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Archaeologists in Spain unearthed well-preserved Roman public baths in the town of Mérida, according to city officials.Several parts of the ancient structure were discovered during the excavations, according to an Aug. 8 Facebook post from the Mérida Monumental City Consortium.Experts identified the baths' apodyterium — which is a dressing room, according to PBS. The changing room would have been the entry to the baths, and it would have been equipped with storage for bathers to put their clothing and belongings.A set of intact iron bars was also discovered at the site, according to the city consortium. The bars would have...

Archaeologists in Spain recently made an "excepcional" — which translates to exceptional— discovery: an ancient Roman mosaic floor that includes a depiction of Medusa's head.The intricate mosaic was unearthed during excavations at the La Huerta de Otero archaeological zone, the Mérida City Hall said in a July 26 news release. It was found in what was the main room of a Roman family's sprawling home.Experts said the colorful, well-preserved mosaic centers around Medusa's head, which is surrounded by an octagonal medallion. Four peacocks representing each of the four seasons are within hexagons in the medallion's corners.This image is framed by...

@mrubin1971Two news stories from recent weeks, if true, should raise a red flag in the United States that Iran is preparing to use Hezbollah to strike at U.S. interests in Latin America, if not in the United States itself.First, this story from the Lebanese news portal Naharnet and sourced in part to Israeli radio. The Naharnet story was taken down shortly after it appeared: Hezbollah is using a training base established by Iran in northern Nicaragua near the border with Honduras, the Israeli radio reported on Thursday [September 6]. “The area is cordoned off and there are around 30 members...

American national wanted by US government among alleged terror group members detained in Merida. An alleged terrorist belonging to the radical Islamic movement Hezbollah has been arrested in Mexico and handed over to US authorities, Mexican media reported Sunday...

MEXICO CITY – The U.S. has released $214 million of an aid package to help Mexico fight drug trafficking, including funds for five helicopters for the military to be delivered by year's end, a top State Department official said Tuesday. The helicopters will be the first to be sent to Mexico under the Merida Initiative, a three-year, $1.4 billion program to train and equip law enforcement to deal with the ruthless cartels, said David Johnson, U.S. assistant secretary for international narcotics and law enforcement. He said $214 million of the package has been spent or committed. The funds have gone...

On Tuesday afternoon El Paso Mayor John Cook vetoed a resolution unanimously passed by city council that would have asked the U.S. government to begin a serious debate on legalizing narcotics. Earlier in the day city council passed a resolution, rationing that the best way to stop the drug wars in Juarez may be to legalize the drugs here in the United States. It was part of a larger resolution outlining several steps for the United States and Mexico to take in order to cut down on the number of murders between rival drug cartels. Last year more than 1,600...

Few rituals are more futile than the "housecleaning" of Mexico's police forces. So deep, broad and brazen is cop corruption south of the border that removing it makes eradicating rats from landfills look easy. Mexico stages quasi-annual purges of officers high and low — last year it was 284 federal police commanders — and yet every year it seems to find itself with an even more criminal constabulary. This year's scandals, however, are especially appalling. Over the summer, President Felipe Calderon's anti-drug czar, Noe Ramirez, resigned abruptly. This week, the likely reason became apparent after Ramirez was detained and accused...

MEXICO CITY — One of Mexico's top pointmen in the war against drug trafficking died when a government jet crashed into a Mexico City street, setting fire to dozens of vehicles and dealing crusading President Felipe Calderon a serious blow. Officials said the Tuesday crash appeared to be an accident but the loss of Interior Secretary Juan Camilo Mourino, former anti-drug prosecutor Jose Luis Santiago Vasconcelos and six others thinned the ranks of Mexico's already embattled leadership. U.S. Ambassador Antonio Garza praised the two officials and suggested them as models for the fight against organized crime. "Their dedication and commitment...

Colombia smashes drug ring with Hezbollah ties Reuters South Africa, South Africa - 21 Oct 2008Among those arrested in Colombia were three people suspected of coordinating drug smuggling to send some of their profits to groups such as Hezbollah, http://africa.reuters.com/world/news/usnTRE49L0GQ.html

MERIDA, Mexico (AFP) - Twelve decapitated bodies bearing signs of torture were found Thursday in eastern Mexico, authorities said, adding that they were still looking for the heads. Eleven headless male bodies were found piled on top of each other and covered with blankets in a suburb of the city of Merida, the capital of Yucatan state. Some of the cadavers also had their legs tied, an AFP photographer saw. One was completely naked, while others wore denim clothing. Some of the murdered men had tattooed arms. A twelfth body was found in a town called Buctzotz, 70 kilometers (45...

