Ciudad Juarez

Human rights organizations launched a series of protest marches Thursday in the border city of Ciudad Juarez to demand justice in the slaying of a prominent activist who had vociferously criticized alleged abuses by the Mexican military. The activist, Josefina Reyes, was among a group of human rights advocates who for a year have been protesting what they call the militarization of Juarez, Mexico's deadliest city, where more than 2,500 people were killed in 2009. The government of President Felipe Calderon poured thousands of army and federal police troops into Juarez to fight powerful drug gangs, but the killing has only soared.

Gunmen walked into a border restaurant and fired more than 100 rounds at a single table, in an incident that left six people dead and three others wounded in what may have been part of a war for control of the Juarez drug cartel. One of the dead was a prison official who was gunned down outside, apparently after he walked from a nearby bar to investigate the shooting.

Four are killed in what officials call a well-planned trap near a federal police headquarters. It appears to be the first time traffickers have used a car bomb since the start of a military-led offensive against drug cartels. Drug traffickers have added a powerful weapon to their arsenal, employing a car packed with nearly 20 pounds of explosives to kill police officers, Mexican authorities said Friday. Four people were killed — including a police officer and a doctor lured to within a few feet of the bomb — in what authorities said was a well-orchestrated trap.

The danger signs had been mounting. The U.S. Consulate in Ciudad Juarez recently shut down for a bomb threat (which proved false). Federal police guards were redoubled. Officials working at the diplomatic mission saw their movements being gradually restricted, some parts of the city deemed too dicey to frequent. But the Americans leaving a weekend child's birthday party probably made the same calculations that many people living in Mexico make. It was broad daylight. We'll be traveling on major roads.

Fifteen years ago, Sinaloa state's moneyed elite wouldn't give Jesus Vizcarra the time of day. His murky past and reputed personal ties to major drug traffickers kept him out of the top social clubs and business associations. Today the same power brokers who once shunned him are Vizcarra's enthusiastic backers as he emerges as the solid favorite to become governor of the key state. To critics, Vizcarra's election on Sunday would be the culmination of a steady penetration by narcotics traffickers into Mexican political power.

Mexico violated human rights conventions by failing to properly investigate the killings of three young women in 2001 during a now-infamous wave of slayings in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, an international tribunal decided in a ruling released Thursday. The Inter-American Court of Human Rights ordered the Mexican government to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages to the families of the three victims and directed authorities to take other steps aimed at acknowledging their failings and finding the killers.

Gunmen stormed a party packed with teenage revelers in Ciudad Juarez early Sunday, killing at least 14 people in the latest spasm of violence to slam the border city, authorities said. Officials in the northern state of Chihuahua said high school students and others were at a private home celebrating a school soccer victory when armed men rolled up in seven vehicles and opened fire. At least eight of the dead were younger than 20, officials said. The youngest confirmed victim was 13. At least 14 people were reported wounded.

The slayings of three people attached to the U.S. Consulate here underscore the failings of Mexico's military offensive against drug gangs despite a steady flow of troop reinforcements and personal attention from President Felipe Calderon. Calderon came to Ciudad Juarez on Tuesday for the third time in 33 days. The trip had been previously scheduled, but its agenda was overtaken by the consulate slayings -- the American couple and Mexican man are just three of the 500 people killed in the city this year alone.

Four men were convicted Thursday in last year's killing of 15 people at a teen party in the border city of Ciudad Juarez. A three-judge panel delivered guilty verdicts on several counts after a two-week trial in Juarez, which in recent years has been the deadliest zone in Mexico amid spiraling drug violence. President Felipe Calderon set off national outrage when he referred to the victims of the Jan. 30, 2010, massacre as gang members. He backpedaled after it turned out they were promising students and athletes.