KEY POINTS:
MEXICO CITY - Heavily armed police, backed by helicopters, locked down the capital's most notorious neighbourhood yesterday as part of the latest offensive against rampant drug trafficking.
Hundreds of officers lined the Tepito neighbourhood's main artery, searching passing motorists.
Police had stormed the district, a warren of scruffy homes and market stalls, last week and seized a tenement complex known as "The Fortress" - reputedly a major cocaine and marijuana distribution centre.
President Felipe Calderon has sent thousands of troops to fight drug gangs in their strongholds along the Pacific coast and near the US border since he took office in December.
The Mexico City operation was run by a political rival, Mayor Marcelo Ebrard, who vowed to fight drug selling in the often chaotic metropolis.
"We're going to do it everywhere. We have to start in the most difficult place," Ebrard told reporters.
"The Fortress" and another housing complex expropriated by the city were like drug malls where dealers operated freely, he said. City hall plans to turn the complexes into a creche, drug rehabilitation centre and school.
More than 2000 people died throughout Mexico last year in a fight between two rival gangs for control of the drug market.
- REUTERS
