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Mexico’s traditional and indigenous community police forces are coming under increasingly deadly fire from drug cartels, authorities said Monday.
Adrián López, the chief prosecutor in the western state of Michoacan, confirmed that gunmen linked to drug cartels shot dead seven members of a community police force in the city of Coahuayana over the weekend.
The community watchdog was killed just days after seven members of the Indigenous community police force were kidnapped, apparently by cartel gunmen, and put in “hell” in another Michoacan town before being released on Friday.
In the face of cartel turf wars that are emptying towns in rural Mexico, many places have turned to “community police,” which are untrained members of the town who volunteer or are paid a small stipend to protect residents.
More common in Indigenous cities – which have centuries of experience in organizing and defending themselves – the community police are a more stable and reliable force than the short-lived “self-defense” squads that developed in Michoacan between 2013 and 2014 to fight cartel but in a hurry. broken
But while they enjoy the trust of the townspeople, the community guards are no match for the power of the cartels who want their land.
López, the state prosecutor, said Saturday’s attack in Coahuayana was linked to a fight by drug cartels for control of coastal areas, the main route for landing cocaine shipments by sea.
“This all includes the decision of members of criminal groups to gain territory and carry out illegal activities, especially drug smuggling,” he said.
Coahuayana (koh-kok-YAH-nah), located on the Pacific coast near neighboring Colima, is particularly attractive to cartels; Go-fast boats transporting cocaine from South America have a direct route here, but often dump floating bales of cocaine at sea with location devices, to be picked up and taken ashore.
“The areas along the coast of Michoacan and Colima have been ideal for picking up packages of cocaine from South America,” said López. “There have been multiple seizures of cocaine packages by the Navy.”
While no one in Coahuayana will say which gang carried out the murders, suspicions point to the Jalisco New Generation cartel, which has long been active in the region.
The cartel is also suspected of being responsible for the kidnapping of seven community guards – six men and one woman – who were kidnapped last Tuesday and released on Friday in the Indigenous town of Purepecha in Tangamandapio (tahn-gah-man-dah-Pee-oh) Michoacan.
These traditional officers are known as “Kuárichas,” (KWAH-rich-ahs) in Purepecha. In the native city, the force has the legal status to deal with minor offenses.
The seven were kidnapped on Tuesday, and a massive search operation was launched involving helicopters, the military and the state police. No one will say who the kidnappers were or what they did, but suspicions are again linked to the Jalisco cartel, based in the neighboring state of that name.
One of the officers, Brayan Javier, said after his release, “actually, it was hell, because a lot happened.”
Another of the rescued guards, Luis Reyes, said the release was due to the unity and strength of the Purepecha community that helped in the search efforts.
“Thanks to the whole city, all the people of Purepecha, we are strong,” said Reyes.
While Reyes and others remain convinced that Indigenous resilience and community ties can fend off the cartels, what is less clear is that.
In recent months in the southern state of Chiapas – one of Mexico’s most indigenous regions – the area near the border with Guatemala has been controlled by warring drug gangs, causing some Chiapas residents to surrender and flee to neighboring Guatemala. .
