MEXICO DRUG WARS: VIOLENCE ESCALATES AS CARTELS CHALLENGE FELIPE
CALDERON'S WAR ON DRUGS

The Mayor Of A Ranching Town In Northern Mexico Was Murdered By
Drug Cartel Members On Tuesday In A Revenge Attack For The
Army's Capture Of 25 Hitmen.

Gunmen shot dead Hector Meixueiro in his car as he drove to work in
Namiquipa, Chihuaha state, in a rare attack on an uncorrupted
politician in the country's vicious drug wars.

The murder followed just hours after the discovery on Monday that 12
people tortured, killed and dumped along a mountain road in another
state, Michoacan, were off-duty federal agents.

They were ambushed by members of the La Familia drug cartel in an
apparent reprisal for the arrest at the weekend of Arnoldo Rueda
Medina, the gang's chief of operations.

Recent days have seen a major escalation in the violence in Mexico as
the cartels challenge a clampdown on their activities ordered by
Felipe Calderon, Mexico's president.

On Tuesday, drug gangs hung banners in the border city of Cuidad
Juarez blaming Mr Mexueiro and the state's attorney general for their
reported part in the arrest last month of 25 cartel hitmen.

"Attorney General ... this time it is serious. We know you and the
mayor of Namiquipa rounded up the 25 paramilitaries," read the banners
that appeared in the city shortly before Mr Mexueiro's murder.

Benjamin LeBaron, an American leader of a breakaway Mormon group based
in Chihuaha who had led protests against the cartels, was murdered
last week for his alleged part in the capture of the hitmen.

Six federal police and two soldiers were killed by cartel gunmen armed
with grenades at the weekend in a series of attacks following the
arrest of the La Familia leader.

"This marks an important change in the drug war in that they are
attacking federal forces directly," said Jorge Chabat, a Mexican drug
expert.

"It also suggests the capture of this person has affected the
operations of the cartel. It was a major blow and this is a reaction
out of weakness not strength."