Mexico home to five of world’s 10 deadliest cities

January 15th, 2012 - 4:05 pm ICT by IANS  

Mexico City, Jan 15 (IANS/EFE) Five of the world’s 10 deadliest cities in 2011 are in Mexico, a report has said.

A Honduras metropolis, San Pedro Sula, topped the list with 159 murders per 100,000 inhabitants, Mexico’s Citizen Council for Public Safety and Criminal Justice said.

The council — an NGO founded in 2002 — compiled the list of the globe’s 50 most violent cities by comparing every city with more than 300,000 residents for which homicide statistics were available on the internet.

Mexico’s Ciudad Juarez, which led the list for three consecutive years, dropped to second in 2011 with a tally of 148 homicides for every 100,000 residents.

The other Mexican cities finishing in the top 10 for 2011 were Acapulco with 128 murders per 100,000 people, Torreon with 88, Chihuahua with 83, and Durango with 80 homicides.

Forty of the 50 most dangerous cities are in Latin America, including 14 in Brazil.

The council said the actual murder figures for some Mexican cities may be higher than the official statistics used in the analysis.

The Mexican government said that 12,903 people were killed in drug-related violence between January and September 2011, an increase of 11 percent from the same period in 2010.

The toll in the drug war since December 2006 has risen to 47,515, according to the official figures.

–IANS/EFE
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