Monica Villamizar:
But despite the president's harsh reaction, the Nahua indigenous community are still preparing to defend themselves against a drug cartel known as Los Ardillos, or The Squirrels.
The children are part of what's called a community guard that's made up of 96 adult men and a dozen children who defend this village, Ayahualtempa, where 600 people live.
Mexican law allows some indigenous communities to establish their own police forces. So, children over 12 can have real guns, but all of the very small ones have toy guns. And the reason is, it gets them used to the idea that they have to defend themselves.
This self-defense group is filling the void left by the state. There are no armed Mexican security forces nearby to protect the besieged town. There is no medical facility, and no financial aid has been provided to these villagers so they can weather the crisis that has isolated them from the outside world.
After decades of growing poppy plants, the raw material for heroin, this impoverished agricultural community stopped growing the illegal crop in 2015, cutting off all transactions with the local cartels and their intermediaries, fearing a takeover from the increasingly powerful and violent group.
In November of 2019, as the cartel gained more power, the murder rate started steadily increasing. In the past few months, nine people have been killed in this village and 34 others were slain in surrounding towns.
The villagers believe the violence is a deadly message from the cartel that wants to take over this drug corridor and tax local businesses as a form of extortion.
Today, this picturesque town has still not been invaded and occupied by the cartel, but the security situation is so bad, locals can't travel to the nearby farmers market. The local school shut down because it sits in a cartel-controlled area just past this chain that serves as a demarcation barrier.
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