Napolitano: Mexico border violence reduced
Wed May 6, 2009 2:37pm EDT


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The drug violence on the Mexico border has been reduced as a result of the thousands of troops that President Felipe Calderon sent to Ciudad Juarez, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said on Wednesday.

Turf wars between rival drug cartels are threatening stability in Mexico where 6,300 people were killed last year due to drug violence, which has started to spill over into the United States.

Napolitano said the Mexican troops sent to Juarez were having an impact. "Yes we have seen a reduction in violence," she told a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing.

But the question remained, "how long can it be sustained?" she said.

Last month, Monte Alejandro Rubido, who recently joined Calderon's National Security Council as a technical director, told the Mexican daily El Universal that Mexico will keep its army on the streets to quash drug cartels until at least 2013.

(Reporting by Tabassum Zakaria; Editing by Sandra Maler)
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