10 killed after prison dispute spills over into streets of Ciudad Juárez

By

-

August 12, 2022

At least 20 stores were attacked throughout the city on Thursday, resulting in the death of at least two people at an Oxxo convenience store.

At least 10 people were killed in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Thursday during a day of violence that began with a brawl between imprisoned members of rival criminal gangs.

At least two state prison inmates were killed before the violence spilled over into the streets of the northern border city, where eight other people were murdered and businesses and vehicles were set on fire. Reports indicated that 10 to 15 people were injured.

The wave of violence began in the early afternoon when a fight between members of rival criminal factions affiliated with the Sinaloa Cartel broke out in the Cereso No. 3 prison. Some of the feuding prisoners are believed to be members of Los Chapitos – a Sinaloa Cartel cell led by the sons of notorious drug lord Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán – while others allegedly belong to a gang called Los Mexicles.

Chihuahua authorities said that two inmates were killed during the confrontation, but the newspaper Reforma reported three deaths and said that two of the victims were members of Los Mexicles. Witnesses cited by El Universal said that some inmates used armas blancas (nonexplosive weapons such as knives) in the melee, while others relied solely on their fists. Four prisoners were injured.

Radio presenter Alan González and three other radio station employees were among those killed. They were shot by an armed group while reporting live on air.

The brawl occurred during visiting time at the prison, meaning that inmates’ family members witnessed the outbreak of violence. One woman indicated that a group of men entered the prison from outside and initiated the fight.

“It appeared that the devil came in,” she said. “… We want the authorities to tell us how it is that there is no security and anyone can enter the prison.”

Authorities said the prison brawl had been brought under control by 4 p.m., at which time a spate of attacks in different parts of Ciudad Juárez was just beginning.

Armed men opened fire near a pizza restaurant in the city’s east side, killing four people and wounding one other, according to municipal police. The victims were radio station employees who were broadcasting live from outside the pizzeria.

Ciudad Juárez vivió la jornada más violenta del año, la cual se inició con una riña en un penal, más tarde hubo quema de comercios y ataques armados; al menos hay nueve muertos. Info: https://t.co/OHrWNxf3Lc pic.twitter.com/yapB7wl5pM

— La Jornada (@lajornadaonline) August 12, 2022

Video footage of the attacks, shared by the newspaper La Jornada. This video includes violent images.

According to El Universal, two women were murdered at an OXXO convenience store in a neighborhood in the border city’s southeast. One of the women was an employee of the store while the other was dropping off a job application.

El Universal said that armed attacks at a gas station and another OXXO store left two other people dead. Reforma reported that arson attacks and/or gun violence occurred at at least 20 stores as well as OXXOs, food businesses and gas stations. Vehicles were torched to create fiery narco-blockades in different parts of the city.

Chihuahua Governor Maru Campos condemned the violence in a Twitter post Thursday night. “I deeply regret the loss of human life in this atrocious event against Ciudad Juárez this afternoon,” she wrote.

“I condemn the violent acts that occurred. … I reiterate my commitment to working to the best of my strengths and capacity to guarantee the well-being of Ciudad Juárez residents.”

With reports from El Universal and Reforma

Restoration work proceeds at 18th century Querétaro mission

By

Lydia Carey

-

August 11, 2022

0

A restorationist at work on the mission's facade.

Restoration work is under way that the Santa Maria del Agua Mission in the town of Landa de Matamoras, Querétaro. The Franciscan mission was one of a series of five Catholic missions built between 1750 and 1770 as part of a grand plan to evangelize the native peoples of the hard-to-access region.

By the time the missions were built, the Spanish colonizers had had several setbacks with local populations destroying any structures or settlements they managed to establish in the region. Franciscan monk Junípero Serra is generally credited with the idea to build the five consecutive missions even though other monks, including Miguel de la Campa de Landa, were involved in their construction and management.

Serra is also said to have invested himself in the well-being of the local populations, their issues, and their health as a kind of early liberation theologist, but the historical record shows that most of the local communities were never fully subjugated by the colonialists or by the Catholic Church.

