Alejandro Poire

Gunmen targeting a rival drug cartel opened fire in a crowded bar in the northern city of Monterrey, killing at least 20 people and wounding several, authorities said Saturday. The attack occurred late Friday in the Sabino Gordo bar in downtown Monterrey, a prosperous and once-orderly industrial hub that has been buffeted by more than a year of fighting between the Zetas, known as the country's most violent drug gang, and the Gulf cartel. Authorities said most of the dead — four of them women — were bar employees.

Mexican authorities announced Wednesday that they had busted an international smuggling ring that was planning to sneak a son of Moammar Kadafi into Mexico, where he was to be ensconced in a ritzy oceanfront estate. Saadi Kadafi, the 38-year-old son of the deposed and slain dictator, and three relatives were to travel to Mexico using falsified documents that gave them new names and Mexican citizenship, authorities said. The plot involved a network of safe houses, illicit bank accounts and private jets crisscrossing the globe from the Middle East to Kosovo to Canada, said Alejandro Poire, Mexico's interior minister.

Gunmen stormed a crowded casino in northern Mexico on Thursday and ignited a fire that trapped patrons inside, killing at least 53 people in what the nation's president called an "aberrant act of terror. " The attack on the Casino Royale was the latest bout of spectacular violence in Monterrey, an industrial hub that is Mexico's third-largest city. For more than a year, the city has been the setting for a brutal turf war between rival drug-trafficking gangs that at times have held gunfights on downtown streets in broad daylight.

Gunmen stormed a crowded casino in northern Mexico on Thursday and ignited a fire that trapped patrons inside, killing at least 53 people in what the nation's president called an "aberrant act of terror. " The attack on the Casino Royale was the latest bout of spectacular violence in Monterrey, an industrial hub that is Mexico's third-largest city. For more than a year, the city has been the setting for a brutal turf war between rival drug-trafficking gangs that at times have held gunfights on downtown streets in broad daylight.

Mexican authorities said Friday that they believe a top leader of the violent La Familia cartel was killed during two days of pitched fighting in the home state of President Felipe Calderon. In violence that erupted Wednesday afternoon and raged until early Friday, federal forces deployed in the western state of Michoacan battled scores of gunmen from La Familia who set vehicles on fire and barricaded roads in a dozen cities. At least 11 people were confirmed killed, including five federal police officers and an 8-month-old.

Mexican authorities announced Friday the discovery of 13 more bodies in the violence-torn border state of Tamaulipas, where 59 bodies were unearthed in eight pits earlier this week. It was not immediately clear if the latest two graves, found Thursday, were related to the others. The 13 bodies, all men and thought to be Mexican, were discovered in a different spot than the other graves, a state official said. Authorities found the previous bodies while investigating mass kidnappings of passengers from buses passing through the area.

Nine workers from two prominent Mexican polling firms were missing Tuesday in the violence-plagued state of Michoacan, which holds elections this fall. Six pollsters from the Consulta Mitofsky firm vanished over the weekend while surveying residents in Apatzingan, a town in a rural area that has seen bloody clashes between Mexican security forces and a violent drug-trafficking gang. On Tuesday, a separate firm, Parametria, reported that three of its field workers disappeared while on the job in the same region.

The Mexican drug kingpin known as "Tony Tormenta," a top leader of the powerful Gulf cartel, was killed Friday in a ferocious gun battle with military forces in the northern border state that had long been his tightly controlled home turf. Antonio Ezequiel Cardenas Guillen, alias Tony Tormenta or Tony the Storm, was killed along with three of his henchmen after hours of battle in the city of Matamoros, in Tamaulipas state just across the border from Brownsville, Texas, the Mexican government announced.

Shackled in chains, he grimaced in apparent pain as he heaved his hefty body from the back of a police van. Jose de Jesus "El Chango" Mendez was paraded before reporters Wednesday, a day after the reputed drug lord was captured by federal police. Authorities identify Mendez as the reigning leader of the notorious La Familia cartel, and his capture — with nary a shot fired, officials say — is a coup for the besieged government of President Felipe Calderon, whose drug war has claimed nearly 40,000 lives in 4 1/2 years.

