~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

From the Los Angeles Times

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Texas landowners stuck on wrong side of border fence

In and around Brownsville, Rio Grande farm and pastureland — even some homes — end up on the 'Mexican' side of the Homeland Security Department's border barrier.

by Richard Marosi, Los Angeles Times

February 28, 2011

Reporting from Brownsville, Texas

The Rio Grande once ran wide and deep behind the four-room house that Pamela Taylor and her husband hammered together more than half a century ago. Migrant workers had to take a ferry upriver to get across from Mexico, and a flood once inundated the family's citrus groves.

Over time, the waters receded, the river narrowed and Mexico got closer. Thieves led by a one-legged man stole Taylor's horses from the barn and beans off the stove. Drug smugglers hid marijuana in her bushes. Migrant workers would camp in her front yard and bring her fresh tortillas in the morning.

The once-swift river now could be crossed with little more than a leaky inner tube. Still, there was some comfort in knowing that, on the map anyway, the Rio Grande marked the international boundary. Nowadays, Taylor isn't so sure.

The Homeland Security Department last year put up a tall steel barrier across the fields from Taylor's home. The government calls it the border fence, but it was erected about a quarter-mile north of the Rio Grande, leaving Taylor's home between the fence and the river. Her two acres now lie on a strip of land that isn't Mexico but doesn't really seem like the United States either.

The government doesn't keep count, but Taylor and other residents think there are about eight houses stranded on the other side of the fence.

"It's a no man's land," Taylor said. "They said they were going to build a fence to protect all the people. We were just lost in the draw."

When the Homeland Security Department began its Southwest border buildup four years ago, erecting barriers seemed a straightforward enough proposition. The international boundary is ruler-straight for hundreds of miles from California to New Mexico, and planners laid the fencing down right on the border, traversing deserts, mountains and valleys.

But here, where the border's eastern edge meets the Gulf of Mexico, the urgency of national security met headlong with geographical reality. The Rio Grande twists through Brownsville and surrounding areas, and planners had to avoid building on the flood plain. So the barriers in some places went up more than a mile from the river.

While the border fence almost everywhere else divides Mexico and the U.S., here it divides parts of the city.

Authorities defend the barrier, saying it helps control illegal immigration and drug trafficking. The fencing doesn't stop immigrants, but they say it slows people down and funnels them to areas where U.S. Border Patrol agents can respond quickly.

In and around Brownsville, the fence slices through two-lane roads, backyards, agricultural fields, citrus groves and pastures for more than 21 miles, trapping tens of thousands of acres, according to some property owners' estimates. (The Homeland Security Department did not keep track of the total.) Narrow gaps allow back-and-forth access for cars and tractors, pedestrians and Border Patrol agents, but they are spaced as much as a mile apart.

"My son-in-law tells people we live in a gated community," joked Taylor, 82, who shares her modest home with her daughter's family.

Originally from England, she married her Mexican American husband during World War II, and picked tomatoes and cotton to scrape enough money together in 1948 to build a modest home and raise four adopted children.

She never learned to speak much Spanish and struggled with Mexican food. "My father-in-law told me I was the only person he knew that made square tortillas," Taylor recalled. Hers has been a life defined by adapting, but she said nothing prepared her for America's new border barrier.

"We feel abandoned here," she said. "That's why we refer to it as the Mexican side of the fence."

Planning challenges and fierce opposition held off construction crews for several years, making Brownsville the last border city to get barriers under the Secure Fence Act of 2006.

Tensions escalated in this mostly Latino, working-class city of 172,000 when people realized that large segments of the fence would not sit anywhere near the international boundary.

Some residents got the word by studying maps of the project at public hearings. Others answered knocks on their front doors to find Border Patrol agents bearing clipboards: Would they sign a waiver allowing the government to begin surveying their land?

Landowners were offered compensation, but many were outraged. They protested at public hearings, lobbied politicians in Washington and fought court battles. The government had to start condemnation proceedings against more than 100 residents, some of them poor farmers or senior citizens with centuries-old ties to the community.

