Victim’s wife: Kidnappers’ silence ‘very cruel’

Lourdes Batista wishes she had super powers so she could use them to find her husband, she said Wednesday, 105 days after authorities said he was kidnapped in Mexico. Felix Batista, a renowned kidnapping consultant, disappeared after getting into a vehicle outside a Saltillo restaurant December 10

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Obama’s ‘Trade War’: No Truck with Mexico

The U.S. press has given the flare-up an ascending series of alarming descriptions: “a dispute that could lead to a trade war”; a “mini trade war”; and the full, flaming “Obama’s first trade war.” This month’s ban on Mexican truckers operating in U.S

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Suspected drug lord arrested in Mexico

The Mexican army has arrested a top drug cartel chief and four of his bodyguards, the government announced Wednesday. Hector Huerta Rios, also known as “La Burra” or “El Junior,” was arrested Tuesday in the city of San Pedro Garza Garcia in Nuevo Leon state, along Mexico’s border with the United States

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American, 88, freed after two months in Mexican jail

An elderly American man has been released from a Mexican jail more than two months after the grandson he was traveling with was arrested on child pornography charges, a family member said. Edward Chrisman, 88, and his grandson had traveled to Algodones, Mexico, for discount dental care, as a part of a growing trend known as medical tourism

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Joaquin Guzman Loera: Billionaire Drug Lord

You’ll no doubt recognize the names of Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and Oprah when scanning Forbes’ latest list of “The World’s Billionaires.” But amid the various business tycoons, A-list celebs and royal heirs on the annual roll call is someone known mainly by members of Mexico’s seedy underground and the police officers who chase them: Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman Loera. The 54-year-old, 5’6” drug lord is considered the country’s most wanted criminal. And because his Sinaloa cartel trafficks billions of dollars’ worth of cocaine to the U.S

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Mexican drug lord makes Forbes’ billionaire list

What do software mogul Bill Gates and banking investor Warren Buffett have in common with wanted Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman Loera? They are all featured in Forbes magazine’s world’s billionaires report as “self-made” billionaires. Guzman Loera, whose nickname means Shorty, escaped from a Mexican prison in 2001

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Mexico pours troops into border city stricken by drug war

Nearly 7,000 Mexican soldiers and federal police arrived in the U.S.-Mexico border city of Ciudad Juarez this week to restore security to a city plagued by a long-standing, bloody drug war. Random vehicle checkpoints, patrols of masked soldiers and police in SWAT gear are some of the signs of the massive military buildup ordered by Mexico’s president, Ciudad Juarez police spokesman Jaime Torres Valadez said Thursday. Another 1,500 soldiers are expected to join the 3,500 that rolled into Juarez earlier this week to support municipal police in street patrols and ultimately take control of their operations, Torres said

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20 dead in Mexico prison riot, official says

A prison riot Wednesday in the troubled Mexican border town of Juarez left 20 dead and 15 wounded, an official said. None of the dead were police or military officials, said Enrique Torres, a spokesman for the joint operation at the Cereso Estatal de Ciudad Juarez prison. Authorities called in 200 federal police agents and 50 army soldiers to help put down the riot; two helicopters and an airplane also were employed, he said.

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Behind the Troop Surge at the U.S.-Mexico Border

The ebbing stretch of Rio Grande that divides the Texas city of El Paso from the Mexican city of Juarez may soon become one of the world’s most militarized borders. This week, as Texas Governor Rick Perry went to El Paso to announce that has asked Washington for 1,000 more “boots on the ground” to enforce the border, Mexico’s government ordered 5,000 extra soldiers to Juarez. The armies massing on both sides of the border are marching against a common foe — drug cartels — and the coming months will be a crucial test as to whether they can effectively work together to fight it

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