The U.S. government will have unmanned surveillance aircraft monitoring the whole southwest border with Mexico from September 1, as it ramps up border security in this election year, a top official said on Monday.

Predator B is powered by a turboprop engine and can carry a greatly increased payload.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said U.S. Customs and Border Protection would begin flying a Predator B drone out of Corpus Christi, Texas, on Wednesday, extending the reach of the agency’s unmanned surveillance aircraft across the length of the nearly 2,000 mile border with Mexico.

“With the deployment of the Predator in Texas, we will now be able to cover the southwest border from the El Centro sector in California all the way to the Gulf of Mexico in Texas, providing critical aerial surveillance assistance to personnel on the ground,” Napolitano said during a conference call.

“This is yet another critical step we have taken in ensuring the safety of the border and is an important tool in our security toolbox,” she added.

Illegal immigration and security along the porous border with Mexico has become a hot topic this year, when the ruling Democrats’ control of Congress is on the line in November 2 elections.

Earlier this month, President Barack Obama signed a $600 million bill that would fund some 1,500 new Border Patrol agents, customs inspectors and other law enforcement officials along the border, as well as paying for two more unmanned drones.

Napolitano said the additional aircraft pledged under the bill, together with the new aircraft soon to begin operations in Texas, would increase the Customs and Border Protection drone fleet to six by the start of next year.

The Predator B drones are made by defense contractor General Atomics. They carry equipment including sophisticated day and night vision cameras that operators use to detect drug and human smugglers, and can stay aloft for up to 30 hours at a time.

(Reporting by Tim Gaynor; editing by Mohammad Zargham)

[Via: Reuters]

Soldiers stand next to a detainee and seized packages of marijuana in Tijuana, northern Mexico. Photograph: Rodrigo Abd/AP

The Mexican president, Felipe Calderón, said today he would consider a debate on legalising drugs, as his government announced that more than 28,000 people have been killed in drug violence since he launched a crackdown against cartels in 2006.

The director of country’s intelligence agency, Guillermo Valdes, also said the authorities had confiscated about 84,000 weapons and seized $411m (£258m) in US currency and $26m worth in pesos.

Valdes released the statistics during a meeting with Calderón and representatives of business and civic groups, where attendees explored ways to improve Mexico‘s anti-drug strategy and called on the government to open a debate on legalisation.

Calderón said he has taken note of the idea of legally regulating drugs in the past. “It’s a fundamental debate in which I think, first of all, you must allow a democratic plurality [of opinions],” he said. “You have to analyse carefully the pros and cons and the key arguments on both sides.”

Three former presidents – César Gaviria of Colombia, Ernesto Zedillo of Mexico and Fernando Cardoso of Brazil – urged Latin American countries last year to consider legalizing marijuana to undermine a major source of income for drug cartels. Mexico’s congress has also debated the issue.

But Calderón has long said he is opposed to the idea, and his office issued a statement hours after the meeting saying that while he was open to debate on the issue, he remains “against the legalisation of drugs”.

The latest debate on legalisation was proposed by the historian and writer Héctor Aguilar Camín, who said: “I’m not talking just about marijuana … rather all drugs in general.”

The most recent official toll of Mexico’s drug war dead came in mid-June, when the attorney general said 24,800 had died. Valdes did not specify a time frame for the new statistics.

The government does not regularly break down murder statistics, but leading newspapers who have kept their own counts say last month was the deadliest yet under Calderón: according to the daily Milenio, 1,234 people were killed in July. The Mexican government says most victims were involved in the drug trade.

Some delegates at the meeting criticised the government for lacking consistent statistics on the drug war and an effective way to communicate its successes. They also said the government needs to do more to combat the financial arm of organised crime.

“There’s no systematic policy for investigating or seizing the assets of organised crime,” said José Luis Piñeiro, a security expert at Mexico’s Autonomous Metropolitan University, “nor a system of locating the properties of organised crime”.

[Via: Guardian]

How did a Mexican drug trafficker manage to use a CIA rendition aircraft to smuggle drugs into the U.S.? The death of drug cartel leader, Ignacio “Nacho” Coronel reveals surprising (or not so surprising) connections.

Earlier this week, Sinaloa drug cartel leader Ignacio “Nacho” Coronel was killed in a raid conducted by the Mexican military. According to several media and official Mexican government reports, Coronel had a long criminal history and played significant roles mostly within the Sinaloa cartel. He was currently a member of the ‘inner circle’ working for Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzman –the drug lord listed by Forbes as one of the richest men in the world.

Yesterday, thanks to the arduous work of the Mexican newspaper Por Esto!, it was discovered that Nacho Coronel was literally running “El Chapo” Guzman’s cocaine operations in the Yucatan Peninsula since 2004, when evidently, he became the visible head of the Sinaloa Cartel which operated out of the cities of Merida, Cancun, and Cozumel. This was known as “the Yucatan Peninsula Route.”

Nefarious Connections

Coronel’s Yucatan operations included the transportation of narcotics via air, mainly cocaine from Colombia to be later smuggled into the United States. During that time, Nacho Coronel had the protection and collaboration of corrupt elements from local, state and federal police, as well as from Mexican military. One particular example of the involvement of Mexican military in his operations included the arrest of 11 Mexican Navy officials who were caught smuggling cocaine from Colombia into Yucatan on May 12 of 2006. Coronel had apparently established connections with the Colombian drug cartel known as “Valle del Norte” (North Valley). Further, Nacho Coronel had allegedly established connections with Cuban intelligence agents operating in Cancun, according to Mexican columnist Raymundo Riva Palacio.

