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ByChristopherSherman The Associated Press MCALLEN,TEXAS Ashiftby immigrant smugglers to tar- get the tough-to-defend U.S.- Mexico border in southern- most Texas has accelerated this year as the Border Pa- trol scrambles to shift its re- sources from states further west, according to an inter- nal agency report obtained by The Associated Press. From Oct. 1 through May 17, agents in the southern- most tip of Texas made more than 148,000 arrests, on pace to match last year's to- tal in less than eight months, according to the intelligence report. That compares to nearly 63,000 arrests in the Tucson, Arizona sector, which it surpassed for the first time just last year. The Rio Grande Valley sector av- eraged nearly 1,100 arrests per day from May 11-17, ac- cording to the document. What these numbers look like on the ground is a near-constant flow of peo- ple across the Rio Grande. The arrests do not represent the full level of traffic, only those who are caught, but the report's hourly break- downs showed the arrests never stopped. Heat maps illustrating concentrations of arrests glowed bright red along miles of the Rio Grande south of McAllen. "I don't think we have anywhere near the re- sources that we would re- quire to even make a dent in what we've got going on here," said Chris Cabrera, a Border Patrol agent in McAl- len and local vice president of the agents' union. "I think it's common knowledge that we don't have the resources, that's why they're coming in droves like they are. They're exploiting a weakness that they've found and quite frankly they're doing a good job of it." When a delegation of state agriculture commissioners from around the country vis- ited the McAllen Border Pa- trol station Wednesday, they were told about 1,400 arrests were made the night before. They saw more than 1,000 immigrants, many mothers with infants or solo teenag- ers, being held in spaces in- tended to accommodate only a fraction of that. The Border Patrol did not immediately respond to re- quests for comment Fri- day. But last month, at the McAllen station to welcome a new group of temporar- ily assigned agents, the sec- tor's Deputy Chief Raul Or- tiz said he and the new chief were talking a lot about staff levels. "We do plan to bring on additional agents," Ortiz said. "Our plan is to cer- tainly increase the staff- ing commensurate with the threat level down here." The Border Patrol has been trying to beef up its resources in the area for more than a year. Most new academy graduates come straight to Texas, and 115 agents from sectors else- where in Texas as well as Arizona and California have been temporarily detailed here. At the end of the last fiscal year, the Tucson sector had 1,049 more agents than the Rio Grande Valley. The difference is not only in agents. Drones hum above the South Texas border with high-powered cameras, and a growing fleet of blimp-like aerostats are tethered at busy crossing spots to watch with infrared cameras. But one slide in a presentation by Border Patrol Chief Mi- chael Fisher in March listed each sector's "deployment density," which it defined as having "sufficient assets to detect and respond to il- licit cross-border activity." At that point, before the ar- rival of the temporary de- tail, the Rio Grande Valley ranked third from the bot- tom on the Southwest bor- der at 58 percent, compared to 100 percent in San Diego. The Southwest border totals are less than half the arrests made annually between 2004 and 2006, though they've been rising for the past two years. When most of the traffic was crossing in Tucson, the overwhelming majority were Mexican citizens. But of the 7,640 arrests made in the Rio Grande Valley last week, Mexicans ranked fourth, behind people from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala. Widespread gangviolenceandlackofeco- nomic opportunity are cited as factors in the growing numbersofpeoplefromthose countries. Crossing through Mexico into South Texas is their most direct route. Immigrant smuggling is a huge business dominated by Mexico's drug cartels, which either cross the groups themselves or collect a tax per head from smugglers. "These guys watch us," Cabrera said. "They know where we're at, when we're going to be there, when we're going to leave." BORDER Sh i o f il le ga l cr os si ng s in to T ex as a cc el er at es YONHAP,CHOIJAE-GU—THEASSOCIATEDPRESS South Korean Army Col. Eom Hyo-sik gives a briefing on a North Korean navy ship which fired two artillery shells in the Yellow Sea, at the Defense Ministry in Seoul, South Korea, on Thursday. By Hyung-Jin Kim The Associated Press SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA North Korea's artillery shell- ing near a South Korean warship patrolling disputed waters was likely a warn- ing, not an attack attempt, Seoul officials and analysts said Friday. On Thursday, the two Koreas exchanged artil- lery fire along the poorly marked western sea bound- ary. South Korean officials say the exchange started af- ter two North Korean artil- lery shells fell in waters near a South Korean navy ship on a routine patrol of the area. The South Korean ship wasn't hit but fired several artillery rounds into waters near one of several North Korean warships near the sea boundary, South Ko- rean defense officials said. The North Korean ship also wasn't hit. The North doesn't recog- nize the Yellow Sea bound- ary, which was unilaterally drawn by the U.S.