The New Nation - Internet Edition

Police disarmed in Mexican town

BBC ONLINE: The Mexican army has confiscated guns from the entire police force of the town of Rosarito, near the Mexican border with the US. Mexican authorities suspect that the town's police have been colluding with drug trafficking gangs. Mexican troops carried out a similar crackdown in January on Tijuana police. The Rosarito force's 200 guns will be examined to see whether any were used in an attack on the town's police chief earlier this month. One of his bodyguards was killed in the attack. "We recognise that the enemy is inside our house and for this reason we are purging the ranks - we need to have confidence in our police," Baja California state police chief Daniel de la Rosa said. Drug gangs are strong in Mexico's border region, which includes Rosarito, a beach resort town south of Tijuana. Mexican President Felipe Calderon has deployed about 25,000 troops to the region, and to the neighbouring province of Michoacan, since taking office 12 months ago.

Nurse abducted

BBC ONLINE: The Somali security forces are hunting for the gang which kidnapped two women who work for an aid agency. The pair, a Spanish doctor and an Argentine nurse, were seized near the northern port of Bossasso, in the semi-autonomous region of Puntland. They work for the aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF). A French journalist was freed on Monday more than a week after being captured in the same region. Police denied that any ransom had been paid. A Puntland official told the AP news agency that the kidnappers were "holed up in a mountainous area". Another official, Ahmed Aaid Aw-Nour, said one of the kidnappers was arrested during the kidnap.