Federal security officials in Mexico are touting declines in violence nationwide, but the state of Sonora is a different story.
Earlier this week, Mexico’s Security Secretary Secretary Rosa Icela Rodriguez detailed a steady, monthslong decline in murder across the country. This January, the monthly toll was down 14% from the previous January, all of which she chalked up to the national security strategy.
But Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador acknowledged that Sonora is bucking that positive trend.
He singled out the municipalities of Cajeme, home to the state’s second largest city Ciudad Obregon, and Caborca. The former is one of 50 so-called priority cities and has shown dramatic recent growth in murder while half the cities are on the decline.
Caborca was recently the site of a night of terror as armed gunmen in some 20 vehicles rolled through town, firing their weapons, breaking into homes and kidnapping several people.
