quesada, who said on 14 November that this had been "a lost war." Calderón told Milenio the dead were to do with "criminals who are killing people, some innocent others probably linked to rival cartels." Violence in Mexico he said "is not a consequence of the Federal Government's actions" but "of violence which we have seen rising in many states," because he said cartels were no longer just sending drugs outwards but seeking to control Mexican territory. This was "a change in the dimension of criminality that was never understood," he said. Mexico he said now had "powerful" armed and police forces, and he praised the intelligence services that had helped catch 25 of Mexico's 37 most wanted criminals, during his term. He said he found Mexican intelligence "totally devastated" when he succeeded Fox, as it had been dismantled. This had been done for the perception that it had been used before 2000 as a "political instrument" to "spy on opponents", and there "was something in that" Calderón admitted. Mexico was governed from 1929 to 2000 by the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), a centrist party that became increasingly authoritarian and is set to recover the presidency on 1 December. The conservative National Action Party (PAN) to which Fox and Calderón belong, won elections in 2000 and Fox became president. But aside his later criticisms of Calderón, he angered the PAN by backing the PRI candidate in the 2012 general elections. Calderón told Milenio he had not spoken to Fox for some time. Fox in turn told the broadcaster Univisión on 14 November that he had "time and again" advised Calderón not to use the army to fight cartels, but "he did exactly the opposite and we are seeing the consequences today." The only way to win against drugs he said "is by being with our children, educating and informing them and taking responsibility for our children's behaviour." He said the state could not be expected to protect "our children and prevent them from accessing drugs." He also chided the United States for allegedly doing little to curb the habits of its "60 million" drug users. "We are doing all the work for them," he said.

At least 20 killed in Mexico mid-week

"At least" 20 were reported killed or found dead around Mexico on 12-14 November, presumed victims of criminal violence and most likely of organized crime. These included: a bus driver shot before a bus-full of passengers in Acapulco on the western coast, four gunned down outside a brewery in Ciudad Valles near the eastern port of Tampico, five bodies found at the back of an estate car in Ecatepec outside Mexico City and two including a journalist shot dead in Tehuacán, in the eastern state of Puebla, Proceso reported on 13 and 14 November. The journalist was shot while driving from an assignment; the other victim was a former policewoman, CNN reported. In the north-eastern state of Nuevo León, police arrested on 10 November, 22 suspects identified as members of the Gulf Cartel and working in a team led by a 19-year-old, Proceso reported on 14 November. The "cell," including three members aged 15-17, was thought involved in drug trafficking, kidnapping and murders in the district of China where the suspects were arrested, Nuevo León's security spokesman Jorge Domene Zambrano said. Authorities revealed on 13 November the arrests of three other presumed members of cartels, Proceso reported. These were identified as Mario Arturo Zurita, head of The Zetas in the northern district of Saltillo arrested on 12 November, and two members of the Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generación, detained on 9 November in the eastern port of Veracruz. Separately the mayor of El Bosque in the southern state of Chiapas and two municipal offficials were shot and injured in an ambush, while driving to nearby Simojovel on 13 November, Proceso reported.

Colombian police arrest gang bosses at "summit"

Police forces arriving in helicopters bust a meeting of criminal bosses on an estate in western Colombia on 9 November, arresting 27 leading members including the two chiefs of Los Rastrojos, a gang involved in drug trafficking, extortion and murders, EFE reported on 11 November. Members of this gang recently gunned down 10 farm workers, apparently for their employer's failure to pay protection money. The gangsters were meeting outside the town of La Virginia in the Risaralda department to discuss strategies in south-western Colombia, EFE cited Colombia's police chief José Roberto León as saying. The detained included Nelson Mauricio Taborda or Mascota (Pet), who led the Rastrojos following the arrest last July of their chief Diego Pérez Henao, and his deputy dubbed Picante (Spicy), whom the police chief described as "extremely dangerous." He said Picante was thought involved in several murders that included brutal methods like the dismemberment of victims, a practice apparently learned from unspecified Mexican cartels. The gang's chiefs for seven or eight departments of Colombia were reportedly among the 27 held, EFE and El Espectador reported.  The daily cited President Juan Manuel Santos as saying on 10 November that the state had ever-improving intelligence on the workings of such gangs and would keep arresting new leaders "as they emerge."

