In Juarez, Mexico -- the border city where 5,000 have been murdered since 2008 by battling drug cartels and their affiliated street gangs -- businesses are closing up shop in response to a new threat: extortion gangs who demand protection payments.

Speaking yesterday at the University of Texas at Austin, Juárez Mayor José Reyes Ferriz said that the street gangs in Juarez have been looking for alternative rackets by which to generate revenue as law enforcement has effectively closed the drug smuggling route from the city into El Paso, TX as reported by Zahira Torres for the El Paso Times. Moreover, Reyes Ferriz attributes much of the current violence in his city to control over the local retail drug trade:

"For the most part, the killings between the Sinaloa cartel and the Juárez cartel have ceased in Juárez," Reyes Ferriz said. He blamed the majority of the 2,600 killings in the city during the past year on the feud between warring gangs. He said the Aztecas and their rivals the Mexicles and Artistas Asesinos (Artists Assassins) are now fighting for control of the retail distribution of drugs in Juárez. The Aztecas are linked to the Juárez cartel, and the Mexicles and Artistas Asesinos are linked to the Sinaloa cartel.