AP: Mexican Deserters Start Drug Turf War

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Members of an elite Mexican army unit have deserted and formed a drug gang, using their military training to launch a violent battle for control of this border city, Mexico's top anti-drug prosecutor said in an interview with The Associated Press.
The war for Nuevo Laredo is unlike other recent drug conflicts it's a turf war involving most of Mexico's major cartels in broad alliances not seen in a decade. It has the Mexican army fighting an organized unit of former comrades, and it has cost American lives.

"They are extremely violent, and they are very much feared in the region because of the bloodshed they unleash," Jose Santiago Vasconcelos, Mexico's top anti-drug prosecutor, told AP.


The battles, which have taken 87 lives since 2002, have involved unprecedented alliances among Mexico's drug cartels, according to Nuevo Laredo police commander Martin Landa Herrera. "I don't think anything like this has happened before in Mexico," he said in an interview. "I have never heard of this many cartels fighting for one piece of territory."

http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20031010_1163.html