16.Mar.2011
Yanqi Drones Patrol Mexican Skies
Buy pervasive surveillance by a foreign power
The Pentagon began flying high-altitude, unarmed drones over Mexican skies last month, American military officials said, in hopes of collecting information to turn over to Mexican law enforcement agencies. …
In addition to expanding the use of drones, the two [national] leaders agreed to open a counternarcotics “fusion” center, the second such facility in Mexico, where Mexican and American agencies would work together, the officials said. …
One American military official said the Pentagon had flown a number of flights over the past month using the Global Hawk drones — a spy plane that can fly higher than 60,000 feet and survey about 40,000 square miles of territory in a day. They cannot be readily seen by drug traffickers — or ordinary Mexicans — on the ground.
• Read more at NYT > World
