Guns, Trade and "Control"
Ross, John
Tepito is the Caibah of Mexico City, shadowy and serpentine, its back alleys vanishing into sinister dead-ends. lcre underground tunnels lead to thieves'. dens, and clandestine warehouses are...
...Indeed, Tepito is as much an international weapons marker as Peshawar, Pakistan--Gerian, Israeli, Russian and Brazilian manufactured arms are hawked here -not to mention the 80% of the inventory that is smuggled south from the United States...
...Wry realistic toy guns are also available from your better street vendors...
...National Rifle Association...
...The United States is seeking to export its gun culture to Mexico, charges the capital's Human Rights Ombudsman Emilio Alvarez Icaza, but "I don't really think we want to buy it...
...With one family in three wracked by domestic violence, daily Reforma columnist Miguel Angel Granados Chapa predicts the five-gun limit will be a surefire formula for spousal homicide...
...The weapon then joins the anus stream south...
...From 1990 to 2001, 108,000 Mexicans died as the result of firearms misuse...
...For US$20,000, he figures he can equip a guerrilla unit of 20...
...The entire northern border has to be considered a grand riangiis (swap meet) for gun enthusiasts...
...The PRI-PAN "gun control" bill faltered at the final hour in the outgoing congress but is expected to be reintroduced as the new legislature convenes this fall...
...AK-47s, known in Mexico as Cuernos de Chivos ("Goat Horns") and M- 16s run between 4,000 and 15,000 pesos depending on accessories, The gun dealer points out a compact little Uzi with a L200 peso price tag---"a very popular item," Flaco boasts he can furnish grenade launchers with appropriate ammunition...
...where gun tragedies are pandemic, Mexico, most probably because weapons are highly regulated, is not accustomed to one-man mass-murder sprees...
...Since the Mexican revolution and the drafting of the 1917 Constitution, the military has regulated arms use in Mexico...
...The above-ground weapons and ammunition trade between the United States and Mexico is legitimized by its inclusion in NAFTA...
...All goods are guaranteed and deliverable to your doorstep within five days...
...deaths here...
...With 2.13 homicides daily on its hands the left-leaning Mexico City government is strongly opposed to the generals' new gun law...
...According to numbers developed by a congressional investigating panel, 87,000 of these killings were deliberate, another 11,000 "accidental" and 8,000 self-inflicted...
...manufacturers...
...Tepito is Mexico City's hottest drug "plaza," the city's pirate goods, capital and, as even a casual observer might conclude foam the number of gun...
...our guide Flao wants to know...
...At present, a gun owner must be registered with the military and prove him or herself of"good moral character" to obtain a gun permit...
...I would have to turn them loose under the new gun law...
...Just across the border a deranged U.S...
...Under existing gun laws, farmers are permitted to own one shotgun or a .22 caliber rifle for hunting, but sporting clubs can negotiate special licenses with the military for the use of high caliber weapons...
...Tepito is hardly Mexico's only gun market...
...Twenty-one were killed, mostly kids...
...The rule, of thumb is that the drugs go north and the weapons south...
...Despite the push to pistolize the populace, many Mexicans think the new gun control law is really a bad idea...
...You do not want to be caught out after dark in this "barrio bravo" when it crackles with gunfire...
...An enterprising dealer can legally buy one automatic weapon each day in El Paso, Texas, smuggle it across the river and pass it on for three times the U.S...
...Such NAFTA-induced mass murder is "lunacy," grumbles Mexico City Secretary of Government Alejandro Encinas...
...These are helpful in facilitating street holdups, of which 109 are reported each day in Mexico City;, Given enough time, Flaco claims he can deliver anything from a "Saturday Night Special" to a John Ross is an &dependent reporter based ir Mexico Ciy He Chi wr/eabbtir# tenin thesbofthafp0at)etRsipgoin Chiapas In the twxr issm* o trhe NACL 4.pr bazooka...
...The legislation was sponsored by two PRI retired generals, Alvaro Vallarta and Ram6n Mota Sanchez, a gun-loving duo who political wags compare to Charlton Heston, the venerable former president of the U.S...
...So far in 2003, 32 bullet-riddled corpses have turned up on these mean streets in a battle for control over the flourishing drug trade...
...dens, and clandestine warehouses are stuffed with stolen goods...
...gun manufacturers push the fivegun-limit "gun control" law through Mexico's congress...
...vet once opened fire with an automatic weapon on Mexican families snacking at the San Ysidro, California McDonald's a few yards north of Tijuana...
...But U.S.-style killings will soon be coming to Mexico compliments of NAFTA if U.S...
...The numbers are going to skyrocket with the five-gun legal limit, warns Granados Chapa...
...price...
...Bis catalogue lists Glocks, a Barretta 9 mm and .357 Magnums in the 3,000 peso range (US$300), but Flaco has a line of discount handguns too-- arnas calientes" (hot guns) that have been recently used in the commission of a crime...
...Unlike the gun-toting U.S.A...
...W ith concern for public safety running at the top of the list as politicians look toward future elec" tions, the political patties are talking up gun contrite . But the measure contemplated by the once-ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PR) and President Vicente Fox's right-wing National Action Party (PAN) is a peculiar form of gun control...
...Mass murder in Mexico is generally perpetrated by those who control the weapons: the military, paramilitaries and police...
...What do you need...
...Actually, Mexico's Constitution proclaims the right of its citizens to bear arms, but only of a caliber inferior to those weapons declared to be "exclusively for the use of the military...
...In fact, it would allow citizens to own up to five guns per domicile for "the legitimate defense of his or her person and property," Multiple domicile owners-Benjamin Arrellano, the imprisoned capo of the Tijuana carter, listed 70 homes-could legally amass arsenals und&r the proposed "gun control" legislation...
...The new law would for the first time litnse commercial gun shops, encourage coirniercial sales and establish norms for weapons manufacturingalthough most weapons will continue to be imported from U.S...
...I have 541 criminals in jail today on firearms violations," Encinas rues...
...a world-class weapons bazaar...
Vol. 37 • September 2003 • No. 2