The Santa María del Agua Mission consists of a complex of buildings surrounded by an outer wall that encircles an open-air atrium with a raised cross at its center. The church itself, like its fellow missions, is known for its Mexican Baroque style and has an impressive facade that includes images of the angels, cherubs, apostles, and martyrs, as well as St. Michael the Archangel vanquishing the devil.

A front view of the mission under restoration in Landa de Matamoros.

The 7.5-million-peso (US $376,000) government-funded restoration project required a particular amount of care and attention as the collection of missions was named a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2003. Local officials are hoping that the newly restored mission will draw even more religious tourists to this part of Querétaro state.

The area is also well known for the La Joya de Hielo, an area inside local communal lands that is home to 100-million-year-old marine fossils on public display.

With reports from Agencia Informativa de México

Reports of hazing continue at teachers college where student died

By

MND Staff

-

August 11, 2022

0

It's not the first time the school has been in the spotlight for abusive treatment of new students.

A Durango teachers college is facing accusations that hazing is still occurring on its grounds four years after a 19-year-old student died due to injuries he sustained during degrading initiation rituals.

The college at the center of the scandal is the J. Guadalupe Aguilera Rural Normal School in the municipality of Canatlán, located north of Durango city.

In August 2018, Ronaldo Mujica Nevárez died of head injuries he sustained during hazing at the school. Now, several new students have reported being forced to participate in hazing rituals at the same college.

One student from the municipality of Guadalupe Victoria reported that his human rights were violated during the school’s recent induction week. During a period of two days, he said he was only allowed to eat once and that older students stripped him in the morning and forced him to dance in the nude. The student’s mother said that her son was also forced to go without sleep for three consecutive nights.

In 2018, 10-year-old Ronaldo Mujica Nevárez died of head injuries after being hazed. — In 2018, 19-year-old Ronaldo Mujica Nevárez died of head injuries after being hazed at the same teachers college.

According to the mayor-elect of Guadalupe Victoria, the young man managed to call his mother and arranged for her to pick him up. “He lied, saying that his grandfather had cancer, so they would allow him to leave the institution. His mom found him dehydrated and low in glucose. She took him to a hospital to be stabilized,” David Ramos Zepeda, a former state deputy, told the newspaper El Sol de Durango.

He asserted that the school hasn’t learned from the recommendations issued after the death of Mujica, who died in a Canatlán hospital.

The father of a new student from Gómez Palacio told El Sol that his son was also a hazing victim. According to a report by that newspaper, the student and six others left the teacher’s college on Monday after being subjected to brutal treatment during their induction. The young men were reportedly stripped of their belongings, verbally abused and forced to carry out strenuous physical work under a blazing sun. More extreme physical activity followed at night before older students sent the newbies to sleep on the floor.

The abusive seniors consumed alcohol and drugs as they subjected the new arrivals to demeaning hazing rites, according to the student from Gómez Palacio.

Despite the testimony of the new students, the director of the school denied that hazing occurs at the college she leads. Academic, sporting and cultural activities are the focus of the school’s induction week, Alma Guadalupe Salazar Castañeda said.

She acknowledged that new students do cleaning and maintenance work at the school and elsewhere in the municipality, but rejected claims that they were mistreated. They carry out such work to strengthen their character and make a contribution to society, Salazar said.

Asked by El Sol about the case involving the Guadalupe Victoria student, the college director asserted it was false that students are deprived of food, explaining that they can access cooked meals in a kitchen area.

In a message directed to parents, Salazar said: “Rest assured that I’m your eyes [in the school] and I’m attentive [to what’s happening]. I’m also a mother, … I invite you [to come to the school] and verify the conditions.”

Miguel Estrada, a state education official with responsibility for Durango’s teacher-training colleges, also asserted that hazing no longer takes place at the school in Canatlán. He bluntly told a press conference that the inappropriate and violent treatment of new students has been eradicated.

However, Estrada later conceded that “we don’t know exactly what happened” during the recent induction week at the college. “We’re waiting for a detailed report from the institution’s director,” he said.

With reports from El Sol de Durango

Ignorant, inefficient and inept: bishop has low opinion of political leaders

By

MND Staff

-

August 11, 2022

0

Miguel Ángel Alba Díaz, Bishop of La Paz, Baja California Sur.

The bishop of La Paz, Baja California Sur, has delivered a scathing assessment of Mexico’s political leaders, describing them as ignorant, inefficient, ineffective and inept.