Kirchner opponents repeat protests in Argentina

"Tens of thousands" of Argentinians protested on 8 November in Buenos Aires and other cities against insecurity, inflation, corruption and the policies of President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, repeating the protests organized in September, the daily Clarín reported on 9 November. It observed that these protests were "directed principally against" Kirchner, who many Argentines suspect may wish to serve a third presidential term. She is not allowed by law to serve a third consecutive term and the government has said nothing about plans to alter the constitution to allow this, but suspicions evidently persisted. Police reportedly counted some 30,000 people outside the presidential palace in Buenos Aires in the evening, while Clarín, a daily unsympathetic to Kirchner, reported "massive demonstrations" not just in the capital but in cities including Córdoba, Mendoza and San Miguel de Tucumán, without citing figures. The government noted the support of some opposition politicians for the protests including of the mayor of Buenos Aires Mauricio Macri who was reportedly in the crowd. The speaker of Argentina's lower legislative chamber Julián Domínguez observed on 9 November that mobilisations "for negative sentiments are not good for" Argentina and would not strengthen institutions, the state agency Telam reported. Kirchner in turn defended her policies at a gathering in the presidential palace on 9 November, as a "political project of inclusion, even of those who disagree," Telam reported. On 7 November, a power outage left some 1.5 million residents of central Buenos Aires without electricity for over two hours, also halting the metro and utilities and causing traffic jams, Europa Press reported on 8 November. Work in parliament and government offices was also affected. The planning minister Julio de Vido said on 8 November that the government would investigate prior to possible legal action, and insisted there had been "no problem with energy supplies or generation," Europa Press reported. He said "we cannot blame the heat...we notice the hour, the place and the demand, which was half what that line could convey." November is late spring in Argentina.

Ten reported killed around Mexico, traffickers held

Ten people were reported killed or found dead in six states around Mexico on 8 November, the review Proceso reported. One of the dead, apparently strangled and beaten to death, was found in the morning in the very busy Distribuidor Juárez intersection of the north-central city of San Luis Potosí, where public messages from unspecified drug cartels were also displayed. In Sonora a 17-year-old schoolboy was injured in the face as gunmen fired shots at the family car driving to school; he was reportedly recovering in hospital. Separately, a day after she was kidnapped, the mother of a regional legislator from Guerrero in western Mexico was freed; she was left by a building on the road between Zihuatanejo and Acapulco in Guerrero, though it was not immediately clear if a ransom had been paid, Proceso reported on 8 November. Authorities also announced the arrests of three drug traffickers on 7 November, one of whom was already reported as detained the previous summer. They were identified as the head of The Zetas cartel in the northern city of Saltillo where he was arrested, a presumed member of The Zetas dubbed El Chikano detained in the city of Aguascalientes, and a leader of the Cartel del Centro named as Benicio Flores Hernández - El Benny.  He was detained in Tlalnepantla in Estado de México where the cartel works, Proceso reported. It was not immediately clear why he was arrested twice. Flores reportedly ran the cartel's trafficking in the districts of Tlalnepantla, Atizapán and part of Ecatepec in Estado de México from 2011, the year the cartel's chief was reportedly arrested.

Colombian gangsters murder 10 peasants

Suspected gangsters murdered 10 workers on a fruit farm in northern Colombia on 7 November, firing "indiscriminately" before throwing a grenade at them, The Associated Press reported, citing police statements. The police were reportedly told that three gunmen gathered a group of workers on an estate in the district of Santa Rosa de Osos in the Antióquia department, and asked if the business was paying protection money; the workers apparently did not know or would not say, whereupon the gunmen began shooting. The massacre was attributed to the Rastrojos gang, the broadcaster Caracol reported on 8 November. Colombia's Defence Minister Juan Carlos Pinzón said in Bogotá on 8 November that "such barbaric acts have no explanation," though police commanders would travel to the zone to investigate, El Espectador reported. Pinzón said in an interview with Blu Radio that the incident was of concern as authorities had recently detained the presumed local head of the Rastrojos, dubbed 18. The governor of Antióquia Sergio Fajardo Valderrama also spoke to Blu Radio, lamenting that "the criminal phenomenon" continued even as leading criminals were caught. Separately a Venezuelan beauty queen and two Colombians were among five arrested in Venezuela at an unspecified date and being questioned for suspected ties to the Colombian drug trafficker Daniel "Crazy" Barrera, arrested last September. The detained, including Gabriela Alexandra Fernández Ocando - beauty queen for the Venezuelan state of Zulia in 2008 - may be charged with money laundering and criminal conspiracy, Caracol reported on 8 November.