Gunmen stormed into a nightclub Feb. 6 in the Mexican beach resort of Mazatlán, Sinaloa, and opened fire on the crowded dance floor, leaving three dead—two waiters and a patron. They shot down three more at the door as they fled, killing a total of six. (Reuters, Feb. 6) That previous day in Apatzingán, Michoacán, police found the decapitated bodies of six men with their severed heads inside an SUV. (AP, Feb. 5)

On Feb. 1, the White House solicited Congress for the allocation of $410 million to Mexico and Central America for fiscal year 2011, starting Oct. 1. The money would be used to support counternarcotics efforts under the Merida Initiative. Deputy Secretary of State Jacob Lew said in a press conference that Mexico would receive $310 million dollars and Central America the rest. "We are working very closely with the Mexican government," he said, while also emphasizing efforts to strengthen the rule of law and human rights. The Merida Initiative's limited human rights conditions have been a controversial aspect of the program.

Sharp debate over the direction of Mexico's narco war has broken out in the wake of twin massacres in northern Mexico last weekend. As the death toll from the narco violence punctures past records, some political leaders propose drastic responses that could curb civil liberties.

In Mexico's first major demonstration of 2010, on Jan. 29 thousands of unionists and campesinos marched from the Angel of Independence in Mexico City to the city's main plaza, the Zócalo, continuing a tradition of annual protests against the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the federal government's neoliberal economic policies. The demonstration was focused on the high cost of living, and the demands included an emergency pay raise to counter the effects of the world economic crisis. Another goal was to show support for the Mexican Electrical Workers Union (SME), whose 44,000 active members were laid off when President Felipe Calderón Hinojosa's administration suddenly liquidated the government-owned Central Light and Power Company (LFC) the night of Oct. 10.

Ciudad Juárez Mayor José Reyes Ferriz announced Jan. 31 that the city is calling on artists across Mexico to submit proposals for a monument to memorialize the city's murdered women. The monument will likely focus on the eight victims whose bodies were found in 2001 in a cotton field across from the Association of Maquiladoras. The Inter-American Court of Human Rights ordered the Mexican government earlier this year to erect a monument to dignify the memory of the victims. (Las Cruces Sun-News, Jan. 31)

Gunmen burst into a party and killed 14 high school students Jan. 31 in Ciudad Juárez. The assailants jumped out of sport utility vehicles, entered the house near the US border, where the students were celebrating a birthday and victory in a local American Football championship, and began killing them one by one. (Reuters, KVIA, El Paso, NM, Jan. 31)

A riot at the notoriously harsh Durango prison known as Social Readaption Center (CERESEO) No. 1 left 23 inmates dead and another 20 injured Jan. 20. Army troops were sent in to put down the violence, which supposedly involved members of the rival Gulf Cartel and Sinaloa Cartel. (El Universal, AHN, Jan. 21)

Mexico's National Defense Secretariat announced the mobilization of 860 army troops to Tijuana in anticipation of reprisals following the capture of Tijuana Cartel kingpin Teodoro García Simental AKA "El Teo". Baja California state officials say 76 people have been killed in the city so far this year. The toll for 2009 was over 700 murders.