The CIA plane crash and the 3 tons of cocaine belonging to the Sinaloa Drug Cartel

On September of 2007, there was a plane crash in Yucatan. When authorities arrived at the crash site, they discovered well over 3 tons of cocaine onboard the Gulfstream II aircraft. The narcotics reportedly belonged to the Sinaloa Drug Cartel, under the command of “El Chapo” Guzman and the local control of Nacho Coronel. However, after further investigations into the origins of the aircraft’s markings and registration number (N987SA), it was discovered that it was used for CIA rendition flights. Later that month, another drug bust took place involving a DC9 aircraft transporting cocaine, registered to an American business (although the American owner was never arrested, and the identity was not publicly revealed).

Confirmed by several sources

The Mexican newspaper El Universal obtained several records pertaining to the ownership and recent flight information for the Gulfstream II aircraft. The plane had recently been purchased by a company registered as “Donna Blue Aircraft Inc.” Some news media outlets and investigators like Daniel Hopsicker discovered that the company known as “Donna Blue Aircraft Inc.” or “DBA” did not exist. He published detailed information about DBA’s phony address and empty offices on his website. According to flight records, the Gulfstream II aircraft had been used by the CIA in rendition flights from Europe to the U.S. Navy base in Guantanamo, Cuba.

The flight records obtained from the FAA and the European Organization for the Safety of Air Navigation or ‘Eurocontrol,’ included a time period from November 17, 2001 through September 18, 2007. A detailed list of some of the flights, including locations, dates, arrivals and departures was published by El Universal.

[Via:DeadlineLive.info]

Apparently Mexican drug cartels are taking control of some towns in Arizona, the sherrif”s department is requesting that the military or national guard come in and give assistance.

Pointing their rifles, Mexican security forces chased away U.S. authorities investigating the shooting of a 15-year-old Mexican by a U.S. Border Patrol agent on the banks of the Rio Grande, the FBI and witnesses said.

An unidentified relative (unseen) shows a photo of Sergio Adrian Hernandez Huereka, 15, to the press outside his mother's home in the northern border city of Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, Tuesday

The killing of the Mexican by U.S. authorities — the second in less than two weeks — has exposed the distrust between the two countries that lies just below the surface, and has enraged Mexicans who see the death of the boy on Mexican soil as an act of murder.

Shortly after the boy was shot, Mexican soldiers arrived at the scene and pointed their guns at the Border Patrol agents across the riverbank while bystanders screamed insults and hurled rocks and firecrackers, FBI spokeswoman Andrea Simmons said. She said the agents were forced to withdraw.

A relative of the dead boy who had been playing with him told the Associated Press that the Mexicans — who he described as federal police, not soldiers — pointed their guns only when the Americans waded into the mud in an apparent attempt to cross into Mexico.

The Mexican authorities accused the Americans of trying to recover evidence from Mexican soil and threatened to kill them if they crossed the border, prompting both sides to draw their guns, said the 16-year-old boy who asked not to be further identified for fear of reprisal.

The boy was shot late Monday by a Border Patrol agent who says he was defending himself from rock throwers along the nearly dry Rio Grande that divides Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, from El Paso, Texas.

Mexicans said they were seething over the killing of the teen Wednesday and the incident threatened to escalate tensions over migrant issues.

About 30 relatives and friends gathered late Tuesday to mourn Sergio Adrian Hernandez Huereka, whose shooting Monday evening came along the border with Texas. He died on the Mexican side of the river.

“Damn them! Damn them!” sobbed Rosario Hernandez, sister of the dead teenager, at a wake in the family’s two-room adobe house on the outskirts of Ciudad Juarez.

Preliminary reports on the incident indicated that U.S. officers on bicycle patrol “were assaulted with rocks by an unknown number of people,” Border Patrol Special Operations Supervisor Ramiro Cordero said Tuesday.

“During the assault at least one agent discharged his firearm,” he said. “The agent is currently on administrative leave. A thorough, multi-agency investigation is currently ongoing.”

The shooting happened beneath a railroad bridge linking the two nations, and late Tuesday night a banner appeared on the bridge that said in English: “U.S. Border Patrol we worry about the violence in Mex and murders and now you. Viva Mexico!”

Less than two weeks ago, Mexican migrant Anastasio Hernandez, 32, died after a Customs and Border Protection officer shocked him with a stun gun at the San Ysidro border crossing that separates San Diego and Tijuana, Mexico. The San Diego medical examiner’s office ruled that death a homicide.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon said Tuesday that his government “will use all resources available to protect the rights of Mexican migrants.”

The government “reiterates its rejection to the disproportionate use of force on the part on U.S. authorities on the border with Mexico,” the president added in a statement.

On an unpaved street, gathered around Hernandez’s gray metal casket, the teen’s family called for justice.

“There is a God, so why would I want vengeance if no one will return him to me. They killed my little boy and the only thing I ask is for the law” to be applied, said the boy’s father, Jesus Hernandez.

His mother was less hopeful. “May God forgive them because I know nothing will happen” to them, Maria Guadalupe Huereka said.

Above the casket was a photo of the youth wearing his soccer uniform and his junior high school grade cards, which showed A’s and B’s.

His mother said he was a good student who never got in trouble. He was the youngest of five children, played on two soccer teams and had just finished junior high school, she said.

The case took a testy turn when U.S. and Mexican officials traded suggestions of misconduct in the incident.

Chihuahua state officials released a statement demanding a full investigation into the death.

The boy’s sister, Rosario, told Associated Press Television News that her brother was playing with several friends and did not plan to cross the border.

“They say that they started firing from over there and suddenly hit him in the head,” she said.