Latin America: Week in Review, Mexico

Ciudad Juárez Human Trafficking Raid: Mexican Police Detain Over 1,000

July 26, 2011 By Staff

Today in Latin America

Top Story — More than 1,000 people were detained over the weekend in Ciudad Juárez during raids aimed at combatting human trafficking. Two dozen bars, hotels and boarding houses were raided by Mexican federal police in an operation that brought in 500 men and 530 women allegedly connected with human trafficking and sexual exploitation. The nine hour sweep, involving more than 300 police officers, also rescued 20 female minors as part of Mexico’s AMBER Alert program, which searches for missing children. The raids come less than a month after Mexican President Felipe Calderón approved changes to the country’s constitution in the hope of cracking down on human trafficking, including one change that requires those accused of human trafficking to be imprisoned during trials and another guaranteeing the anonymity of victims. “There are thousands and thousands of cases, in a society that is still unaware of the seriousness of this crime,” Calderón said. “We have to break through this curtain … that is hiding from the Mexicans a criminal reality that is in front of us.”

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Headlines from the Western Hemisphere

North America

Caribbean

Central America

Andes

  • The Venezuelan government said Monday that after a year of studying the exhumed remains of 19th-century independence hero Simón Bolívar, scientists have yet to find conclusive evidence to explain his death.
  • A city council candidate and his driver were slain in a rural area of the southwestern Colombian province of Cauca, authorities said.
  • Dutch Bancassurer ING Groep NV said on Monday it would sell most of its Latin American operations to Colombia’s GrupoSura for 2.6 billion euros ($3.7 billion) in the largest-ever acquisition abroad by a Colombian company.
  • Peru’s benchmark borrowing costs in dollars fell to a three-month low after President-elect Ollanta Humala’s appointment of government and central bank officials eased investors’ concerns about how he’ll manage the economy.

Southern Cone

Image: Gobierno Federal @ Flickr

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