Mexico City
Tracy Wilkinson, Bureau Chief
Tracy Wilkinson has covered wars, crises and daily life on three continents. Her career began with United Press International where she covered the Contra war in Nicaragua. She moved to the Times in 1987, first as a writer on the metro staff, then as a foreign correspondent based in San Salvador. In 1995, she moved to Vienna, where she covered the war in the Balkans, winning the George Polk Award in 1999, and then to Jerusalem. From there, she went to Rome, where she covered two popes and did several stints in Iraq. In 2008, she became Mexico bureau chief, where her coverage was part of a team Overseas Press Club Award and a Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award. She earned her B.A. in English literature from Vanderbilt University. Her book, The Vatican’s Exorcists: Driving out the Devil in the 21st Century, has been translated into a dozen languages. EMAIL
- 1
Moviegoers tired of the arrogant behavior of the country’s ‘Juniors’ and ‘Ladies’ have turned Gary ‘Gaz’ Alazraki’s screwball satire ‘Nosotros los Nobles’ (We Are the Nobles) into a mega-hit.
- 2
Mexican officials and trade executives look for ways to minimize damage to tourism, an industry that is a top income-earner and employer in Mexico.
- 3
Under ex-President Calderon, incidents of torture soared, according to human rights organizations, as well as testimony collected by The Times.
- 4
Top Mexican officials say the U.S. kept them in the dark. One official was stunned to learn that the cartel hit men who killed her brother had assault rifles from Fast and Furious in their arsenal.
- 5
A police agent who was Santiago Mayor Edelmiro Cavazos’ bodyguard is among the suspects held. A state prosecutor says the detainees ‘confessed.’ He predicts additional arrests.
- 6
In the state of Zacatecas, residents of Villanueva demanded that the military take over. The soldiers came, but drug war violence got worse.
- 7
In Mexico, at least 1,500 Sinaloa families in the Sierra Madre highlands have fled fighting between the Zetas gang and the Sinaloa drug cartel in the last month.
- 8
Father Alejandro Solalinde says witnesses told him that at least 80 people were abducted from a train by masked gunmen in Veracruz state.
- 9
A feared interior minister and intelligence czar, Tomas Borge was the Nicaraguan leader most closely tied to human rights abuses.
- 10
Edelmiro Cavazos of Santiago was seized at his home near Monterrey on Sunday. He might have been targeted because of his efforts to purge corrupt local police, the state governor says.
- 11
Songwriter Facundo Cabral was riding with a concert promoter who may have been the intended target of the gunmen, Guatemala’s interior minister says.
- 12
Ruiz organized a network of lay Bible teachers who fanned out across Chiapas state, allowing Indians to participate in church worship in ways never before possible. In 1994, during the Zapatista rebellion, he mediated peace talks.
- 13
The onetime Coca-Cola executive led the largest anti-Sandinista Contra rebel force in 1980s Nicaragua.
- 14
Eduardo Medina Mora, a key figure in the administration’s war on drug cartels, had been facing severe criticism from opponents who say the strategy is failing.
- 15
Mexican officials say Miguel Ortiz Miranda, alias ‘El Tyson,’ directed operations in Morelia for the Michoacan-based La Familia, including an attack on security chief Minerva Bautista Gomez’s convoy.
- 16
Its citizens have made Luis Estrada’s ‘El Infierno’ a blockbuster. But the film, which gives a bleak view of the country’s raging drug war, has angered government officials.
- 17
Gustavo Sanchez of Tancitaro in Michoacan state is found beaten to death with rocks, authorities say. He is the fifth mayor in Mexico killed in six weeks.
- 18
Why were drug smugglers’ cocaine shipments being seized all over the U.S.? The boss in Mexico was demanding answers. He had no idea he was being targeted by the DEA’s Operation Imperial Emperor.
- 19
He served as defense minister and army chief of staff in the last half of the Cold War-era conflict that ended in 1992, becoming one of the U.S.-backed government’s most important military strategists.
- 20
An intellectual of the Mexican left, he was a highly regarded critic of the nation’s social and political adventures.
- 21
Four gunmen leap from a pickup truck and fire semiautomatic weapons at revelers in the town of Navolato in Sinaloa state. The shooters escape.
- 22
Amnesty International, citing cases of alleged slayings by the military in the drug war, criticizes civilian officials, saying they fail to properly investigate or prosecute crimes by the army.
- 23
An investigator and a commander and his family are killed at their homes as Mexico’s drug trafficking crackdown continues.
- 24
One ‘Bulletproof Lawyer’ survived four assassination attempts before being gunned down. Such unsolved killings highlight the violence within a judicial system manipulated by powerful drug cartels.
- 25
The attack in Ciudad Juarez, near a federal police headquarters, was a well-planned trap, officials say. It is the first time traffickers have used a vehicle bomb in many years.
