Edgardo Buscaglia, a professor at Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México in Mexico City recently told El Universal that through corruption of local officials, criminal gangs are now in control of 71.5 percent of Mexico’s cities and towns.
Buscaglia said: “They are operating notoriously in front of the noses of the police, the politicians, and the authorities of all stripes, and for this there has to be some type of tolerance from the state and it can be at a political or a police level. This is telling us that this type of co-opting is on the rise and now we are seeing greater competence between criminal groups to place themselves in these municipal jurisdictions and this competition generates violence.”
Buscaglia has served as an advisor to the World Bank and the United Nations.
As evidence of Buscaglia’s findings, federal prosecutors announced on Wednesday, that more 47,000 people have been killed in Mexico’s ongoing drug war.
According to the Attorney General's Office, there have been 47,515 drug-related killings since December 2006, when President Felipe Calderon began sending troops throughout the country to confront the various cartels through September 2011.
Read the entire El Universal article here: http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/nacion/192540.html
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