Mexico purges top police in battle against corruption

Mexico purges top police in battle against corruption
By David Usborne in New York
Published: 28 June 2007
Independent UK

Mexico has launched an unprecedented purge of its top police officers as the latest step in its increasingly high-stakes campaign to combat the drugs cartels and end a gruesome wave of narcotics-related violence.

Summarily removed from their posts, at least for the time being, are 284 federal police chiefs spread across every state of the country. Each of them will be extensively vetted for corruption and possible ties to the cartels and their ruthless gangs of enforcers.

Since taking office in December, Felipe Calderon, Mexico's President, has taken increasingly bold measures to tackle one of his country's most intractable problems - the unabated activities of the drug lords and the corruption within law enforcement that protects them from arrest.

It is a crusade that has drawn wide applause from most Mexicans, who are tired of the bloodshed spawned by the drugs trade, as well as from the United States government. However, there is so far no evidence that the assault is slowing the distribution of drugs. Nor has it quieted the violence.

Replaced for now by agents who have been extensively screened for their integrity, the suspended officers will be required to take drugs tests and undergo lie-detector tests. Their relatives and friends will be interrogated and their financial assets examined.

The death toll last year from drugs-related killings reached 2,000 and could be higher this year. Grisly discoveries in towns as far apart as Monterrey, Acapulco, Veracruz and Mexico City are reported almost daily. Beheadings of gang soldiers are commonplace. One killing was shown on a video that turned up on on the web site YouTube. Last month, a top-ranking narcotics investigations chief was gunned down in one of Mexico City's wealthiest neighbourhoods.

Corruption in the police is hardly a new problem in Mexico. It was highlighted in 2004 with the arrests of a regional intelligence director and 26 other officers in Cancun following the killings of seven people, including three federal agents.

Mr Calderon has been nothing if not relentless. He has deployed 24,000 army officers and federal agents to areas most affected by violence. Early this year, the army virtually took over law enforcement in the border city of Tijuana after all local police officers were accused of protecting the cartels.

Critics doubt whether the war can be won with so much money at stake. About 75 per cent of all the cocaine consumed in the US is smuggled through Mexico, generating up to $24bn (£12bn) in profits for the traffickers, who spend $3bn a year corrupting officials. The risks for Mr Calderon could even extend to his own safety - he has admitted to receiving death threats.

Alex Sanchez, a Mexico analyst at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs in Washington, said: "The problem is the way the cartels are structured. Taking out one guy... just leaves a vacuum that others fight to fill. There is a perpetual cycle of violence."