There's Been a Spike in Violence in Mexico's Troubled State of Guerrero Gabriela Gorbea - VICE News
go to original November 12, 2015

A wave of extreme violence in Guerrero has turned a new spotlight on the failure of multiple government operations designed to at least contain rampant organized crime in the beleaguered southern Mexican state.

In one attack armed men stormed a cock fight in a small coastal plain town killing 12 people. In another six people in a mountain town were kidnapped and their corpses scattered in a neighboring area.

The violence of recent days also included a seven-hour shootout between community police officers and gunmen in a different mountain region, and three men shot dead outside a football match on the outskirts of the resort city of Acapulco where a number of schools were also stormed by armed groups looking for protection payments.

"There has been an escalation of organized criminal violence in various parts of the state," Juan Angulo, director of the local newspaper El Sur told VICE News. "In Acapulco there have been deaths every day."

Guerrero has long been among the country's most violent states as a patchwork of cartels fight to control territory used for the cultivation, transport and distribution of drugs, as well as other criminal activities such as kidnapping and extortion. Groups such as Guerreros Unidos, Los Rojos and Los Ardillos typically also seek to infiltrate political and security institutions to advance or defend their turf.

But a major scaling up of federal forces, and special security operations, in the last year was supposed to be addressing Guerrero's long-running security crisis. The operations were launched when the state's troubles were put under the spotlight after the disappearance of 43 student teachers in the city of Iguala in September, 2014.

Read the rest at VICE News

Related: 12 Afro-Mexicans Killed in Guerrero, Mexico, by Armed Commandos (teleSUR)

Related: Did Mexico’s Army Help a Mass Murder in State ot Guerrero? (The Daily Beast)

Related: Guerrero: Jail for Ex-Mayor of Iguala Involved in Missing Students Case (teleSUR)

Related: Mexican Police Continue to Attack Student Teachers in Guerrero State (teleSUR)

Photo: EPA

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