Mexico death toll rises to 250
There was a violent shudder and a roar, and then the side of a volcano gave way, burying two villages under a rush of mud and flood waters.
Residents said at least 50 people were killed in the landslide in Solola, a town close to the popular tourist destination of Lake Atitlan, that remained cut off from the outside world.
It was thought to be the worst single incident in days of flooding that have killed 250 people in southern Mexico and Central America.
“We’ve been pulling bodies out for two days and we’ve found 50 in an area encompassing 100-square meters,” Lucas Ajpus, a former firefighter coordinating rescue efforts, said via cellular phone from Santiago Atitlan, near where the mudslide occurred.
“There’s still a lot to be done,” he said. “Because two towns have disappeared completely.”
Ajpus said police and soldiers had been unable to get to the area 100 km west of the capital, Guatemala City, and that “we need food, clothing, medicine and help.” He said the mudslide began Wednesday morning, and that while most residents were able to evacuate, two villages were buried.
“You look at these people who have very little and they’ve lost everything,” said 32-year-old Stephanie Jolluck, a businesswoman from Atlanta who has traveled to Guatemala for work since 1999.
Source: timesofindia.indiatimes.com
Mexico police storm steel plant, 2 shot dead
Hundreds of Mexican police stormed a major steel plant on Thursday to force out striking workers in a violent clash that spilled onto the streets and left at least two workers dead.
Steel workers and police with riot gear and shields fought a pitched battle at the Sicartsa complex, which has been closed for three weeks by workers defending a union boss whom the government accuses of graft.
Dozens were injured when some 600 police moved in firing tear gas canisters early in the morning at the plant in the western state of
Death toll reaches six, could climb in Mexico blasts
Official says 10 still hospitalized with severe burns
Mexican officials say a sixth person has died of injuries suffered in last week's fiery collision of a propane tanker and freight train in the agricultural community of Lucio Blanco, and the death toll could climb.
"There are still lot of people in very grave condition who could die in the next 15 days," said Roberto Garcia, head of the Department of Civil Protection in Matamoros. He said 10 people are hospitalized with burns over 70 percent of their bodies.
The latest victim was Rodolfo Briseno Flores,
Beyond the season of death on the US-Mexico border
When I arrived in southern Arizona in the first days of June, temperatures were in the 90s - considerably more bearable than two weeks earlier when the mercury spiked and reached 115 degrees. The heat wave marked the early beginning of another "summer of death" in Arizona's Sonoran Desert: Authorities found the bodies of 12 unauthorized immigrants in the scorched terrain stretching from Yuma in the west to Douglas in the east.
This summer has been especially deadly in Arizona as migrants are perishing - most frequently from heatstroke and dehydration -
Hurricane Stan kills 162 in Mexico, Central America
Huge mudslides, flooding and torrential rains from Hurricane Stan have killed at least 162 people in Central America and southern Mexico, rescue workers said on Wednesday.
Relentless rain pounded mountain villages and urban shanty towns across the impoverished region, and hillsides collapsed under four days of downpours.
The death toll more than doubled on Wednesday when rivers burst their banks in southern Mexico, and emergency teams found dozens more victims buried under banks of mud in remote Guatemalan towns.
By the evening, the death toll in Guatemala stood at 79 people, but the government said that
Stan Hits Central America and Mexico, 231 Deaths
The number of casualties because of hurricane Stan in Central America and Mexico has risen to 231.
Search and rescue teams in Guatemala have taken 40 bodies from the debris of a landslide caused by the hurricane and in a small coastal village 20 more people died in another landslide, reported the country’s civilian defense spokesman Benedicto Giron.
Along with the corpses found in Guatemala, the total number of hurricane victims is 231 including the death toll in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Honduras and Mexico.
Source: zaman.com
Mexican police respond to protests after death in Mexico City women's prison
Dozens of riot police on Monday poured into a women's jail in eastern Mexico City to quell protests after an inmate died of an apparent heart attack.
Protesters at Santa Martha Acatitla prison hung burning clothes from the windows along with protest signs proclaiming "no more death" and "we are innocent."
There were no injuries in the protests following the death of one inmate from natural causes, said Pedro Aguilar, a spokesman for the city corrections department.
Prison officials met in the afternoon with inmate leaders to listen to grievances.
About 1,600 inmates,
Mexico tourism rises despite hurricanes
Nearly 22 million foreign tourists visited Mexico last year, 6.5 percent more than in 2004, according to Tourism Department data.
The visitors spent a total of $11.8 billion in Mexico, the department said in a news release Saturday.
The rise in tourists came despite three ferocious hurricanes that hit last year.
Hurricanes Emily, Stan and Wilma struck the country between July and October, killing 75 people and causing $2.15 billion worth of damage.
Wilma smashed directly into Cancun, the nation's glitzy Caribbean resort, on Oct. 22, damaging hotels and clearing sand from some beaches.
More: mercurynews.com
Record deaths in U.S.-Mexico crossings
A record 460 migrants died crossing the United States-Mexico border in the last year, the U.S. Border Patrol says.
The toll was pushed higher by unusually hot temperatures and a shift of illegal migration routes through remote deserts.
The death total from Oct. 1, 2004, through Sept. 29 surpassed the previous record of 383 deaths set in 2000, according to Border Patrol statistics.
The dead were mostly Mexicans, many from the states of Mexico, Guanajuato and Veracruz, but also from the impoverished Southern states of Oaxaca and Chiapas, the Los Angeles Times said.
Migrants continue to die in automobile accidents
Mexico minister in crash had received death threats
A Mexican anti-drug minister who died in a helicopter crash last week had received death threats but his death was most likely an accident, the government said on Monday.
Public Security Minister Ramon Martin Huerta, a key figure in the government's fight against drug traffickers, and eight others were killed last Wednesday when the helicopter carrying them slammed into a fog-shrouded mountain near the capital.
"Yes, he had received death threats, like many other public servants," presidential spokesman Ruben Aguilar told reporters.
He said government officials frequently received anonymous death threats by telephone or letter.
"It's part
Mexico axes death penalty
Mexico has outlawed its long-dormant death penalty, setting itself apart from its northern neighbour - the United States.
President Vicente Fox announced the decree, based on a constitutional change approved by the Mexican Senate in a 79-2 vote last March.
"Through the reform of our constitution, the ultimate penalty has been stricken from our laws," Fox said on Friday.
Mexico last executed a prisoner in 1961, but Mexico and the US have clashed repeatedly over the years over Mexicans sentenced to die by US courts.
In 2002, Fox cancelled a visit to US President George W.