Bishop Miguel Ángel Alba Díaz issued the rebuke during a Mass earlier this week for victims of violence and their families. Baja California Sur, currently governed by Mexico’s ruling Morena party, is now one of Mexico’s safest states, but it was plagued by violent crime as recently as the second half of the last decade.

In a contemptuous homily, Alba charged that the nation’s political leaders are “ignorant, inefficient and ineffective.”

He didn’t name any names, but it was apparent that President López Obrador was one of the targets of his criticism.

“[Mexico’s leaders] are good at talking, … they can have us laughing with our mouths open every day, but they’re inept at governing,” he said.

The bishop attacked political leaders and governments for failures in a range of areas including healthcare, public security, education and the economy. They haven’t ended corruption or inequality, he bemoaned.

“Nothing. [They’re] inept. They knew how to win over the people but they don’t know how to govern them,” Alba said.

The bishop went on to accuse politicians of putting their own interests and those of their political parties first.

The bishop did not name names, but mentioned several states led by Morena politicians like Colima Governor Indira Vizcaíno Silva.

“We see them laughing at all the campaign closing events of all the candidates of their parties in all the states: in Colima, in Nayarit, in Guerrero,” Alba said, mentioning three states currently governed by Morena.

“They’re they are, laughing and laughing with all all the candidates of their parties. … There are no medicines, [there are budget] cuts and republican austerity but there are resources for [political events], for [political leaders] and for all the bootlickers that accompany them,” he said.

“Our country is dripping with blood, enough already,” Alba added. “We’ve gone to the men [in power] asking for justice and peace, asking them to contain the high levels of criminality that exist in our homeland but our authorities haven’t known how to respond.”

Alba advised his congregation to pray for those in power, to ask God to give them the wisdom they currently lack and to purify them of the corruption that has invaded their souls. He suggested that a lot of politicians are in cahoots with organized crime, an accusation that a former Morena lawmaker made against López Obrador earlier this year.

“Perhaps a lot of … [politicians] owe their positions to [criminal] gangs that supported them with money, with resources, with violence. In how many states are narco-elections and narco-governments spoken about? … Let’s pray for our authorities,” Alba said.

The bishop has previously criticized the Baja California Sur government for not doing enough to combat crime in the state, a move that triggered a war of words with Governor Víctor Manuel Castro Cosío.

Alba is far from the first Catholic Church leader to be critical of Morena, the federal government and López Obrador, who openly professes his Christian faith. In 2020, Cardinal Juan Sandoval Íñiguez accused the president of leading Mexico into communism, while Cuernavaca Bishop Ramón Castro Castro earlier this year described the government’s non-confrontational “hugs, not bullets” security strategy as “demagoguery and to some extent complicity.”

Several Catholic priests last year urged citizens to vote against Morena at elections, prompting the federal government to issue a statement calling on all religious figures to stay out of politics.

With reports from Zeta Tijuana

Indigenous artisans in Guerrero have their own Barbie doll

By

Lydia Carey

-

August 11, 2022

0

Artisans display the Xochistlahuaca Barbie and Ken dolls in traditional dress, along with other products.

The world’s most famous toy doll now has her own outfits in the style of the traditional dress of the Amuzgo women of Guerrero.

A group of women from Xochistlahuaca in southeastern Guerrero has long been dedicated to making traditional clothing for men and women that include colorfully embroidered shirts, skirts, and huipiles — a boxy traditional shirt worn by many women throughout the country.

Susana Martínez de Jesús, one of the group’s members, remembers sewing from the time she was a child and had to steal thread from her mother because “thread was expensive and they didn’t let children play with it,” but, she said, it was the only way to start to learn how to sew and embroider.

Martínez de Jesús said that several years ago, the mayor approached the women to make something that could be given to visitors at the local traditional culture fair and only requested that it be beautiful and represent the traditional arts of the town. The women decided to make outfits for the Mattel dolls Barbie and Ken in the local style, with intricately embroidered patterns and designs.

“It was difficult work,” says Martínez de Jesús, “because if making a garment of normal size is difficult, working in miniature is even more difficult, nevertheless, we made them and presented them and the comments from the public were really encouraging, they really liked them.”

