MEXICO: Gringos Wary...But Continue Living Amidst Narco Violence; 7 Bodies Found Inside Car In Exclusive Cuernavaca Suburb.

USTODAY/ D.AGREN/

     U.S. expatriates and others continue to remain and even move to Mexico despite increasing narco violence...like "narcobloqueos"-- where gunmen randomly hijack and torch vehicles.
     Some experts believe that foreigners have failed to grasp the seriousness of the drug war.
    "Most are so addled by their love of Mexico that they would be hesitant to see the dangers," claims professor Lattanzi Shutika.

 AND:  The bodies of six men and one woman were found inside a car in the exclusive gated community of Temixco near Cuernavaca. Three bodies were inside the car and four more in the trunk.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5h9g7c5dwzxg4JsLYWYzDXz5dSgOA?docId=6394819

MEXICO: U.S. Citizen Found Dead In Sonora.

AP/ MIAMI HERALD/        Sonoran police found the body of Ronald C. Ryan, 67, of Phoenix, Arizona partially buried near a creek on the outskirts of Santa Ana, a city 60 miles south of Nogales. He was reported missing on 3 May. State police also reported detaining three men who had left Ryan's pickup truck at a carwash in Santa Ana. Officers seized several automatic rifles, dozens of bullets and marijuana from the men, ages 18, 20 and 21.

MEXICO: New Words Coined For Narco Terror.

LATIMES/
Spanish words can't capture the drug war's vicious nature in Mexico, so the media has coined new palabras.
Now, there's a word for being lined up and shot, and another for being dumped in the trunk of a car; also for mafia kidnappings, for drug-gang spies and for the hand-scrawled notes hit men leave with the bodies of their victims. Also to describe beheadings and bodies cut up and stewed in acid? View the glossary!

MEXICO: Abuzz Over Video Of Young Thieves Being Abused By Vigilantes.

LATIMES/
The YouTube video of the slapping and sexual abuse of five young alleged thieves in Tepic,in the state of Nayarit by vigilantes is causing outrage in Mexico. But also some approval.
The video shows the teenage boys being slapped in the face and forced to French kiss one another. Each is then forced to say that they are about to be raped as punishment for robbing houses.

MEXICO: Pemex Losses May Force Contract Renegotiations.

BLOOMBERG/
Pemex's declining oil output and more than $10 billion of losses since 2008 may force Schlumberger and Weatherford International to accept less money for drilling contracts in Mexico as Pemex looks to renegotiate contracts to include performance-based incentives.

Mexico's Supreme Court Rules Oaxacan Governor Violated Citizen's Rights.

LAHT/
Mexico’s Supreme Court ruled that Oaxaca Gov. Ulises Ruiz’s government violated individual rights during disturbances from May 2006 to January 2007 that saw 20 people die.
The high court said “The governor of the state of Oaxaca bears clear and plain responsibility” for what happened.

Mexico Seizes Public Electric Utility.

NYTIMES/
President Felipe Calderon dissolved Luz y Fuerza del Centro(LyFC), a public power company and supplier of electricity for the capital and central Mexico, because of a labor dispute.
Federal police occupied LyFC’s facilities after Calderon issued an executive order dissolving the utility company on the basis of “proven operating and financial inefficiency.”
The utility has labor liabilities of 240 billion pesos ($18 billion) and its costs are “almost double its revenues,” the president said.

SEE ALSO: BLOOMBERG for more details: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601086&sid=aOoHjLZwnXqA

Is Mexico The Most Misreported Country?

CJR.ORG/Michael Massing
"... since President Felipe Calderon declared war on the Mexican drug trade nearly three years ago, the coverage has only deteriorated. When it comes to Mexico, U.S. journalists seem interested in only four things: drugs, traffickers, violence, and corruption (with an occasional nod toward immigration). Journalists peddle a sort of drug-war pornography, salaciously and insatiably dwelling on the most lurid aspects of the trade: narcos, gangs, smugglers, pipelines, cells, mass graves, severed heads, torture chambers, dirty cops. Journalists promiscuously quote DEA agents, eagerly accompany undercover cops on ride-alongs, descend daringly into drug-infested neighborhoods, and intrepidly interview members of the drug trade."

When Is a Cartel NOT A Cartel? In Mexico...When Dealing Drugs.

NYTIMES/ECONOMIX/
Some following Mexico’s cartels, like the Tijuana Cartel, the Sinaloa Cartel, the Gulf Cartel and the Beltran Leyva Cartel, acknowledge that the cartels are something else entirely.
“The term drug cartel is inaccurate and improperly used by media, based exclusively on strict economic fundamental theory,’’ Rodolfo Sosa-Garcia, a Mexican economist. He urged reporters to pick a more accurate term, such as “narco-producer."