Construction crews bulldozed orchards, drained lakes and graded over driveways and roads. The fence towers 18 feet and its steel posts, a few inches apart, whistle like a freight train when northern winds blow.

Eloisa Tamez, 75, who lives on land granted to her ancestors by the king of Spain in 1767, rejected the government's offer of $13,500 for a 50-foot-wide strip across her three acres west of Brownsville. The government seized the land and built the fence anyway. Now, three-quarters of the fallow acreage where her family once grew tomatoes, squash and okra is south of the barrier.

"It represents my heritage. This land here is what gave me life. I didn't have riches or luxuries, but we had food that was good for us," said Tamez, who is in a legal battle with the federal government over the seizure of her land. "I didn't want to let the government have it to build this monstrosity."

Rancher Alberto "Beto" Garza and his father have been cut off from their cattle. Ninfa Young, 56, said she can't stroll over to her neighbor's farm to pick watermelons. Nature Conservancy manager Maxwell B. Pons said the 6,000 feet of fencing on the Southmost Preserve severs an important corridor for coyotes and Texas tortoises.

At the Loop farm on the outskirts of Brownsville, dozens of citrus trees were bulldozed to make way for the fence, which splits the family's 900 acres. On the Brownsville side, Debbie and Leonard Loop tend groves of oranges and grapefruit; on the "Mexican" side, their son, Ray Loop, cultivates soybeans, sunflowers and watermelons.

Things could get more complicated. With the government planning this year to install gates at 40 of the gaps, the family wonders about access. Residents will be provided with access codes, according to border authorities. But they've also heard that the gates would be locked during a high national security alert. Debbie Loop, 69, wonders how her young granddaughters would get through to the Brownsville side of the fence under that scenario.

"It's an eerie feeling crossing that," Loop said, as she drove with her husband through the fence line onto her son's farmland. "In the past, if you needed to get out in a hurry, you could. Now you have to find a gap."

Duncan L. Hunter, the former congressman from San Diego County who co-wrote the fencing legislation before leaving office in 2009, visited Brownsville in 2008 to explain how barriers helped reduce the numbers of undocumented immigrants flooding into California border cities.

Though the Brownsville fence placement sounds "illogical," it is probably necessary if it means cutting off illegal crossings, said Hunter, who expressed surprise that the barrier here was placed so far from the river. Asked about the location, border officials said in a statement that a number of factors were considered, including the flood plain and "historic illegal crossing patterns."

"From time immemorial, the way that you keep people from going into a restricted area is a fence," Hunter said, citing a significant drop in crime in San Diego after the fence there was built in the 1990s. "It brought calm to both sides of the border."

Longtime resident Taylor, however, said the no man's land where her property ended up hardly qualifies as tranquil.

The fence funnels more illegal immigrants than ever through her property, she said, because it is close to an easily breached gap. Taylor is all for bolstering national security, but adding agents, cameras and lighting would have been more effective, she said.

She still opens her house to patrol agents on Thanksgiving and Christmas for turkey dinner. It's the politicians and senior officials who earn her wrath. She attended hearings and sent letters and e-mails to numerous officials, and got few responses.

"It was like talking to a brick wall," she said.

These days, immigrants walk across a small dam that serves as a footbridge, traversing the Rio Grande in minutes. Crossings trigger the immediate appearance of Border Patrol agents on the river side of the fence, but Taylor fears that U.S. Customs and Border Protection could someday reposition its agents behind the barrier, leaving her family more vulnerable.

Heightened U.S. enforcement efforts, Taylor said, have bred a meaner, more desperate class of illegal immigrants. Some banged on her doors and windows last week, possibly seeking help. She can hear the "booms and bangs" from the drug wars in Matamoros, and Mexican military helicopters have strayed over her house, she said.