Mexican authorities announced Wednesday that they had busted an international smuggling ring that was planning to sneak a son of Moammar Kadafi into Mexico, where he was to be ensconced in a ritzy oceanfront estate. Saadi Kadafi, the 38-year-old son of the deposed and slain dictator, and three relatives were to travel to Mexico using falsified documents that gave them new names and Mexican citizenship, authorities said. The plot involved a network of safe houses, illicit bank accounts and private jets crisscrossing the globe from the Middle East to Kosovo to Canada, said Alejandro Poire, Mexico's interior minister.

Nine workers from two prominent Mexican polling firms were missing Tuesday in the violence-plagued state of Michoacan, which holds elections this fall. Six pollsters from the Consulta Mitofsky firm vanished over the weekend while surveying residents in Apatzingan, a town in a rural area that has seen bloody clashes between Mexican security forces and a violent drug-trafficking gang. On Tuesday, a separate firm, Parametria, reported that three of its field workers disappeared while on the job in the same region.

Gunmen targeting a rival drug cartel opened fire in a crowded bar in the northern city of Monterrey, killing at least 20 people and wounding several, authorities said Saturday. The attack occurred late Friday in the Sabino Gordo bar in downtown Monterrey, a prosperous and once-orderly industrial hub that has been buffeted by more than a year of fighting between the Zetas, known as the country's most violent drug gang, and the Gulf cartel. Authorities said most of the dead — four of them women — were bar employees.

Shackled in chains, he grimaced in apparent pain as he heaved his hefty body from the back of a police van. Jose de Jesus "El Chango" Mendez was paraded before reporters Wednesday, a day after the reputed drug lord was captured by federal police. Authorities identify Mendez as the reigning leader of the notorious La Familia cartel, and his capture — with nary a shot fired, officials say — is a coup for the besieged government of President Felipe Calderon, whose drug war has claimed nearly 40,000 lives in 4 1/2 years.

Mexican authorities announced Friday the discovery of 13 more bodies in the violence-torn border state of Tamaulipas, where 59 bodies were unearthed in eight pits earlier this week. It was not immediately clear if the latest two graves, found Thursday, were related to the others. The 13 bodies, all men and thought to be Mexican, were discovered in a different spot than the other graves, a state official said. Authorities found the previous bodies while investigating mass kidnappings of passengers from buses passing through the area.

Mexican authorities said Friday that they believe a top leader of the violent La Familia cartel was killed during two days of pitched fighting in the home state of President Felipe Calderon. In violence that erupted Wednesday afternoon and raged until early Friday, federal forces deployed in the western state of Michoacan battled scores of gunmen from La Familia who set vehicles on fire and barricaded roads in a dozen cities. At least 11 people were confirmed killed, including five federal police officers and an 8-month-old.

The Mexican drug kingpin known as "Tony Tormenta," a top leader of the powerful Gulf cartel, was killed Friday in a ferocious gun battle with military forces in the northern border state that had long been his tightly controlled home turf. Antonio Ezequiel Cardenas Guillen, alias Tony Tormenta or Tony the Storm, was killed along with three of his henchmen after hours of battle in the city of Matamoros, in Tamaulipas state just across the border from Brownsville, Texas, the Mexican government announced.

Mexican marines searching a ranch in northern Mexico found the bodies of 72 people who may have been Central and South American migrants kidnapped by the Zetas drug gang, authorities said Wednesday. Officials said the corpses of 58 men and 14 women were found Tuesday after a daylong search of a rural swath about 90 miles south of Texas in the violent border state of Tamaulipas, a key smuggling corridor where a bloody feud between the Gulf cartel and the Zetas has produced an air of lawlessness and widespread fear.