|
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
May 10, 2007
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) _ New Mexico's
two U.S. senators on Thursday
asked federal agencies responsible for security at the border and fighting drugs
to do more against growing drug-related violence around the small southern
New Mexico town of Columbus.
Two men were killed
and another was injured in a shooting Monday in the Mexican city of Palomas, a few miles south of Columbus. Two days later,
a U.S. citizen who lives in
Palomas drove his bullet-riddled truck to the Columbus port of entry and was taken to a Texas hospital with
multiple gunshot wounds.
Authorities have said
the violence appears to be part of an escalating drug war on the Mexican side of
the border.
Sens. Jeff Bingaman,
D-N.M., and Pete Domenici, R-N.M., sent letters to Homeland Security Secretary
Michael Chertoff and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales seeking help to assure
the security of southern New Mexico and to combat drug-related
warfare.
They asked Chertoff
to consider increasing Border Patrol and Customs agents in the area and asked
Gonzales to send in more Justice Department narcotics teams. By Thursday
evening, Domenici said he was assured that immigration and customs would beef up
their presence on the border.
"We do not want the
Columbus-Palomas crossing to be seen as a weak spot for drug traffickers and the
violence that follows them," Domenici said in the release. "These thugs are not
playing with sticks and stones, and we shouldn't be
either."
"While the violence
is primarily a problem for the Mexican government to solve, it is important for
us to ensure our federal authorities are engaged in the situation," Bingaman
said in a news release.
Claudia Banuelos, a
spokeswoman for the state attorney general's office of northern Chihuahua, said Mexican
authorities have dispatched extra state and federal police to
Palomas.
Palomas and Columbus,
population 2,000, have many close economic and family
ties.
Domenici and Bingaman
sent representatives to Luna County on Wednesday to be briefed. They
also asked Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to work with her Mexican
counterparts to control violence in the Palomas
area.
Domenici said
Thursday the State Department is trying to determine whether the recent
shootings are isolated incidents or are part of a changing pattern of violence
along the border.
Gov. Bill Richardson
has ordered state police officers to increase their presence in and around
Columbus.
"People are very
scared," said state police Capt. Eddie Flores, who is stationed in Deming, north
of Columbus.
"People are worried about their safety and on alert. They know that this is very
unusual."
Attorney General Gary
King, addressing other border violence, said Thursday his office will
participate in this week's events in Santa Fe
marking the deaths and disappearances of hundreds of women in the Mexican city
of Juarez, across the Rio
Grande from El
Paso, Texas. Most of the
victims of the 10 years of violence have been women between the ages of 17 and
22.
King said the
attorney general's border violence division has been helping its Mexican
counterparts investigate and prosecute and prevent such crimes in the
future.
The Santa Fe event, called "Ni
Una Mas!" or Not One More, includes a Saturday panel discussion, a vigil and a
fundraiser. | 
