Sad state of the Mexican press

The drug war in Mexico has claimed the lives of at least 56 reporters in the last five years; 90 percent of the media-related crimes go unpunished, according to a recent report from the Committee to Protect Journalists. In response, one newspaper to ask the drug lords what exactly they want it to publish. From the New York Times:

It was by turns defiant and deferential, part plea and part plaint, a message as much to the drug gangs with a firm grip on Ciudad Juárez, the bloodiest city in Mexico’s drug battles, as to the authorities and their perceived helplessness.

“We want you to explain to us what you want from us,” the front-page editorial in El Diario in Ciudad Juárez asked the leaders of organized crime. “What are we supposed to publish or not publish, so we know what to abide by. You are at this time the de facto authorities in this city because the legal authorities have not been able to stop our colleagues from falling.”

In Mexico’s drug wars, it is hard to pinpoint new lows as the atrocities and frustrations mount. But Ciudad Juárez belongs in its own category, with thousands killed each year, the exodus of tens of thousands of residents, the spectacle of the biggest national holiday last week observed in a square virtually devoid of anybody but the police and soldiers, and the ever-present fear of random death.

The question now is whether anyone there will dare to continue documenting the turmoil in Ciudad Juárez, a smuggling crossroads across from El Paso that is battled over by at least two major criminal organizations.

The Committee to Protect Journalists is meeting with President Felipe Calderon on Wednesday to discuss the constant and dire threat journalists face. The group's report on journalists deaths in Mexico is here.

Bring out your dead

The drug wars in Mexico have left thousands of people dead - often the result of gruesome killings - and one tabloid, El Nuevo Alarma!, has made it its business to feed the appetite of readers who want to see the gory aftermath.

From the Daily Beast:

With every ritual execution, with every decapitation, the editors of Mexican tabloids like El Nuevo Alarma! (warning: graphic photos) snap into action. Alarma! is Mexico’s most shameless tabloid, like the New York Post with one-100th of the editorial discretion. Since 1963, Alarma! has specialized in publishing graphic photos of Mexico’s dead, and, now, the drug cartels have handed the paper an unending stream of bodies. “Ellas También,” reads the cover headline of a recent issue, alongside the photo of two youngish women who had been murdered by the cartel that calls itself La Familia. The editor, Miguel Ángel Rodriguez Vazquez, told me the photo piqued his interest, because it’s not every day he sees a woman so casually executed.

-snip-

Alarma! is a weekly newspaper. It claims a circulation of 80,000, with 15,000 to 20,000 of those copies sold in the United States—the bulk of them in southern California, Texas and New York.

Easter earthquake*

A long, rolling temblor felt here in Los Angeles but centered in Baja, Mexico, south of Mexicali. Hit about 3:40 p.m. Pacific. Initial measurements put it at magnitude 6.9.

*Update: The USGS has revised the earthquake to a magnitude 7.2 centered 38 miles south of Mexicali. Two relatively big aftershocks, one 5.4 and the other 5.1, hit nearby. Imperial, California, also got rattled by a 5.1-magnitude temblor at 4:15 p.m.

The dangers of reporting south of the border

The Los Angeles Times had a chilling piece earlier this week about the perils of being a reporter covering Mexico's drug wars:

The government assigned bodyguards to the crime reporter for El Tiempo newspaper in Durango, but as time wore on and there were so many other crises, the escorts were withdrawn. A couple of days later, he was snatched by gunmen; his strangled, bruised body was discovered at nightfall.

With the corpse was a hand-scrawled message: "This happened to me for giving information to soldiers and writing too much."

Antuna, who died last month, was the third journalist killed in Durango since May and one of as many as 12 reporters and media workers slain in Mexico this year...

Leader of Sinoloa cartel killed by Mexican authorities

The Los Angeles Times reports that Arturo Beltran Leyva, the leader of Mexico's largest drug cartel, was killed today by Mexican forces. The story is here.

Rolling Stone shrinks

Rolling Stone Mexico is kaput.

Mi guerra es su guerra*

Unlike here, Mexico's 'war on drugs' looks like a war. Since the start of 2007, the country has recorded 6,836 drug-related deaths. The staggering numbers are only eclipsed by the savagery of the killers. While the violence has so far stopped at the border, the war's roots run deep inside the U.S.

Fortunately the Los Angeles Times has decided to devote serious resources to covering Mexico's drug war, despite cuts in other areas of international reporting. The stories from reporters Richard Marosi, Tracy Wilkinson, Ken Ellingwood, Sam Quinones and others are collected here.

*UPDATED: The latest story comes Sam Quinones, who looks at a 2007 massacre at a Monterrey, Mexico jewelry store. The killers left four people dead and didn't take a thing. Video included.