Gunmen slay former Mexico state governor

November 21, 2010

– 1 hr 7 mins ago

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – The former governor of the Mexican Pacific coast state

of Colima was gunned down in his home on Sunday morning by unknown assailants,

the Colima state prosecutor said.

Jesus Silverio Cavazos, who left office in November 2009, died of his wounds

after being rushed to a hospital, Colima state prosecutor Arturo said in an

interview on Mexico's Foro TV.

Cavazos' wife was also wounded in the attack. Investigators have no suspected

motive for the crime, said.

Mexican regional politicians have been increasingly targeted by assassins in

states that are home to drug gangs and major smuggling routes as rival gangs

battle for control of the lucrative business.

Gunmen murdered the front-runner in the campaign for the governor's job in the

northeastern state of Tamaulipas in June in the highest-profile political

assassination in Mexico linked to drug gangs.

Colima, a small state located west of Mexico City on the coast, is home to the

port of Manzanillo but has been relatively free of the spiraling drug-related

violence that has ravaged some other Mexican states, particularly those in the

north of the country that straddle drug smuggling routes.

President Felipe Calderon has staked his legacy on crushing the country's

powerful drug gangs, deploying tens of thousands of soldiers to combat the

heavily armed cartels.

The fighting between security forces and drug gangs, as well as clashes between

rival cartels, has killed more than 31,000 people since Calderon took office in

late 2006, rattling foreign investors and Washington, which worries the violence

could spill across the border into the United States.

(Reporting by and Rojas Mena; Editing by Vicki

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