Mexico City mayor praises police force after attack

Mexico City residents on Saturday woke up to front page news of the dramatic assassination attempt on Mexico City’s police chief, Omar García Harfuch.

Yet life for many carried on as normal, with people filling up their cars and paying for petrol at a station near the scene of the attack, which left it riddled with bullet holes.

Friday's attack was just the latest and clearest sign that Mexico’s powerful criminal element is bringing the violence it has unleashed on the general population directly to President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s door.

Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum praised the city's police for a rapid response that likely saved Harfuch's life.

She said that authorities have made 19 arrests since the attack, including the alleged mastermind of the plot.

More than 35,000 Mexicans were murdered last year, the highest number on record and a grave threat to the president's ambitious agenda.

The soaring murder rate already challenged Lopez Obrador longer-term goal of attacking the root causes of violence.

The economic devastation worsened by the COVID-19 pandemic is making clear those policies will have little chance as more Mexicans are pushed into poverty.