Wilderness On The Border? 2

Here's some more articles on the violence along our southern border associated human and drug trafficking.

Nothing like yesterday's Al Qaeda eyes bio attack from Mexico, but indicative of the efforts to control travel routes. Travel routes that are helped, not hindered by wilderness. No motorized vehicles or mechanized equipment is allowed in wilderness areas, crippling the operation of our Border Patrol.

So again I ask: Why would any elected official propose to designate hundreds of square miles of wilderness along our border with Mexico? "It shouldn't be a surprise to anyone that terrorist organizations would utilize the border to enter the U.S." says a DEA official and yet Senators Bingaman and Udall propose to create a play pen for them on our border? Why, when other designations would protect the resource without excluding federal and state law enforcement?

The other posts yesterday were:

270 Somalis Illegaly Enter Across Mexican Border

Mexican Police Capture 18 Tons of Stolen Explosives Headed To U.S. Border

The Battle Against Mexico's Drug Lords Could Threaten America

Thousands of Mexicans Come to El Paso Fleeing Violence in Mexico

For background see my previous posts here, here, here and here

In the articles today is one on recent events in Juarez. For those not familiar with the area, it lays less than 50 miles south of where I sit writing this, just across the river from El Paso, Texas and not far from the proposed wilderness.

U.S. Issues New Travel Alert for Mexico The U.S government issued a new Travel Alert for Mexico because of the recent increase in violence there and particularly recommended to travelers that they avoid the states of Michoacan, Durango, Coahuila and Chihuahua, which are the ones that are in the most turmoil. Behind the increase in violence in Mexico is the violent conflict that has been unleashed among the drug cartels for control of trafficking routes along the border with the United States, in addition to pressure on the cartels by the security forces. The multisided conflict has claimed more than 17,000 lives in a little more than three years...

Seven Die in Shootout Between Rival Gunmen in Northern Mexico Seven people died Monday in a shootout between rival groups of gunmen in Magdalena, a city in the Mexican border state of Sonora, state police said. Police seized six AK-47 assault rifles, a shotgun and seven vehicles damaged in the shootout. Sonora is a battleground between the Sinaloa drug cartel, which has controlled the state since the 1980s, and the Gulf cartel, which is trying to grab smuggling routes into the United States, Mexican media reported (Sonora borders NM & Az)...

Six Die in Shootout Between Army and Gunmen in Northern Mexico Four suspected gunmen and two soldiers died in a shootout on a stretch of the Mexico City-Piedras Negras federal highway in northern Mexico, the Nuevo Leon state Public Safety Secretariat said. Nuevo Leon, which is on the border with the United States, is one of the Mexican states most affected by drug-related violence...

Four Gunmen Die in Clash with Mexican Troops Four gunmen died in a battle with Mexican soldiers near a city just across the border from Brownsville, Texas, the defense department said. Assailants traveling in three vehicles opened fire Thursday on a contingent of soldiers headed toward Matamoros on Highway 99 in the northeastern state of Tamaulipas, the department said. The troops returned fire, killing four of the attackers, and seized one of the vehicles, a stolen SUV found to contain four rifles and 730 rounds of ammunition. Some 30 people have died in Tamaulipas since last Sunday amid a wave of attacks attributed to a feud between the Gulf drug cartel and former allies “Los Zetas,” a band of Mexican special forces deserters turned killers-for-hire. The mayhem prompted the temporary closure of the U.S. Consulate in Reynosa, Tamaulipas, which lies across the Rio Grande from McAllen, Texas...

Juarez: Ex-police officer arrested in birthday party massacre Mexican authorities on Saturday arrested a third man in connection with the massacre at a house party last month in Juárez that left 15 people dead. Chihuahua Joint Operation officials said former municipal police officer Aldo Favio Hernández Lozano, 36, allegedly worked as a hit man for the Juárez cartel, also known as La Linea.In another development, Mexican Federal Police on Friday arrested Tiburcio Ramírez Arrellanes, who is believed to be related to and work closely with Crispín Borunda, an alleged leader of the Juárez cartel. Borunda is wanted by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration in El Paso on charges of continuing criminal enterprise and conspiracy, according to the agency's records...