-led U.N. Command at the end of the 1950-53 Korean War. Defense Ministry spokes- man Kim Min-seok said Fri- day that South Korean offi- cials suspect the North Ko- rean shells came from a land-based artillery sys- tem, but they haven't offi- cially pinpointed the origin. Defense officials had said Thursday that the North's shelling came from a war- ship. Kim said officials believe North Korea didn't aim to at- tack the South Korean navy ship because the North only fired two rounds. The North Korean ships in the area also didn't leave the area af- ter the North fired shells, something they would have done to avoid counter-fire if the North had intended to hit a South Korean ship, he said. On Tuesday, South Ko- rean navy ships fired warn- ing shots to repel three North Korean warships that briefly violated the disputed sea boundary. On Wednes- day, North Korea's military vowed to retaliate. Koh Yu-hwan, a profes- sor at Seoul's Dongguk Uni- versity, said the North likely didn't want to hit South Ko- rean ships because Pyong- yang doesn't want fighting to divert public attention from widespread criticism of South Korean government incompetence in the han- dling of a ferry disaster last month that left more than 300 people dead or missing. On Friday, North Korea's military issued a statement denying it fired artillery shells. It claimed a South Ko- rean warship intruded into North Korean waters and initiated firing on its own. Thursday's artillery ex- change, which forced hun- dreds of residents on a front- line island to flee to bomb shelters, is the latest sign of rising animosity between the divided countries in re- cent weeks. North Korea has conducted a string of artil- lery drills and missile tests and threatened the leaders of the U.S. and South Korea. N. Korean shelling likely a warning EAST ASIA By Zeina Karam The Associated Press BEIRUT In the first attack to target a campaign event, a mortar shell slammed into a tent packed with sup- porters of President Bashar Assad, killing 39 people and wounding 205 others, Syr- ian state TV said Friday. The shelling underscored deep fears in government strongholds that rebels will escalate attacks in an at- tempt to disrupt the ballot- ing. Assad is widely expected to win a third, seven-year mandate in the vote sched- uled for June 3, but the West and opposition activists have criticized it as a farce since it is taking place de- spite a raging civil war. The 49-year-old president himself has not made a pub- lic appearance in more than a month and was not at the gatheringstruckbythemor- tar shell late Thursday in the southern city of Daraa. But campaigning has begun in earnest, with supporters waving his pictures and Syr- ianflagsduringdailydemon- strations in the capital, Da- mascus, the coastal city of Latakia and other govern- ment-held areas. Many gatherings have been held in so-called "elec- tion tents" where national- istic songs are played and supporters mingle. State TV showed pic- tures of Assad supporters dancing in a campaign tent in Daraa. It then showed people lying dead and wounded on the ground, in- cluding several children. Its toll was the first provided by the government for the at- tack, which opposition ac- tivists earlier said killed 21. Ahmad Masalma, an opposition activist in Da- raa, said six such tents — festooned with posters of Assad and Syrian flags — have been set up in the past week in the city, which holds special significance as the birthplace of the uprising against his rule in March 2011. He criticized the celebra- tory mood in the tents. "They have loud music and Dabka," he said, refer- ring to a traditional foot- stomping dance. "It's very provocative and an insult to the blood of martyrs." He said and another ac- tivist who identified himself by his first name, Ahmad, said rebels from a faction of the Free Syrian Army um- brella group fired a single mortar shell at the tent in a government-held area, after repeatedly warning civil- ians to stay away. Daraa is divided into a rebel-held and a government-held sector. He said about 100 people, including members of pro- Assad militias, officers and employees, were in the tent when it was hit in the Matar district. The Britain-based Syr- ian Observatory for Hu- man Rights, which relies on activists on the ground for its reports, said at least 21 people, including 11 civil- ians, were