On June 6 Salvador Alanís Trujillo, commander of Chilpancingo police community, led an armed raid on the town of Xolapa in Acapulco, controlled by his former ally and later opponent Ignacio Policarpio Rodríguez. The result was a confrontation that left 15 dead.
The fate of the two enemies is opposite. Policarpio's body remained five hours on the spot where he was killed. Among his most visible wounds he had a shotgun on the chest and another one that destroyed half of his head. Apparently he was shot at close range.
Salvador Alanís, however, moves with apparent freedom: on July 12 he headed a security forum attended by the press.
On June 28 Rogelio Ortega, acting governor of Guerrero, told reporters: "Violence has decreased in the state." Asked about the origin of his statement, he explained: "I rely on statistics at national level, made by crime rate observatories."
Four days later, on July 2, it was revealed that Guerrero is the most violent state of Mexico.
Also, Mexico ranked 144 among the most dangerous countries in the 2015 Global Peace Index. "Mexico continues to have the worst overall peace score among the Central American Caribbean countries, and remains mired in domestic conflict against drug-related violence," the report stated.
Between the first half of 2014 and the same period in 2015, intentional homicides rose 21% in Guerrero, from 780 to 943, compared to a national drop of 1%, from 9,057 to 8,963, according to the monthly reports of the National Public Security System (SNSP).
The killings in the state accounted for 8.6% of the national total last year, compared to 10.5% this year.
The effects of insecurity have raised alarms in the state. Coca Cola Femsa closed in Arcelia, Iguala and Chilpancingo; Volkswagen, Seat and Canteras de México withdrew from Iguala. In April, the national leader of the National Chamber of the Transformation Industry (Canacintra), Rodrigo Alpízar, said that 1,300 companies have closed in Guerrero since September 26, 2014, when 43 students of the teachers training college of Ayotzinapa went missing and six people were murdered, plus one who is brain dead.
Similarly, enrollment at the Autonomous University of Guerrero has declined. Dean Javier Saldaña said that until June 25, 29 students had been kidnapped.
Guerrero is also the state where journalists face more threats: 38 of them were attacked between January and June 2015, of a national total of 227, according to a report by the international organization Article 19 presented in London on July 6 .
