BORDER CITY CHAOS BOILS WITH NEWSPAPER ATTACK

Nuevo Laredo Reporter Seriously Wounded As Assailants Open Fire

As bullets rang out in the Nuevo Laredo newsroom and a grenade
exploded, reporters and editors fell to the floor. One reporter saw a
colleague being hit by stray bullets. "I prayed and prayed," he said
Tuesday. "Praying calmed me." "I was afraid I would lose my life,"
said another reporter. "I imagined the person walking in and shooting
at everyone." Two masked assailants stormed into the El Manana
newspaper Monday evening and opened fire, critically injuring one
reporter. The brazen attack was the first known episode in the
escalating border violence that has penetrated the offices of a news
organization. The reporter, Jaime Orozco Tey, was wounded in the
attack and was fighting for his life at a local hospital Tuesday. Mr.
Orozco was hit five times by stray bullets, police said. Other
reporters and editors received minor wounds from flying glass and
debris, he added. "The assailants walked into the lobby of the
newspaper and yelled, 'You're all going to hell' and ... started
shooting up the place," said Ramon Cantu Deandar, editor of El Manana
and an afternoon daily, La Tarde. The gunmen ran out and left in
different vehicles.

No arrests were reported. Mr. Cantu said newspaper editors were
investigating to determine a possible motive for the shooting. "But
even if we find out why, I'm not so sure we would print it," Mr.
Cantu said. "We live here under a code of self-censorship, and even
under those rules we're vulnerable. "Nuevo Laredo continues to be the
battleground for drug cartels.

And reporters continue to get caught in the crossfire.

The problem is you don't know who these assailants are or why they
retaliate against us." President Vicente Fox, traveling in Sinaloa
state Tuesday afternoon, called the attack "despicable" and said the
fight against criminal organizations would continue. He said the
attack was against all journalists and freedom of expression and that
it was to be condemned all the more because it was an attempt to stop
the paper from fulfilling its duty of informing people. Also Online
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images Journalists in Mexico scared into censorship En espanol El
Manana official Web site "To organized crime I only reiterate: You
will not force the Mexican people to yield, nor the federal
government nor the country's security institutions." The federal
government took over the investigation and offered protection for the
newspaper staff. Back at work Mr. Cantu said reporters returned to
work Tuesday and went about their job "as normally as possible given
the consequences." "We're a little quiet, somber, but with the same
determination to do our work," he said. Colleagues across the border
condemned the incident. Reporting the ongoing story is difficult,
said Diana Fuentes, editor of the Laredo Morning Times in Texas. "It
can be terrifying," she said. "We have not been in their shoes
directly. But we have had our people threatened. So we take the
precautions that we would ask everyone to take. ... Be aware of your
surroundings. Maintain the highest professional standards.

Don't get carried away with what everybody has to say. And always let
people know where you're going."

AP Police patrol the streets around the El Manana newspaper after it
was attacked by unknown assailants. In New York, a spokesman for the
Committee to Protect Journalists said the attack underscores the
degree to which "Mexico has become one of the most dangerous places
in Latin America to work as a journalist ... worse than Colombia."
"It's incredible. We have condemned this despicable act and we hope
the reporter makes a full recovery," said Carlos Lauria, Americas
program coordinator. "This is a newspaper that was already censoring
some of its coverage because of attacks against it. Attacking a paper
that was not doing aggressive coverage gives us a clear picture of
the dangers that reporters confront in doing their job." Drugs and
violence The attack is part of a growing climate of fear and violence
that has engulfed Nuevo Laredo and turned drug traffickers into the
primary threat to Mexican journalists along the border, analysts said
Tuesday. "In the last 20 months, the number of violent attacks
against journalists has been on the rise," said Omar Raul Martinez,
president of the Manuel Buendia Foundation for press freedom.

Manuel Buendia was a newspaper columnist killed in 1984. Suspected
drug traffickers have been linked to two or three of the eight fatal
attacks against journalists since 2003. Traditionally, it has been
politicians who have used the courts and sometimes violence to
silence reporters, Mr. Martinez said. But deaths were less common.
Attacks against journalists have happened before in Nuevo Laredo and
at El Manana. In January, two El Manana reporters escaped injury when
they were caught in a crossfire between rival gangs.

In April 2005, radio reporter Guadalupe "Lupita" Garcia Escamilla
died after she was shot nine times by an unidentified assailant as
she arrived at work. In March 2004, Roberto Mora Garcia, El Manana's
top editor, was stabbed to death. His killing remains under
investigation. A suspected assailant, a U.S. citizen, was killed
inside a Nuevo Laredo jail. Battle for control The latest incident
comes as two warring drug cartels fight a bloody battle for control
of the I-35 corridor used to transport tons of drugs across the
border into the United States. An average of one person per day has
been killed in Nuevo Laredo so far this year, most in drug-related
violence, officials have said. Webb County Sheriff Rick Flores, who
traveled from Laredo, Texas, to a border security conference in
Washington on Tuesday, said the attack was "an indication the cartels
are still continuing to keep the media quiet." "I don't see any
hopeful signs of the violence decreasing in Nuevo Laredo," he said.
noting that the Mexican border city has had 26 murders so far this year.

Staff writers Laurence Iliff, Lennox Samuels in Mexico City, Michelle
Mittelstadt in Washington and Ana Barrera in Dallas contributed to this report.
In Newspaper's Own Words

In its Tuesday morning editions, Nuevo Laredo's newspaper El Manana
published a front-page editorial calling Monday's attack an act of
terrorism. Here are excerpts:

El Manana had already suffered a mortal wound.

In March 2004, El Manana's top editor, Roberto Mora Garcia, was
killed on his way home after closing that day's edition.

Ever since, in the name of self-preservation, the newspaper decided
to limit its coverage.

It pains us that innocent victims suffer as a result of this situation.

We propose that the substantial tax dollars being spent in the
alleged war against drug trafficking be redirected to awareness,
education and culture campaigns. To view this as a health problem.

Even to legalize some drugs that are not so addictive or dangerous in
order to exert control. Who was responsible for this? We don't know;
it could have been anyone ... Oftentimes the media are used to get
back at rival gangs - to implicate these rivals and to put pressure
on the so-called authorities to go after the rival. This is a form of terrorism.