A BLOODY WEEKEND

Nearly 50 people have been killed (executed) in apparent drug-gang violence in Mexico this weekend.

INTERNATIONAL IMPLICATIONS

One US couple was shot to death within sight of the border as they fled their attackers.  Lesley A. Enriquez, an employee of the US Consulate in Mexico, and her husband, Arthur H. Redelfs, a Detention Officer with the El Paso County Sheriff's Department, were pursued as they raced toward an international bridge that crosses into El Paso.  They crashed, and the attackers sprayed the car with bullets.  Miraculously, their 10-month-old daughter was found in the back seat unharmed.  This very fine young man was a co-worker of my son.

Please read this New York Times story for more tragic details of this case, as well as another consulate-related murder.

JUAREZ

This week gunmen burst into a home where a funeral service was in progress and killed 6 people; 5 were teenagers.  One 10-year-old girl was wounded.

Over 2,500 people were killed in Juarez last year.  As the death toll mounts, an estimated 420,000 residents from this border city (once 1.5 million population), along with a significant number of businesses, have sought refuge from the violence.  The city has shrunk by tens of thousands.  People are closing their businesses, abandoning their homes (110,000 houses abandoned from 2005-2009) and moving to other parts of Mexico or to the US.  Some estimate that 30% of the city's residents have fled.  Approximately 40% of the businesses - an estimated 10, 678 - have closed.  Since Dec. 2007, 75,000 people have lost their jobs.  It has been estimated that in the past 2 years over 30,000 people have moved into El Paso from Juarez.  

ACAPULCO

A drug-gang battle killed 8 gunmen and a 23-year-old woman caught in the crossfire as she rode in a taxi.

GUERRERO

In one of the hot spots we have previously focused on, more than 30 people were killed in Guerrero this weekend.

EXPECTED SPIKE IN VIOLENCE

An Intercessor from Monterrey wrote. "... Looks like they're removing the dependents of Embassy personnel for a month or so, due to an expected spike in violence during the holidays beginning this weekend with an early celebration of Benito Juarez' birthday and continuing through Resurrection Day... that is a usual spike anyway, only this year they expect more."

The State Department has authorized US government employees in Juarez and five other U.S. Consulates in northern Mexico to send their families out of the area because of the RISING DRUG VIOLENCE.  The other 5 cities are Tijuana, Nogales, Nuevo Laredo, Monterrey and Matamoras.  The US Embassy in Mexico City has advised American citizens to delay unnecessary travel to parts of the states of Durango, Coahuila and Chihuahua.

Let's pray that these American consulates will be able to stay open.  About 1 million American citizens live in Mexico.  Many more will be there during the next couple of weeks, because it is Spring Break.

REMITTANCES

Money sent home by Mexicans abroad is called a Remittance.  Remittances are the #2 source of foreign income after oil exports, and they plunged a record 15.7% in 2009 as migrants (different from the word immigrants) worldwide struggled to find work during the global economic slowdown.  In 2008 the total was $25.1 billion, and in 2009 the total was $21.2 billion.  The decline is predicted to continue during the first half of 2010.  WE MUST BE AWARE OF THE EFFECT THIS IS HAVING ON MEXICO'S ECONOMY.

PAYING TAXES

To the cartels, paying taxes means something different than we might think.  Here is one example.  While I was in Dallas a week ago, I met a lady whose uncle, a Juarez businessman, received an anonymous phone call stating he was to deposit $2000 per week into a particular bank account.  He was given the names of each of his family members, where they work and go to school, etc., and he was told they would be killed if he did not comply.  In Juarez, people are terrified to go to the police, so he pays the money.

Last year the owner of a custom frame store in El Paso shared what happened to his friend with the same kind of business in Juarez.  Cartel members paid him a visit and demanded he pay $650 per month for protection.  He refused, and his shop was burned to the ground.  There are a LOT of fires in Juarez.

Paying taxes to use a transportation route is a little different.  Once it is clearly determined which cartel is in control of a certain "plaza" or marketplace, they assign someone to be in charge of the area.  Agreements are negotiated between cartels.  If one gang wants to transport contraband through an area known to be controlled by another gang, an amount and frequency of payment is determined.  If a gang decides they don't want to pay and are discovered doing business in a controlled area, a hit will probably be placed on them.  When one cartel wants to take over the "turf" of another cartel, they might challenge the control by using transportation routes without paying and by killing those who dare to try and make them pay.  All hell breaks loose, and war breaks out.  Would it surprise you to know that cartels pay taxes to other cartels that "own" transportation routes through the US, including I-35 all the way through the heart of the US?

MILITARIZE THE BORDER

For the past couple of years the Lord has highlighted the real possibility that we could face having our southern border controlled by the military - whether UN or the US Northern Command, US NORTHCOM, which was established Oct. 1, 2002 as a military command tasked with anticipating and conducting homeland defense and civil support operations where US armed forces are used in domestic emergencies. The 3^rd Brigade Combat Team (BCT) is under the day-to-day control of US NORTHCOM.

I have written previously that some people have made it known they want the UN to send troops to Mexico.  Last night I was told the situation in Mexico is so out of control that NATO may be called in.

MEXICAN MILITARY CONFISCATING GUNS

About 3 weeks ago a friend who lives on a little street in Juarez told of a day when her dogs were barking incessantly.  She finally came to the front room of the house to see why they were barking, and she saw 30-35 military personnel with weapons, their faces covered, going door to door.  When they came into her home, they looked all around and asked if there were any weapons in the house because they were going to confiscate them.

BORDER SCHOOL

A year and a half ago the Lord started speaking to me about hosting Border School.

Border School, a two-day intensive secular presentation of the issues confronting our southern border, is dedicated to making our nation safer by:

1) educating, motivating and activating leaders to pray and work effectively 

2) supporting the law-enforcement community through prayer and service.

Initially only intercessors were invited to Border School, but that began to change after Dr. Jim Garlow, pastor of Skyline Wesleyan Church in San Diego, attended a part of the San Diego Border School.  You may be familiar with Jim as the pastor who was the point person for the California Proposition 8 Marriage Amendment stating that marriage is between one man and one woman.

Here is the way Jim Garlow describes what happened to him when he heard a presentation at the San Diego Border School last fall.  "I went to a portion of a seminar here in San Diego that turned my stomach.  What I saw changed me.  I knew I could never be the same.  I knew I would need to--as a follower of Jesus and a pastor--inform myself much more and then speak out."