Mexican drug cartels paid US$4.5 million in bribes to buy protection and political favors in a state run by the country’s main opposition party, US court documents said on Friday, as the party leads polls to win the presidency in July.
The money-laundering case in Texas charges Antonio Pena, arrested on Wednesday, with funneling cash from the feared Zetas cartel to officials in the state of Tamaulipas, according to documents from the US District Court in San Antonio, Texas.
A sworn affidavit from an undercover agent at the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) names former Tamaulipas governor Tomas Yarrington of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), as having a direct personal relationship with Zeta leaders.
A DEA undercover source “described Antonio Pena as a conduit between Mexican politicians, in particular Tomas Yarrington, and Zeta members Miguel Trevino and Heriberto Lazcano,” according to the documents, available on US court database PACER.
Lazcano and Trevino are the leaders of the cartel, which is notorious for decapitations and kidnappings across Mexico.
Yarrington, in office from 1999 to 2005, is under investigation separately in Mexico along with two other former governors of the state, which the PRI has ruled since the party’s foundation.
The centrist PRI has said the probe was politically motivated ahead of the hotly contested July 1 presidential vote.
The federal attorney-general’s office confirmed the investigation, but declined to give further details. Mexican media have reported authorities are searching for evidence the politicians are linked to money laundering.
The accusations have given Mexican President Felipe Calderon’s ruling conservative National Action Party (PAN) fresh ammunition against the PRI, which ruled Mexico for seven decades until it was ousted in 2000.
Yarrington did not immediately reply to requests for comment. He said via a Twitter account on Jan. 30 that his name had appeared on an alert blocking his travel outside of Mexico.
“I hope that the authorities clarify the motive and scope of this action,” his Twitter account said.
The PRI is hoping its youthful presidential candidate, Enrique Pena Nieto, who has a big lead in opinion polls, will bring a new face to the party, still remembered by some Mexican voters for corruption and vote buying during 70 years in power.
Members of Calderon’s PAN have accused the PRI of negotiating in the past with organized crime, a charge the party vehemently denies.
PAN party chairman Gustavo Madero responded to the Yarrington report by urging a thorough investigation of alleged links between the PRI and organized crime.
“Our concern isn’t political posturing, it’s an appeal to the conscience of those governing to think again, because this is putting the lives and well-being of all Mexicans at risk,” he said in a televised statement.
The PAN’s popularity has suffered since the government launched a frontal attack on the cartels five years ago. Since then, more than 47,000 people have died in Mexico as turf wars between the gangs over lucrative smuggling routes intensified.
In the sweltering streets of Jakarta, buskers carry towering, hollow puppets and pass around a bucket for donations. Now, they fear becoming outlaws. City authorities said they would crack down on use of the sacred ondel-ondel puppets, which can stand as tall as a truck, and they are drafting legislation to remove what they view as a street nuisance. Performances featuring the puppets — originally used by Jakarta’s Betawi people to ward off evil spirits — would be allowed only at set events. The ban could leave many ondel-ondel buskers in Jakarta jobless. “I am confused and anxious. I fear getting raided or even
Eleven people, including a former minister, were arrested in Serbia on Friday over a train station disaster in which 16 people died. The concrete canopy of the newly renovated station in the northern city of Novi Sad collapsed on Nov. 1, 2024 in a disaster widely blamed on corruption and poor oversight. It sparked a wave of student-led protests and led to the resignation of then-Serbian prime minister Milos Vucevic and the fall of his government. The public prosecutor’s office in Novi Sad opened an investigation into the accident and deaths. In February, the public prosecutor’s office for organized crime opened another probe into
RISING RACISM: A Japanese group called on China to assure safety in the country, while the Chinese embassy in Tokyo urged action against a ‘surge in xenophobia’ A Japanese woman living in China was attacked and injured by a man in a subway station in Suzhou, China, Japanese media said, hours after two Chinese men were seriously injured in violence in Tokyo. The attacks on Thursday raised concern about xenophobic sentiment in China and Japan that have been blamed for assaults in both countries. It was the third attack involving Japanese living in China since last year. In the two previous cases in China, Chinese authorities have insisted they were isolated incidents. Japanese broadcaster NHK did not identify the woman injured in Suzhou by name, but, citing the Japanese
RESTRUCTURE: Myanmar’s military has ended emergency rule and announced plans for elections in December, but critics said the move aims to entrench junta control Myanmar’s military government announced on Thursday that it was ending the state of emergency declared after it seized power in 2021 and would restructure administrative bodies to prepare for the new election at the end of the year. However, the polls planned for an unspecified date in December face serious obstacles, including a civil war raging over most of the country and pledges by opponents of the military rule to derail the election because they believe it can be neither free nor fair. Under the restructuring, Myanmar’s junta chief Min Aung Hlaing is giving up two posts, but would stay at the
RSS