World in brief: Official says drug gangs buying arms in U.S.
Mexico’s top police official said Thursday that drug gangs are relying on a flow of arms from the United States and using terrorist strategies learned from al-Qaida to pressure the government to halt anti-drug efforts.
Mexican Federal Public Safety Secretary Genaro Garcia Luna complained of “a large flow of weapons … many of which came from the United States,” noting authorities have seized assault rifles, .50-caliber machine guns and hand grenades from the gangs.
“Just in the U.S. border zone, just over the bridge, there are 6,000 gun shops,” Garcia Luna said. “That represents an opportunity for drug traffickers.”
Mexico is struggling to battle drug gangs responsible for a recent spate of executions, and has sent thousands of police and army troops to several states.
Harare, Zimbabwe
Inflation rate hits 3,714 percent
Zimbabwe’s annual inflation rate surged to an unprecedented 3,714 percent at the end of April, the official state newspaper reported Thursday, as the government set up a commission to try to bring prices down to single digit levels.
Prices more than doubled last month as shown by a 100.7 percent increase – the highest on record – in the consumer price index calculated by the state Central Statistical Office, the Herald newspaper said. In the past year they increased 36-fold.
The Herald said that President Robert Mugabe on Monday signed into law regulations to enforce wage and price controls through “comprehensive price surveys and inspections,” with a penalty of up to five years in jail for violators.
United Nations
Belarus blocked from rights council
Belarus was defeated for a seat on the U.N. Human Rights Council on Thursday after a campaign by the United States, key European countries and human rights groups against the former Soviet republic’s repressive rights record.
Egypt, Angola and Qatar easily won seats on the council despite opposition from human rights groups that accused them of rights violations.
The 192-member General Assembly also elected Bolivia, Bosnia, India, Indonesia, Italy, Madagascar, Netherlands, Nicaragua, Philippines, Slovenia and South Africa to three-year terms on the 47-member council.
The Human Rights Council was created in March 2006 to replace the widely discredited and highly politicized Human Rights Commission, and one aim was to keep some of the worst human rights offenders out of its membership.