"We're not afraid, but we do realize that Matamoros could spill over here," said Taylor, who keeps three assault rifles loaded. The guns give her a sense of safety, she said, unlike the fence: "It's not providing security for us, and it's actually shutting us out of America."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-texas-fence-20110228,0,90921.story

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Stormy seas off Somalia

2011 is shaping up to be a boom year for piracy.

by Peter Chalk

February 28, 2011

The killing of four Americans who were taken hostage aboard the yacht Quest off the coast of Oman serves as an ominous warning that pirate activity will increase in 2011 despite large-scale naval deployments in the Gulf of Aden.

The incident also underscores the limits of raw power. Those aboard the Quest, although surrounded by warships and tracked by a helicopter, still met a tragic end.

Indeed, intercepting a hijacked vessel is an anomaly. In most cases pirates can act with impunity because of the enormous area that naval patrols need to cover. Only rarely will the authorities be in the vicinity of a ship or yacht under attack.

Last year, there were 445 actual or attempted acts of piracy off the Horn of Africa, the highest total on record. This despite international countermeasures that include multilateral task forces — Combined Task Force 151, NATO's Operation Ocean Shield and the European Union's EU NAVFOR — as well as unilateral deployments that combined involve 28 countries. A world of patrols has not stopped piracy, nor kept it from constantly ratcheting up to 1,650 incidents since 2006.

Why not?

The main reason is a lack of effective governance in Somalia. Many pirate syndicates operating off the Horn of Africa trace their origin to coastal clan militias that formed following the collapse of the Siad Barre regime in Somalia. These gangs initially sought to prevent poaching of fish stocks and the illegal dumping of hazardous waste. But they soon evolved into criminal enterprises that intercepted and "taxed" any vessel transiting their self-defined territorial waters. That unruly legacy continues to pervade Somalia, which has no functioning central authority and no way of curtailing the activities of pirate syndicates.

Another reason piracy goes on is money. Last year Somali pirates coerced about $238 million in ransoms, with average payouts of $4 million to $5 million a ship, far more than the $150,000 median in 2005. In one notable example, pirates extorted a record $9.5 million for the release of a South Korean supertanker, the Samaho Dream. These sums are huge anywhere, but especially in a country where most people live on less than $2 a day.

For its part, the shipping industry settles with pirates as quickly as possible. Owner-operators reason that even million-dollar payouts are cheaper than losing a vessel and its manifest. They know that the longer negotiations drag on, the longer their vessels will be out of commission and not making money.

Nor are ship owners willing to opt for safer routes that bypass the pirate-infested region. Alternative passages around the Cape of Good Hope could add three weeks to an average voyage. With unrest in Libya already causing increases in oil prices, shippers are even less inclined to contemplate trips that impose higher fuel costs, an economic burden that would be passed on to consumers.

It's not surprising, then, that the shipping industry has shunned endeavors to make paying ransoms illegal, though it would reduce the incentive for piracy. Shippers' resolve will doubtless be hardened after a British appeals court ruled in January that ransoms does not run counter to the interests of British policy and that the sums paid are recoverable as a business expense.

So the pirates win, and many shippers continue to play the odds. The risk of a hijacking in the Gulf of Aden is still only about 0.5% when measured against the number of transits.

If other individuals like those on the Quest lose their lives and the situation around the Gulf of Aden deteriorates, there will be pressure to upgrade and expand the naval dragnet. However, such measures address piracy only at its end point, on the sea, rather than at its root, on land.

Adm. Robert Willard, head of the U.S. Pacific Command, acknowledged as much this month. "I don't think you're ever going to defeat this threat at the far extremes of their operations on the sea lanes," he said. "Rather, you have to go the centers of gravity — the source on land in the Horn of Africa — and put a stop to it there."

Only by addressing the poverty and lack of central authority in Somalia can the international community lower maritime crime and violence off the Horn of Africa. Defaulting to a naval containment strategy that has so far failed to deliver is not the answer.

Peter Chalk, the author of "The Maritime Dimension of International Security: Terrorism, Piracy, and Challenges for the United States," is a senior analyst at Rand Corp.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-chalk-piracy-20110228,0,928063,print.story

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tracking the gun-runners

The Obama administration appears poised to allow the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to track bulk sales of semiautomatic long guns.

