Mexican cartels compared to IS

Angry kin of nine American citizens massacred in a suspected gangland ambush in northern Mexico urged the government to accept US help to destroy drug cartels that one grieving relative described as being “as bad or worse than Isis.” (Islamic State (IS).

Funerals of the three mothers and six children began to be held in Mexico on Thursday. The government said they were caught in the crossfire of a territorial feud between the Juarez Cartel and the Sinaloa Cartel on Monday.

The victims belonged to three families of dual US-Mexican citizenship born to breakaway Mormon communities.

Sadness and anger gripped grieving relatives, and some urged Mexico’s leader Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador to accept US President Donald Trump’s offer to help crush the gangs.

“I really believe that the cartels in Mexico have moved to another level of barbarity, they are as bad or worse than Isis. Isis have an ideology,” said Rosa LeBaron, 65, whose cousins, nieces and nephews died in the attacks. “These sicarios [hitmen], why are they doing it? Out of greed and pure evil.” She said Mexico needed to overcome pride and accept outside help to stamp out the cartels. “This is so beyond comprehension, we’re living like we’re in Afghanistan, 100 miles [160km] from the US border,” said LeBaron.

More than 250 000 Mexicans have been killed in the mounting violence that has gripped the country since 2007, many of them victims of drug related violence.

Greed and pure evil