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 daimyo Monticello  Registered: 05/13/04 Posts: 7,751 Last seen: 14 years, 8 months |
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Article
BY DAVID MCLEMORE DALLAS - A West Texas standoff along the Rio Grande between U.S. law enforcement officers and heavily armed Mexican drug smugglers in military-style clothing prompted congressional demands Tuesday for an international investigation and a call for deployment of U.S. troops to the border. The incident, which occurred Monday on U.S. soil at an isolated river crossing about 50 miles east of El Paso, Texas, is the latest incident involving armed incursions along the U.S. border with Mexico. And it comes less than a week after Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff called a California newspaper's account of such border incursions "overblown." The incident Monday involved an encounter between two Hudspeth County Sheriff's Department deputies and three Department of Public Safety troopers and 10 heavily armed drug smugglers. A spokesman for Mexico's Foreign Ministry said Mexican military personnel had nothing to do with the incident and suggested the trespassers may have been drug traffickers wearing military-style gear. The incident began on Interstate 10 near the Sierra Blanca checkpoint when DPS troopers began chasing three westbound SUVs believed to be carrying marijuana. When the SUV drivers saw that they were being followed, they made a U-turn and headed south toward the river to an area known as Neely's Crossing, said Rick Glancey, executive director of the Texas Border Sheriffs Coalition. At the crossing, one of the SUVs drove across the shallow river into Mexico. A second one got stuck in the muddy banks. And as the Texas deputies watched, a military-style Humvee attempted to pull it from the mud, while several armed men in green uniforms fanned out around it, Glancey said. When the Humvee failed to extricate the truck, a group of men in civilian clothes walked into the ankle-deep river, removed what appeared to be bales of marijuana and hauled them to the Mexican side. They then set the truck, a Ford Expedition, ablaze. The third vehicle, a Cadillac Escalade, was abandoned on the U.S. side with a flat tire as the driver escaped on foot. Deputies found 1,447 pounds of marijuana inside. "What this latest incidence underscores is the necessity of increased support for local law enforcement to aid improving our border security," said Glancey. "If this doesn't open D.C.'s eyes, I don't know what will." Monday's incident was not the first face-to-face confrontation for Hudspeth County deputies. In November, deputies responded to assist Border Patrol agents at the border town of Fort Hancock, Texas, where they encountered six men in military uniforms attempting to carry a load of marijuana over the river. U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials said Tuesday they have launched an inquiry into the Monday incident and asked Mexican authorities for a thorough investigation and full answer on what happened. "(Customs) is coordinating closely with the appropriate federal, state and local authorities," said Kristi Clemens, Customs' assistant commissioner for public affairs. "The U.S. government is also discussing the matter with the government of Mexico and is asking for a thorough investigation and response. We take very seriously and investigate fully any alleged incident of criminal activity, threats against our agents or possible incursions." Texas Gov. Rick Perry also has ordered an investigation, spokeswoman Kathy Walt said. U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., a frequent critic of the administration's border security efforts, called Tuesday for the federal government and the governments of southern border states to immediately deploy troops to the U.S.-Mexico border in light of what he termed "recent armed assistance Mexico's military has given to drug smugglers." "Our border has literally turned into a war zone with foreign military personnel challenging our laws and our sovereignty," Tancredo said. "The only way to deal with this dangerous situation is to tap the resources of our own military," Tancredo said. "I call on President Bush and the governors of border states to immediately deploy military personnel to defend our borders against the Mexican military." U.S. Sen. Jon Kyl, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Terrorism and Homeland Security, called on Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to initiate a formal investigation on the reported border crossings and to begin a dialogue with Mexican officials to prevent further occurrences. "These illegal incursions are a violation of our sovereignty and pose a significant danger to U.S. law enforcement officials and citizens near the border - especially if all parties involved are armed. The potential for violence is significant." Sen. Kyl noted that the Department of Homeland Security released figures that indicate that there have been 231 documented incursions along the 2,000-mile border with Mexico since 1996. Of those, 63 in that nine-year period occurred in Arizona and 28 occurred along the Texas border, according to Homeland Security. In each instance, U.S. agents at the local level asked Mexican federal police and army officials to clarify what happened. Many included accidental forays by legitimate Mexican authorities across a poorly defined border in rough and isolated country while in pursuit of drug dealers. The Texas-Mexico border, however, is delineated by the Rio Grande River. Investigators have long documented that Mexican drug gangs often wear camouflage clothing and carry military-style automatic weapons. But Tuesday's request for