MEXICO CITY — Three decapitated corpses were discovered in Mexico's northwestern Sinaloa state Friday, bring to a total of seven headless bodies found and 11 police assassinated in a bloody week of often drug-related violence in the country, officials and news reports said. The three headless corpses were found in a car in Culiacan, Sinaloa, together with a note critical of one of the Beltran Leyva brothers, heads of a faction of the divided Sinaloa drug cartel, state judicial officials said in a statement. The Beltran Leyva brothers are in a fight with Sinaloa-based Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, the country's...

WASHINGTON — Besieged Texas sheriffs have vowed to press the White House and Congress to deliver emergency assistance to law enforcement officers battling drug cartels along the Mexican border to match the $400 million on its way to Mexico. The sheriffs said they were frustrated that President Bush and Congress agreed to provide assistance to Mexico as part of the Merida Initiative, without offering additional federal help to their departments. The officers said they'd seek direct federal assistance, as well as changes in Department of Homeland Security restrictions to permit local law enforcement departments to use homeland security funds to...

Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff on Monday blamed tightened security on the U.S.-Mexico border for increased violence there, and he said the border probably will not be fully secured until 2011, three years after President Bush leaves office. "(Increased violence) is what typically happens when you start to enforce and make it harder to fight over the shrinking pie, so to speak, and who gets the best opportunity to exploit the additional space that's left," Chertoff said at a news conference at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection headquarters in Washington, D.C. on Monday. "That's a good sign," he...

Guatemala plans to send hundreds of troops, elite presidential guards and anti-drug police to its border with Mexico to stem growing drug violence, the government said on Saturday. "The unit should be ready within about 90 days. We are talking about 500 troops" and members of the presidential guard, Interior Ministry spokesman Ricardo Gatica said. Gatica declined to say how many counternarcotics police would be sent to the border, where drug smuggling into southern Mexico, bound for the United States, goes unchallenged. In southern Mexico, suspected drug gunmen dumped a man's head outside a newspaper in Tabasco state on Saturday...

Security chief stresses that funds would fight drugs in speech at Rice Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff on Thursday accused congressional critics of imperiling a "historic opportunity" by tinkering with a proposal to provide $500 million in aid to help Mexico combat heavily armed narco-traffickers menacing the U.S.-Mexico border. Chertoff indirectly addressed criticism raised by lawmakers — including Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas; Rep. Ted Poe, R-Humble; and Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Austin — during a wide-ranging, 48-minute address at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University. Republican lawmakers in the House and Senate have balked...

MEXICO CITY — New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson urged U.S. lawmakers Thursday to resolve their differences over an aid package to help Mexico fight drugs, saying it would be "disastrous" for security on both sides of the border if the Merida Initiative fell through. U.S. President George W. Bush has used a wave of violence in Mexico to push for Congressional approval of the first US$500 million installment of the multiyear aid proposal. But the U.S. Senate approved only US$450 million for the plan, and the House US$461.5 million. The two chambers must agree on a final version before sending...

MEXICO CITY - The chief of Mexico's war on drug gangs said Washington should concentrate on halting the flow of arms to Mexican drug cartels rather than haggle over how much aid to give Mexico's anti-smuggling operation. Reacting to a vote by U.S. lawmakers to trim an aid package for the drug war, Mexico's deputy attorney general, Jose Luis Santiago Vasconcelos, said an alternative would be to keep the cash in the United States and use it to curb illegal arms trafficking across the border. "Some of us were talking, remarking that, well, this (sum of money) is all very...

MEXICO CITY — At least eight men were killed in related shootouts Tuesday as shifting alliances feed the already vicious rivalries among Mexico's criminal empires. Initial press reports quoting town officials in western Durango state said the clashes between rival drug cartel gunmen killed as many as 19. But a spokesman for the attorney general of Durango, where marijuana and heroin are produced and through which U.S.-bound cocaine flows, insisted that only eight men had died. "This frightens us, because we aren't accustomed to this kind of thing here," said the spokesman, Ruben Lopez. It was not immediately clear who...

WASHINGTON — President Bush's attempt to win $560 million in aid this year to assist Mexico's anti-narcotics efforts has run into a rebellion from some Texas Republicans worried about corruption, inefficiency and now defections among Mexican police officials. Wednesday's disclosure that three Mexican police chiefs are seeking asylum in the United States prompted the Texans to push Thursday for congressional hearings on the bloody border war among Mexico's drug cartels and a reassessment of U.S. anti-drug assistance to the country. "Our first priority must be to secure our own border and equip our own personnel before we even discuss sending...

Diplomacy: When a neighbor's house is on fire, it makes sense to send water, not argue about building codes. Except to Democrats. As Mexico reels from its drug war, Congress is withholding critical help. It's a lethal logic. The Merida Initiative, proposed to Congress by President Bush after consultations with Mexico last fall, is a three-year, $1.4 billion program to help Mexico wipe out drug traffickers and terrorists. For years they've scourged Mexico, but never as now, since President Felipe Calderon dispatched 36,000 troops to fight them in 2006. Taking these barbarians on is critical to Mexico's future and an...