The dolls were a huge success and the women have continued making and selling them, hoping that their children will see themselves in their newly dressed dolls and feel proud of their heritage. While Barbie has worn the trappings of hundreds of different careers and personalities, this is quite possibly the first time she will be dressed in traditional, handmade garments from Mexico.

With reports from El Sol de Acapulco

First it was tacos, now it’s bread: prices surge as inflation hits highest level in 22 years

By

MND Staff

-

August 11, 2022

0

Shelves of a Mexican bakery, filled with different kinds of sweet bread. Behind, people look in the window. — A traditional Mexican panadería. Wikimedia Commons CC BY 2.5

The announcement earlier this week that inflation in Mexico has reached its highest rate in 22 years included some follow-up reporting that it’s costing people more money to buy bolillos, doughnuts and loaves of Bimbo bread.

“First the tacos and now the tortas,” screamed a headline in the newspaper El Heraldo — alluding to a report last week predicting that a kilo of tortillas will cost 30 pesos by the end of the year.

Now comes word from Anpropan, Mexico’s national association of bread suppliers, that prices at panaderías and in the bread aisle at supermarkets will increase 8% over the second half of 2022.

This is due to a sustained rise in the cost of raw materials needed for the production of bread, namely flour, eggs, and gas or electricity to run the oven.

One factor is that international wheat prices have risen due to the war between Russia and Ukraine, since they are two of the world’s largest producers, noted Iñaki Apaolaza, a member of the Anpropan board. Another factor is that Mexico’s bakery industry gets 70% of the wheat it uses from the United States, El Heraldo reported.

Last month, Grupo Bimbo announced it would raise the prices of its products — including Tía Rosa, Milpa Real, Saníssimo and Mexican-produced Wonder bread — starting on July 18. And that was on top of roughly 10-peso increases that already occurred in 2021, as reported in the newspaper El Financiero.

An informal Mexico News Daily survey of prices on Thursday at Walmart Express, Soriana and Chedraui showed regular-sized Bimbo loaves (610-680 grams) at 42 to 43.60 pesos for pan blanco, 48.50 to 56 pesos for pan integral and 52 to 61 pesos for Cero Cero (zero added fat and sugar). These prices were found online and might include built-in delivery costs.

A survey by El Heraldo that included a regular panadería and a Walmart panadería showed prices, on average, of 2 pesos for a bolillo, 9.5 pesos for a croissant, 10 pesos for a biscuit and 14.50 pesos for a chocolate doughnut, but did note that a chocolate doughnut can reach as much as 20 pesos.

A supermarket aisle filled with Bimbo bread loaves. — It’s not just small businesses feeling the pinch: Grupo Bimbo bread products will also see price increases.

According to Anpropan, Mexicans annually consume 36 kilos (79 lbs.) of bread per capita, which is nearly three times the Canadian average of 29.8 lbs. per year and more than twice the U.S. average of 37.4 lbs. per year, based on data from 2016 and 2017, respectively.

Mexican bread baker Ana Laura told El Heraldo that she has been forced to raise the prices on her small products by one or two pesos each, especially on items that require sugar.

“Sugar, eggs and milk, the basics for making biscuits, have risen in price,” she said. “We would like to avoid raising the prices, but we would lose profits. We have discussed the increases with customers, telling them it’s because we do not want to lower quality.”

Earlier this week, it was announced that general inflation in Mexico was at 8.15% in July, its highest since the 9.12% rate in July 2000. Last year’s annual rate was 5.81%, according to the National Consumer Price Index, and this year’s annual rate by year’s end “could reach 8.7%,” according to Gabriela Siller, director of economic analysis at Banco Base.

While the administration of President López Obrador has announced measures to control inflation and hold down food prices, the rising costs of basic grocery items are putting a pinch on many. The newspaper El País reported the following price increases from June to July: the cost of eggs went up 8.3%, oranges 15.5%, potatoes 12% and green tomatoes 20.4%.

In addition, El Heraldo reported finding tortillas for 27 pesos per kilo in Sonora. Before the pandemic hit in 2020, the average cost nationwide was about 13 to 14 pesos per kilo, and at this time last year, it was just starting to climb over 20 pesos. “Inflation has hit the Mexican economy hard and experts point out that the worst will come at the end of August and the entire month of September,” the newspaper wrote.

