Mexico drug wars claim new victim

A senior police officer has been killed in Mexico - the fifth in less than a week - in what the government has said is a wave of violence by drug gangs.   Esteban Robles, a senior detective in Mexico City, was shot seven times in the head, neck and chest in front of his apartment on Friday.

Felipe Calderon, Mexico's president, said the killing was an attempt by weakened gangs to counter his fight against drug trafficking.   He said: "Organised crime is reacting this way because they know and feel we are hitting their criminal structure and operations.

"They know that Mexicans will no longer live in submission, and we are determined to take back our streets."   Calderon spoke after attending the funeral of Edgar Millan, one of Mexico's senior federal policemen, who was killed outside his home on Thursday.   Millan was responsible for the recent arrests of Sinaloa Cartel leaders, a violent group fighting other crime rings for control of cocaine shipping routes into the United States.  

Wave of violence  

Two other senior policemen were shot in the capital in recent days and drug hitmen are believed to be responsible for the death of Saul Pena, a senior police officer in Ciudad Juarez, across the border from El Paso, Texas.