February 28, 2011

Violence along the U.S.-Mexico border continues to spiral upward, with all-too-frequent reports of bullet-ridden bodies turning up on street corners, in parks, on deserted highways, even at quinceaneras .

A complex combination of drugs, corruption and poverty may be behind the bloodletting. But the source of the weapons used to kill is easily identified: The U.S. accounts for an estimated 85% of guns seized by Mexican authorities, according to a 2009 Government Accountability Office report.

For years, U.S. officials have been promising to clamp down on gun-runners who supply drug cartels and human smugglers. Now, the Obama administration has the opportunity to make good on that pledge, by granting a request by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to track bulk sales of semiautomatic long guns. The new rule would require the 8,500 licensed gun shops in Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas to report to the agency any sale of two or more rifles of greater than .22 caliber to the same person over five days.

It's a sensible and, if anything, too-modest plan that could provide valuable tips to ATF agents and help reduce violence on both sides of the border. President Obama should not only approve it, he should expand it to apply to all gun sellers nationwide. Limiting the rule to the four border states will only push the illicit trade into the nearest state where smugglers can load up on AK-47-style assault weapons.

Unsurprisingly, the National Rifle Assn. and its allies in Washington oppose this perfectly reasonable proposal. The administration, however, shouldn't be cowed by Congress, which, in a rare and unexpected show of bipartisanship, has vowed to foil the plan.

Earlier this month, the House voted 277 to 149 to block the ATF's request by barring the use of federal funds. Lawmakers contend that it threatens Americans' 2nd Amendment rights and creates an undue paperwork burden on gun sellers. But the rule would merely allow the ATF to track bulk gun sales. Americans would remain free to buy as many guns as they wish — more, frankly, than we'd like. Furthermore, gun sellers are already subject to similar reporting requirements involving multiple sales of handguns.

Lawmakers are less concerned about the Constitution than the cash that could be spent against them if they anger the NRA.

Giving federal agents a tool to trace guns isn't going to solve the problem of violence at the border, but it may help identify those who are supplying brutal drug gangs like the one that killed a U.S. immigration agent and injured another one this month in Mexico. As modest as the ATF's plan is, it's far better than what Congress is offering: the continued flow of instruments of death across a dangerous border.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-guns-20110228,0,4145052,print.story

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

From the New York Times

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

28 in Mexico Killed in Attacks

by THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

MEXICO CITY (AP) — At least 28 people were killed in attacks over the weekend along Mexico's border with Texas and on the Pacific Coast, the authorities said Sunday.

In Coahuila State, across the border from Texas, nine men died late Saturday when gunmen opened fire inside two bars in separate attacks, state prosecutors said in a statement. Eleven others were wounded.

Five other men were killed the same night in a bar in Ciudad Juárez, which is across the Rio Grande from El Paso and is notorious for its drug cartels, said Arturo Sandoval, a spokesman for the Chihuahua State prosecutors' office.

In three of Mexico's Pacific Coast states, at least 14 more people were killed in drug-related violence.

The police in Acapulco found the bodies of four men inside a trash container; all had been shot, and three of their throats had been slit. The body of a fifth man was found along a highway, said prosecutors in Guerrero State, where Acapulco is located.

In Nayarit State, soldiers killed four people who were believed to be drug traffickers, the Defense Department said in a statement.

The soldiers were on patrol along a river in the town of Santiago when gunmen opened fire, the Defense Department said. After the shooting, the soldiers seized a car, 12 weapons, 12 grenades and radio communication equipment, it said.

Meanwhile, in Michoacán State, police officers found the bodies of five men in different areas of Morelia, the capital, state prosecutors said. All of the victims had been shot in the head.

More than 35,000 people have been killed in drug-related violence since President Felipe Calderón ordered a military offensive against the country's drug gangs shortly after taking office in December 2006.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/28/world/americas/28mexico.html?_r=1&ref=world&pagewanted=print

.