Mexico Closes Juarez Drug Rehab Centers.

AP/
Officials have closed 10 unregistered drug rehabilitation centers in Ciudad Juarez because they believe the centers serve as recruiters for drug trafficking gangs.
28 people have been killed just this month at two rehab centers in Ciudad Juarez in separate attacks perhaps in a struggle between rival drug gangs.

Mexico Postpones Building Major Dam.

LAHT/
CFE, Mexico’s state-owned utility is postponing construction of a hydroelectric dam planned for the state of Guerrero.
Construction on the Papagayo River “has not been canceled” but rather deferred, said a spokesman.
The La Parota project represents an investment of $800 million and is expected to create 10,000 jobs during construction.

Growing Opposition To Calderon's Nominee For Attorney General.

LAHT.
Activists in Ciudad Juarez, the border city known for the murder of hundreds of women, charge that the man nominated to be Mexico’s next attorney general did nothing about the “femicides” when was the top law enforcer in the northern state of Chihuahua.
Many of the 500 slayings of women and girls that happened in Juarez since 1993 occurred when Chavez was serving as deputy attorney general and then attorney general of Chihuahua.

Priest Used Sand-filled Juice Cans To Highjack Mexican Plane.

AFP.
A Bolivian protestant priest who hijacked an Aeromexico plane from Cancun with 104 people aboard used three Jumex juice cans filled with sand to convince crew members he had a bomb. Jose Mar Flores Pereira, 44, a singer and former drug addict, surrendered to authorities at the Mexico City airport.

Pemex Signs Offshore Exploration Deal With French Firm.

LAHT.
Pemex signed a $463.5 million, five year contract with France’s CGG Veritas for seismic imaging of potential oil fields in a deepwater area in the Gulf of Mexico spanning more than 75,000 sq. kilometers (28,957 sq. miles).

New Carlos Fuentes Novel Portrays Mexico's Drug Wars.

LAHT.
Carlos Fuentes new novel,“Adan en Eden” (Adam in Eden),is a journalistic report on drug trafficking and political corruption in Mexico to be published in November.
“It’s a novel-reportage, very journalistic,” that tells “how the country is being undermined by drug traffickers and by different kinds of corruption,” Fuentes said.

Mexico's Calderon Replaces Attorney General In Drug Fight.

BLOOMBERG.
Mexican President Felipe Calderon has replaced the top official in the struggle against drug cartels. Arturo Chavez Chavez, a former deputy interior minister, will take over for Eduardo Medina Mora as new attorney general.
“There was a general disappointment with the performance of Medina Mora,” said one analyst. “It was the military and the public security ministry that were tracking down the cartel capos and the attorney general’s office was lagging behind.”
Calderon also named Juan Jose Suarez Coppel as chief executive officer of Pemex and Francisco Javier Mayorga as the new agriculture minister.

Mexico's Calderon Replaces Pemex Chief.

BLOOMBERG.
Mexican President Felipe Calderon has named Juan Jose Suarez Coppel to take-over state-owned Pemex immediately. Suarez Coppel, 50, will become the 17th chief executive officer of Pemex, Latin America’s largest oil producer. Pemex's declining output will cost Mexico 300 billion pesos ($22.5 billion)in lost sales in 2009. Some describe Suarez Coppel as a "financial technocrat."

More Trouble In Mexico's $11 Billion Chicontepec Oil Project.

BLOOMBERG.
The $11.1 billion onshore Chicontepec oil project has failed to meet targets, Energy Minister Georgina Kessel said. “Chicontepec has not been generating the production we expected and we have to evaluate with Petroleos Mexicanos how the field is working, and our strategy moving forward.”
Chicontepec, which stretches across Mexico’s Puebla and Veracruz states, will only produce 60,000 barrels a day by year's end, down from a forecast of 72,000.

18 Slain In Juarez Rehab Center.

AP.
Masked men broke into a drug rehabilitation center in Cuidad Juarez and mowed down recovering drug addicts and alcoholics. Eighteen were killed and two seriously injured. It was the third rehab attack in Juarez.
Juárez had the most violent month in its history in August, with at least 326 killings, almost half the murders in all of Mexico. Juárez, Mexico’s most violent city in 2008 with 1,600 killings, may exceed that figure in 2009.

Mexican Remittances Decline 19%.

LAHT.
Remittances sent by Mexicans living abroad fell 19.03 percent in July, compared to 2008.
During the first seven months of this year, remittances totaled $12.91 billion, DOWN 12.56 percent from last year.