With reports from El País and El Heraldo

20 dead turtles were victims of illegal fishing nets

By

Lydia Carey

-

August 11, 2022

0

The dead sea turtles bore signs of injuries from fishing nets.

The Fund for the Protection of Marine Resources (Fonmar) is asking the community of Todos Santos, Baja California Sur, for their support after 20 sea turtles were found dead on local beaches.

The official complaint to Fonmar came from the local organization Grupo Tortuguero de Todos Santos A.C., a group dedicated to the protection of local sea turtles and the beaches that serve as their nesting grounds each year. Members of the group found 20 dead sea turtles on the beach at the end of July that had apparently been caught in fishermen’s nets and were unable to free themselves.

Worldwide, hundreds of sea turtles are killed by ocean trash each year: some are caught in abandoned fishing gear, tangled in the plastic rings of six-packs, or swallow plastic bags and other debris, according to a worldwide survey carried out by the University of Exeter.

The type of gillnet the turtles were tangled in is illegal in this part of Baja California Sur, but authorities have already found three of them in the water in the past three months according to the local representative of the community of El Cardonal, Belén Meza Sandez. Meza said the nets are placed in the water in the evenings and collected again in the morning by fishermen that live far from the community.

The summer season is especially crucial for sea turtles in the area, as they return en masse each year to lay their eggs on the beaches of their own birth. In one week alone, 100 olive ridley sea turtle nests were found in the Cabo del Este region, according to Enedino Castillo García, the president of Grupo Tortuguero.

Martín Inzunza Tamayo, the head of Fonmar, said that the agency would be working with the local community to preserve the turtles and protect the area but gave no specific details as to their plans.

With reports from BCS Noticias and El Sudcaliforniano

Mine rescue efforts hampered by obstacles blocking access by divers

By

MND Staff

-

August 11, 2022

0

An army diver descends into the mine. Pedro Pardo

Army divers on Wednesday entered a flooded coal mine where 10 miners have been trapped since August 3, but their rescue efforts were impeded by obstacles blocking access to the area where the men are located.

The miners have now been trapped in the El Pinabete mine in the Coahuila municipality of Sabinas for over a week. The mine, which flooded when excavation work caused a tunnel wall to collapse, only began operating in January. Authorities haven’t established whether the men are still alive.

On Wednesday, army divers entered and exited the mine on several occasions via a 60-meter shaft leading to one of its wells. One of the divers subsequently reported that tunnels leading to the part of the mine where the miners are located are blocked with wood and rocks.

“We can’t get in, [access] is blocked. It’s completely collapsed,” he said.

Civil Protection officials and rescue workers at El Pinabete mine. Coordinación Nacional de Protección Civil

Coahuila Governor Miguel Riquelme acknowledged his remarks in a Twitter post, writing that “one of the divers who went down to Well No. 4 explained that there are still obstacles to entering” the part of the mine where the miners are located.

“The pumping work will continue so that they can enter again and continue with the search and rescue,” he said.

Family members of the trapped miners, who have set up a camp at the mine site, were left disappointed by the lack of progress in the rescue mission. Some burst into tears when they heard about the impediment the divers faced, the newspaper Reforma reported.

However, the families are still holding out hope that the men will be found alive, although they know that that possibility diminishes with each passing minute.

“It’s been a very long, very painful, very nerve-wracking wait,” Magdalena Montelongo Pérez, sister of one of the missing miners, told the newspaper El Universal.

She praised the work of the rescue teams and stressed that her family still has hope that the miners will be found alive.

Montelongo said her brother, Jaime Montelongo, had retired but decided to go back to work because he still felt up to the job in a physical sense.

“He knew of the risks and dangers,” Montelongo said. “… He used to say, ‘one goes down [to the mine] … but he doesn’t know whether he’ll return.’”

In 2010, Plutarco Ruiz Loredo was trapped in another Coahuila mine for seven days. Now, he's camped outside the flooded El Pinabete mine, waiting for news about a family member. — In 2010, Plutarco Ruiz Loredo was trapped in another Coahuila mine for a week. Now, he’s camped outside the flooded El Pinabete mine, waiting for news about a family member. Noticias NRT

Plutarco Ruiz Loredo, a former miner who was trapped in a flooded Coahuila mine for seven days 12 years ago, was at the El Pinabete mine last week because his granddaughter’s husband is one of the 10 trapped miners.

