Vigilante Groups Hold Off on Confronting Cartel in Stronghold, Give Gov't Chance to Act Katherine Corcoran - Associated Press
go to original November 6, 2013

Soldiers load up into a truck as they patrol through Apatzingan, a town in the state of Michoacan, Mexico, Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2013. Apatzingan is located near the city of Lazaro Cardenas, where Mexico's military has taken control of one of the nation's seaports as part of an effort to bring drug-cartel activity under control in the western state of Michoacan. (AP/Dario Lopez-Mills)

LA RUANA, Mexico — Two leaders of the main vigilante groups in western Michoacan state said Tuesday that they are pulling back from confronting the Knights Templar drug cartel because the Mexican government has promised to oust traffickers from the area.

The self-defense forces made a daring march late last month into Apatzingan, an agricultural city that is the central stronghold of the pseudo-religious cartel that for years has dominated Michoacan, a state that sends a steady stream of avocados and migrants to the United States.

The offensive set off clashes that left at least five men dead and hundreds of thousands of people without electricity.

Hippolito Mora, leader of self-defense forces in the hamlet of La Ruana, said he was coordinating with other vigilante groups and they had decided to hold off on further moves toward Apatzingan in light of a federal security takeover of the city and port of Lazaro Cardenas, one of the nation's biggest seaports as part of an effort to control cartel activity in Michoacan.

He said the self-defense groups would wait for the government to do the same in Apatzingan.

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