killed. Masalma said the attack "set the tent ablaze and sent shrapnel flying every- where." SYRIA 39 r ep or te d k il le d in c am pa ig n te nt s he ll in g SANA — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Backers of Syrian President Bashar Assad hold his portraits and wave Syrian flags during a demonstration in support of his candidacy for presidential elections in Damascus, Syria, on Friday. A mortar shell struck a large tent where supporters of Assad had gathered for election campaigning in southern Syria. By Jason Straziuso The Associated Press NAIROBI, KENYA The good news for hundreds of thou- sands of hungry South Su- dan residents is that inter- national donors this week pledged an additional $600 million to help a country up- ended by conflict. The bad news is that perilous secu- rity and flooded roads mean famine remains a real pos- sibility. Three days after interna- tional donors pledged $606 million — bringing pledges for the year to $1.2 billion — a spokeswoman for the U.N.'s World Food Program said Friday that despite a cease-fire signed between the government and rebel fighters this month, WFP hasn't yet seen any improve- ments in access for hard-to- reach areas. Informal road blocks where armed men demand bribes have impeded food deliveries. Insecurity has also prevented food deliver- ies by river barge. And sea- sonal rains now under way have closed off many of the country's bad dirt roads. "A serious risk of famine remains and we are very concerned about the access to the areas where we know that up to three quarters of the population are in urgent need of food," said Challiss McDonough, a WFP spokes- woman. Because the window to deliver food aid before the rains really set in has closed, food and other aid deliveries now must be done by air, which cost six or seven times as much as road distributions. More than 1 million South Sudan residents have fled their homes because of the fighting that broke out in December. Some 1.3 mil- lion people are in a hunger emergency, one step below famine. South Sudan, which broke away from Sudan in 2011, is one of the world's poorest countries. Fred McCray, the re- sponse manager for the U.S. aid group World Vision in South Sudan, called the new $600 million pledge — including $290 million from the U.S. and $101 million from the U.K. — extremely welcome and desperately needed. He also said that peace seems to be prevail- ing after this month's cease- fire deal. But the need to use air transport to move food creates other problems. "This is obviously more expensive than trucking food, and even those air- craftwillnotbeabletoreach some airports that are little more than dirt strips that shut down when the rains come," McCray said. WFP is hiring about 10 more aircraft to make ad- ditional air drops, but Mc- Donough noted that there are only so many aircraft in the world equipped to drop payloads of food while con- tinuing to fly. AFRICA S. Sudan famine risk remains despite $600M pledge By Brian Witte The Associated Press ANNAPOLIS, MD. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Friday that new officers will be counted on to lead the fight against sexual assault, remain ethical under tough circumstances and help people in the military facing mental health issues. Hagel told the graduating class of the U.S. Naval Acad- emy that students have seen how sexual assault can de- stroy trust and confidence at the core of the military. He told them to use their ex- perience to make sure every- one is treated respectfully. In the past year, the acad- emy has seen the prosecu- tion of three academy foot- ball players accused of sex- ually assaulting a classmate. Charges against two were dropped. A third man was acquitted. "You've seen what these crimes do to the survivors, their families, institutions and communities," Hagel said. "You know how they tear people and units apart, how they destroy the bonds of confidence and trust that lie at the very core, the cen- ter, the heart of our military. Take this knowledge and do whatever you can to make sure everyone, everyone, is treated with the dignity and respect they deserve." Hagel also told gradu- ates they will face tremen- dous pressures in their new leadership roles to succeed at any cost. That, he said, sometimes clouds judgment of what's right from wrong. In February, the Navy said it was investigating cheat- ing allegations against about one-fifth of its trainers at a school for naval nuclear power reactor operators at a nuclear propulsion school at Charleston, S.C. "We see all too often that small actions can reverber- ate in large ways, whether it's sharing answers on a test, looking the other way when someone denigrates another human being or tak- ing advantage of the trap- pings in your office," Hagel said. NAVAL ACADEMY GRADUATION Ha ge l: O ffic er s mu st h el p el im in at e as sa ul t SATURDAY, MAY 24, 2014 REDBLUFFDAILYNEWS.COM | NEWS | 7 B