"maras" killed seven city bus drivers while trying to extort payments from them.
youth gangs known here as "maras" killed seven city bus drivers while trying to extort payments from them. Five were murdered on Tuesday and three on Thursday in the latest wave of violence that President Álvaro Colom blamed on organised crime. The president said the groups were seeking to destabilise his government. "We are asking for security and guarantees, to be able to work safely," Victoriano Zacarías, the head of the bus drivers union, told IPS. He added that he was surprised at the way the attacks were staged, "simultaneously, on busy routes, as if it were a plan designed to hurt the entire sector." Zacarías said that so far this year at least 12 bus drivers have been killed when they refused to fork over "protection payments". Other frequent victims of extortion by the gangs are taxi drivers, the owners of small businesses, and ordinary labourers and employees, who are often forced to flee their homes because of death threats received af...