- 26
The ousted president says he’ll return today to the country, which sits in legal limbo after the military coup that removed him.
- 27
Haiti officials hope the reopening will give a boost to businesses and provide money to begin rebuilding the country.
- 28
The sweep targets local officials in the state of Michoacan, home to La Familia, a fast-growing group of drug traffickers.
- 29
Obama promises to step up efforts to curb guns flowing into Mexico, but says a revival of the U.S. assault weapon ban is not in the offing.
- 30
As traffickers recruit among the poor, their networks are being woven into the social fabric of the country.
- 31
‘Narcos’ have made their way into government, business and culture in this Pacific state, where kids want to grow up to be traffickers.
- 32
Luis Tellez resigns amid a cellphone and e-mail scandal that has roiled Mexican politics. An allegedly scorned woman helped bring him down.
- 33
There’s not much feeling of taboo left in traveling to the island. Obama is expected to open the door wider.
- 34
In the traumatized border city, he talks of social programs aimed at boosting the fight against drug cartels.
- 35
At a Chiapas conference, rebel leader Marcos, in his signature ski mask, holds forth on Mexico’s war on drugs, the bloodshed in Gaza, even the perceived shortcomings of President-elect Barack Obama.
- 36
It takes security forces nearly three hours to contain the unrest among members of three gangs. All of the dead are gang members, authorities say.
- 37
A new U.S.-Mexico government study estimates that $19 billion to $29 billion is shipped south, then laundered through cash purchases of land, luxury hotels, cars and other high-end items.
- 38
Chavez drew attention to the 1990s killings of several hundred women, which were largely ignored by Mexican authorities, and founded her region’s first rape crisis center.
- 39
Former Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo, who helped supervise the Brookings Institution study, says Washington needs to focus on consumption in addition to targeting traffickers.
- 40
President Calderon is set to sign the law, but some fear that letting off users caught with limited amounts of drugs will increase drug use and encourage ‘drug tourists’ from the U.S.
- 41
The Vatican’s No. 2 official, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, calls for a ‘harsh deterrent’ to the drug violence that left more than 5,000 dead last year.
- 42
The 2 1/2-year offensive has uncovered deep corruption and sparked violent gang wars, presenting a stark reality: The longer and harder the war is fought, the more complex and daunting it becomes.
- 43
Attorney General Eduardo Medina Mora says 5,376 people have been killed so far in 2008, more than twice the toll for the first 11 months of 2007.
- 44
The prison warden and two top guards are arrested in Zacatecas after suspected drug cartel men in a 17-car convoy, backed by a helicopter, entered the facility and freed 53 inmates.
- 45
Los Tigres del Norte is initially barred from playing its latest drug-trade lyrics.
- 46
Senator Ricardo Monreal of Zacatecas steps down temporarily to clear his name after an official acknowledges an investigation into a family property where tons of marijuana was found.
- 47
Rodolfo Lopez Ibarra and 12 other people with him are seized by soldiers when he steps from a plane in Monterrey, where he allegedly was assigned to take over cartel operations.
- 48
Report lists 17 allegations of serious human rights abuse by the Mexican army, including torture and murder.
- 49
In many cases, the network that turns ill-gotten gains into legal tender, crucial to operations and lavish lifestyles, continues to spin unhindered.
- 50
Calderon had been focused on a military offensive targeting drug figures and corrupt police. Now officials are being questioned to see how far the cartels have penetrated ‘local political elites.’
- 51
The Mexican government’s crackdown on drug traffickers has sent the big players underground, along with all their free-flowing dollars.
- 52
At least 35 officials and agents from an elite unit have been fired or arrested following tips from an informant involving the so-called Beltran Leyva cartel.
- 53
In one case, Archbishop Hector Gonzalez calls attention to a drug trafficker in his neighborhood and accuses the government of ignoring the situation. The prelate later apologizes for his comments.
- 54
Gunmen hit the homes of Carlos Reyes Lopez and extended family; a 2-year-old nephew and five other children are among the dead. Reyes Lopez was a member of an elite force.
- 55
‘I was hiding it in my hands and it made me shudder,’ Juan Carlos Castro Galeana tells an interrogator in a videotaped session about the deadly attack in Mexico. ‘I was desperate to get rid of it.’
- 56
The cult-like La Familia Michoacana has contaminated city halls across one state, federal officials say. It sometimes decides who runs and who doesn’t, who lives and who dies.
- 57
The slaying of a rising political star is ascribed to his refusal to have any contact with drug traffickers.
- 58
Sightings, real or not, of Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzman are reported often, and the kingpin always manages to stay one step ahead of Mexican and U.S. law officials.
- 59
The increase in slayings and kidnappings related to the nation’s war on drug traffickers has created a climate of fear. Legal experts see too many obstacles to restoring capital punishment.