“I hope they had the opportunity I had [to go] to a high part” of the mine, he told El Universal. “… I hope they had time to take shelter [from the water].”

Ruiz said that all miners know they have to get to a high part of the mine when a flood occurs. He also said that it’s almost certain that miners will be involved in an accident at some stage of their career. “It’s very risky work,” Ruiz said.

Last week’s incident at the El Pinabete mine occurred just over a year after a mine was flooded in the neighboring municipality of Múzquiz, where seven miners were trapped, all of whom died.

Sixty-five miners died in an explosion at another Coahuila coal mine in 2006. Only two bodies were recovered after that disaster.

With reports from Reforma and El Universal

US Embassy issues travel alert for Guanajuato after Jalisco Cartel violence

By

MND Staff

-

August 11, 2022

0

A car on fire in Celaya, Guanajuato. — A car on fire in Celaya, Guanajuato, Tuesday night.

The United States Embassy has issued a travel alert for the state of Guanajuato in the wake of a wave of attacks perpetrated by the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG).

“Following numerous confirmed acts of violence on August 9, including arson of buildings and vehicles, U.S. citizens are reminded to reconsider travel to Guanajuato state due to crime,” the alert issued Wednesday said.

The United States Department of State has for some time advised U.S. citizens to reconsider travel to Guanajuato, Mexico’s most violent state.

The publication of the embassy alert came a day after the CJNG went on a rampage in Jalisco and Guanajuato Tuesday evening in response to a military operation that was reported to have resulted in the arrest of criminal suspects, including Ricardo Ruiz Velasco, an alleged CJNG leader in western Mexico and the Bajío region.

fires in Zapopan, Jalisco — The U.S. Consulate General in Guadalajara also issued a temporary security alert Tuesday after related violence in Zapopan, Jalisco, part of the Guadalajara metropolitan area.

President López Obrador said Wednesday that leaders of the CJNG had been apprehended but on Thursday clarified there had been no arrests after all.

In Guanajuato, scores of businesses — including at least 25 OXXO convenience stores and three pharmacies — were torched, 50 vehicles were set on fire and two people were murdered, according to the newspaper El Sol de Irapuato, which also reported that 11 presumed criminals were arrested in the state. One of the murder victims was the driver of a tractor-trailer who attempted to evade armed men who tried to stop his truck on the Irapuato-Abasolo highway. He and a passenger fled after the men opened fire, wounding both. The driver died later in hospital.

In Jalisco, at least 11 vehicles were torched, a 7-Eleven store was attacked, five people were arrested and a presumed criminal was killed, the newspaper said.

The embassy alert also said that “until further notice, U.S. government employees have been restricted from traveling on highway 45 from Irapuato to the cities of Silao and León in the state of Guanajuato.” In addition, the alert informed U.S. government employees that they “may not travel to the area south of and including Federal Highway 45D, Celaya, Salamanca and Irapuato.”

“Gang violence, often associated with the theft of petroleum and natural gas from the state oil company [Pemex] and other suppliers, occurs in Guanajuato, primarily in the south and central areas of the state. Of particular concern is the high number of murders in the southern region of the state associated with cartel-related violence.”

The United States Consulate General in Guadalajara issued a security alert on Tuesday due to what it described as “multiple road blockades, burning vehicles, and shootouts between Mexican security forces and unspecified criminal elements in various parts of the Guadalajara metropolitan area.”

The consulate said it had instructed employees to shelter in place but advised Wednesday that the instruction was no longer in effect.

FEMSA, a Coca-Cola bottler and owner of OXXO, said that of its 25 convenience stores affected in Guanajuato, all were either completely or partially burned. Twenty are in Irapuato alone, while three are in Celaya and two are in León.

FEMSA said that none of its employees or customers were injured in the attacks.

Oxxo fire set by organized crime n Guanajuato, Mexico — The FEMSA company, which owns Mexico’s OXXOs, said 25 of its franchises in Guanajuato were completely or partially burned, the majority in Irapuato.

