Risking it all on Mexico's 'Route of Death'

MATAMOROS, Mexico, April 14, 2011 (AFP) - The bus driver does his best to appear calm, but as he swerves his vehicle on a nearly empty road towards the border town of Matamoros thoughts of bus hijackings and massacres are clearly on his mind.

Authorities have found 126 bodies in the past weeks - including 10 on Wednesday - in area mass graves. The culprits, they say, are Los Zetas, a ruthless drug cartel run by ex-military commandos, and the victims were taken from passenger buses just like this one.

"Yes, I'm kind of afraid," said the driver, who refused to give his name.

"But one is here to work first, and I hope to God that nothing will happen to us."

There are only 15 customers aboard the Noreste passenger bus en route from San Fernando to Matamoros. Passengers include several women and at least two minors. The adults seem nervous.

State officials say that at least six passenger buses have been hijacked near San Fernando this year, though locals say the toll is higher.

This is the same area where the Zetas last year kidnapped and slaughtered 73 immigrants from Central and South America on their way to try to illegally cross the border into the United States.

"Once they stopped us on the road," said Jorge Enrique Gonzalez, a traveling salesman who works in the region.

"They looked like federal or military agents. At night we couldn't tell if they were good or bad. They asked us to identify ourselves, and asked some of us what our occupations were."

Gonzalez was spared, and now "I prefer to travel by day," he said.

It is unclear why the Zetas kidnap bus passengers along what the Mexican media has dubbed the "route of death."

Jaime Canseco, a senior official in the northeastern state of Tamaulipas, believes the gunmen could be looking for hostages for ransom, or could be recruiting hitmen and murdering those who refuse to join. They could also be forcing people to pay a toll to travel on the road.

The federal government on Tuesday said it was sending reinforcements to patrol the north-eastern highways, but it did not say how many troops would be sent beyond the 8,000 troops already in the region.