a Mexican government response significantly ups the ante, federal officials said. In Mexico, officials said the National Defense Ministry has begun an investigation of the incident and launched a search for the vehicles identified by photographs taken by Hudspeth County deputies. Hudspeth County Chief Deputy Mike Doyal said that men dressed as Mexican soldiers manned what looked like .50-caliber machine guns mounted on vehicles about 200 yards inside the U.S. border during the incident. In Mexico, a ministry spokesman said that the Army's Ciudad Juarez garrison does not maintain Humvees with mounted .50-caliber machine guns. "It cannot be ruled out that said actions are designed as much to harm the image of our armed forces as the bilateral cooperation between Mexico and the United States in the fight against organized crime and, in particular, narcotrafficking," a foreign ministry spokesman said. --------------------
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daimyo Monticello Registered: 05/13/04 Posts: 7,751 Last seen: 14 years, 8 months |
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Article
Mexico insisted Wednesday that men in Mexican military-style uniforms who crossed the Rio Grande River and sparked an armed confrontation with Texas law officers earlier this week were drug smugglers, not Mexican soldiers. Mexico?s presidential spokesman Ruben Aguilar said the FBI supported that view, but he gave no evidence of the claim. ?These were not Mexican soldiers,? Aguilar said at a news conference. ?It is known that these are drug traffickers using military uniforms and they were not even regulation military uniforms.? Texas law enforcement officials confronted armed traffickers near the Rio Grande river on Monday as what looked like a Mexican military patrol assisted the marijuana smugglers as they escaped back into Mexico. On U.S. side of border Andrea Simmons, an FBI spokeswoman in El Paso, told The Associated Press that Texas Department of Public Safety troopers chased three SUVs, believing they were carrying drugs, to the banks of the Rio Grande during Monday's incident. Men dressed in Mexican military uniforms or camouflage were on the U.S. side of the border in Texas, she said. Simmons said the FBI was not involved and referred requests for further details to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The Inland Valley Daily Bulletin of Ontario, Calif., reported Tuesday that the incident included an armed standoff involving the Mexican military and suspected drug smugglers. The incident follows a story in the Bulletin on Jan. 15 that said the Mexican military had crossed into the United States more than 200 times since 1996. Apparent military Humvee helped In a news conference, Rick Glancey of the Texas Border Sheriff's Coalition, said three Hudspeth County deputies and at least two Texas Department of Public Safety troopers squared off against at least 10 heavily armed men from the Mexican side of the Rio Grande. U.S. officials who pursued three fleeing SUVs to the Mexican border saw what appeared to be a Mexican military Humvee help one of the SUVs when it got stuck in the river, he said. ?The other two vehicles headed towards the riverbank. One of them crossed back into Mexico, and the third got stuck in the riverbed,? Zapata County Sheriff Sigifredo Gonzalez said on Tuesday. An estimated 10 men in camouflage gear in what looked like a Humvee equipped with a .50 caliber machine gun unloaded what was believed to be marijuana from the stuck vehicle, set it on fire, then carried the bundles into Mexico, he said. A second SUV had a flat tire and was left behind in the United States and its occupant ran across the border, Glancey said. Gonzalez, also of the Texas Border Sheriffs? Coalition, said he was skeptical about the Mexican government's claims. ?When you see a Humvee vehicle with a .50 caliber machine gun on it, this leads you to believe this is not a vehicle being used by the drug lords, but in fact is part of the Mexican military,? Gonzalez said. ?I think of course the Mexican government knows about this.? Glancey said he could not confirm whether the armed men seen at the site were Mexican Army, police officers, or drug dealers, and would not detail what markings deputies may have seen on the men's uniforms or the Humvee. Fearing international incident Chief Deputy Mike Doyal of the Hudspeth County Sheriff's Department said that Mexican army personnel had several mounted machine guns on the ground more than 200 yards inside the U.S. border, the Daily Bulletin newspaper reported earlier. "It's been so bred into everyone not to start an international incident with Mexico that it's been going on for years," Doyal said. "When you're up against mounted machine guns, what can you do? Who wants to pull the trigger first? Certainly not us." Hudspeth County Sheriff Arvin West, whose officers were involved in a similar incident last year, said he is certain that Mexican authorities know who was involved. After the newspaper reported on Mexican military crossings earlier this month, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the report was overblown and most of the incursions were just mistakes. In eastern California, Arizona and New Mexico, the U.S.-Mexico border is largely unmarked. But in Texas, the Rio Grande separates the two countries and even when dry, is a riverbed about 200 feet wide. In November, Doyal said Border Patrol agents in the border town of Fort Hancock called for help after confronting more than six men dressed in Mexican military uniforms. The men allegedly were trying to bring more than three tons of marijuana across the Rio Grande, Doyal told the newspaper. --------------------
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