President López Obrador confirmed Wednesday that the violence in Jalisco and Guanajuato was triggered by an army operation in the former state.

“There was a meeting of two [criminal] groups, and the Defense Ministry arrived, soldiers arrived … and there was a confrontation, there were arrests. This is what caused the protests, the burning of vehicles, not just in Jalisco but also in Guanajuato,” he said.

Arson attacks — including the torching of vehicles to create fiery narco-blockades — occurred in two municipalities in Jalisco and 14 in Guanajuato, according to El Sol de Irapuato. David Saucedo, a Guanajuato-based security analyst, said that Guanajuato is the CJNG’s second bastion after its home state of Jalisco.

He recently published a “cartel war map” that showed that the CJNG has strongholds in Guanajuato city, León — the state’s largest city — and other important cities, such as Irapuato, Salamanca and San Miguel de Allende.

The cartel, led by Nemesio “El Mencho” Oseguera Cervantes, is believed to have a presence in at least 25 of Guanajuato’s 46 municipalities and 28 of Mexico’s 32 federal entities.

Saucedo told El Sol that Irapuato is the cartel’s operational epicenter in Guanajuato because its location is convenient for receiving drugs from Jalisco and moving them to other parts of the state. He attributed Tuesday’s narco-blockades in Jalisco and Guanajuato and the attacks on OXXO stores to various cells of the CJNG.

In his cartel war map, Saucedo noted that the CJNG’s “invasion” of Guanajuato began in 2014. Its main rival in the state is the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel, which began as a fuel theft gang but has diversified into other criminal activities.

With reports from El Universal and El Sol de Irapuato

Residents paint homes with crosses to ward off feared sorcerer

By

MND Staff

-

August 10, 2022

0

The belief that a supernatural being is lurking nearby has led some residents of a Morelos town to paint white crosses on their homes for protection.

Some Cocoyoc residents say they began hearing strange noises in the early hours of the morning two weeks ago. As they couldn’t attribute the noises to an animal or any other source, they concluded they were made by a nagual (or nahual), which in Mesoamerican folk religion is a human being who has the power to transform, or shape-shift, into an animal.

“First it was a few residents who started … [talking about the noises] and then, as days passed, more people asserted they had heard the same thing,” Luis Salgado, a Cocoyoc local, told the newspaper El Sol de Cuautla.

At some point, one person suggested that the noises were made by a nagual and other residents agreed. They concluded that they needed to do something to ward off the supernatural being so they decided to paint white crosses on their homes.

The crosses mainly appeared on homes on Buenos Aires Street, where Salgado says violent incidents have occurred. However, in recent days, fear of the nagual has extended to other parts of Cocoyoc, a town about 30 kilometers east of Cuernavaca in the municipality of Yautepec. Residents are so afraid that they are staying inside after 10 p.m., El Sol said.

News of the Cocoyoc resident’s belief and photographs of the white crosses on people’s doors and windows went viral on social media, triggering a range of responses, including mockery, and even leading to the creation of nagual memes. Salgado spoke out in defense of the belief, noting that the town – part of a region of Morelos where indigenous Nahua people live – is governed by the indigenous governing code known as usos y costumbres.

Gustavo Garibay, a historian, also observed that traditional beliefs remain strong in Cocoyoc.

“Sometimes we forget that … Cocoyoc is a town with a Nahua tradition. This cultural influence prevails in ideas and healing ritual beliefs. Let’s not forget that Cocoyoc is a cultural stronghold where until relatively recently there were still practices of magic and [traditional] healers,” he said.

Another town where fear of the nagual overtook residents is Soledad del Doblado, Veracruz, where men, women and children armed with rocks, shovels and guns ventured out of their homes in August 2020 to attempt to kill or drive away the mythical creature.

A nahual, whose name comes from a Náhuatl word used to describe the purported ability of individuals to transform into animals or natural phenomena, is believed to use its power for either good or evil depending on its personality.

“Whether they use their powers for the benefit or detriment of others wholly depends on whether the individual’s personality … is benevolent or malevolent,” according to an article by Mexican digital publisher Cultura Colectiva.

With reports from El Sol de Cuautla and Plumas Atómicas