1.   Especially vulnerable are journalists working on the U.S.-Mexico border, where narcotics traffickers appear to have a stranglehold on the government.

2.   Eventually, according to this argument, the United States could be drawn into directly fighting the rebels, who have joined forces with the narcotics traffickers.

3.   Having a cop on the payroll, a federal agent noted, accomplishes two key objectives for a narcotics trafficker.

4.   He recently received land of his own, part of a parcel confiscated from narcotics traffickers.

5.   He said the new drug agents will be better paid than those in the past, helping them resist the temptation of bribes from narcotics traffickers.

6.   In some cases, a special prosecutor who is investigating the disappearances, says, the agents carrying out the detentions appear to have been working for narcotics traffickers.

7.   It also appears to involve former narcotics traffickers and certain organized-crime factions, particularly from the former Soviet Union, they said.

8.   Johnson said the status of money-laundering enforcement is watched by big narcotics traffickers.

9.   Jesus Blancornelas, a prize-winning newspaper editor who has crusaded against narcotics traffickers, was seriously wounded Thursday in Tijuana by gunmen who killed his bodyguard.

10.   Military officials in Guerrero state argued recently that narcotics traffickers were lighting fires to pin the army down while moving large drug shipments.