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davidholmessmith@holmesandcompany.org

www.holmesandcompany.org

M:  (+34) 635 712 048

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F :  (+34) 951 893 438

SKYPE :      dhs.2010

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 HOLMES&COMPANY Ltd

ASSET ACQUISITION & PROPERTY DEVELOPMENT

davidholmessmith@holmesandcompany.org

www.holmesandcompany.org

M:  (+34) 635 712 048

T:   (+34) 951 893 438

F :  (+34) 951 893 438

SKYPE :      dhs.2010

Linkedin :    uk.linkedin.com/in/holmesandco

Twitter :     @holmescompany

FaceBook :  /holmesandco.property

Spain’s long-term borrowing costs soared to their highest level since the country joined the euro zone. Investors have apparently concluded that the rescue is potentially a much better deal for the banks and their shareholders than for the government, its taxpayers and bondholders.

Many details of the banking bailout remain to be resolved — including which of Europe’s rescue funds will supply the money. The one thing that is clear is that even though the money will be funneled to the banks, the government in Madrid will ultimately be responsible for guaranteeing that $125 billion, adding to the Spanish government’s already rising debt load.

That fact, more than any other, probably explains why there was heavy selling of Spanish government bonds on Monday and Tuesday. The yield on Spain’s 10-year bonds — an indicator of the government’s borrowing costs and the risk of holding that debt — rose Tuesday to as high as 6.8 percent. That is approaching the level that led to bailouts for Ireland, Portugal and Greece.

With its banking industry in trouble, Spain probably would eventually have had no choice but to seek a rescue. And by not having to cede autonomy over its government budgets or spending, Madrid attained a much better deal than other governments have with their bailouts.

And yet, critics are noting that any upside from the arrangement will go to the banks and their investors. The potential downside will be the Spanish people’s to bear.

“Unfortunately Spain didn’t manage to reach one of its main goals in the negotiations, which was to have Europe bear part of the risk of rescuing the financial sector, without letting it fall instead directly onto the shoulders of the Spanish taxpayer,” said Luis Garicano, a Spanish economist who teaches at the London of School Economics. “Ultimately, those who lent to our financial system were the banks and insurance companies of Northern Europe, which should bear the consequences of these decisions.”

The full bailout loan would add 10 percentage points to Spain’s debt, raising it to about 90 percent of gross domestic product this year.

And Fitch, the credit rating agency that downgraded Spain’s government debt nearly to junk status last week, warned Tuesday, that even if Spain used only 60 billion euros of the bailout loan, that would put Spain’s debt “on a trajectory to peak at 95 percent of G.D.P. in 2015.” As recently as April, Luis de Guindos, the economy minister, had forecast that debt would rise to 78 percent of G.D.P. this year.

On Tuesday, despite the bailout plan, Fitch downgraded the credit ratings of 18 Spanish banks. That included Bankia, the troubled mortgage lender the government nationalized in early May.

Some analysts are questioning the rush by European finance ministers to push for Spain to accept a bailout before Greek elections on Sunday. Those elections could create deeper turmoil for the euro zone.

“The Europeans wanted to put a firewall between Greece and Spain, but they’ve accelerated things in a way that doesn’t at all give confidence to the markets,” said Xavier Sala-í-Martin, an economics professor at Columbia University. Instead, he said, the deal “leaves the impression that everything was just improvised rather than planned properly.”

Until last weekend, in fact, Mr. Rajoy’s government had resisted formally requesting a rescue package, saying it wanted first to establish exactly how much money was needed to keep its troubled banks afloat.

Madrid had already grossly underestimated the problems at Bankia when it seized the mortgage lender last month after giving it a 4.5 billion euro cash infusion. Less than two weeks later, the bank’s overseers said it would need an additional 19 billion euros ($23.88 billion) of new capital — a declaration that unsettled the markets and threatened to turn a steady outflow of investor money from Spanish banks into a torrent.

Two consulting firms hired by the government to conduct stress-test audits of the Spanish banking industry, Roland Berger and Oliver Wyman, are not scheduled to present their findings until June 21. Another four consulting firms are auditing the 14 largest Spanish financial institutions, with those results not expected before the end of July.

Still, the International Monetary Fund on Friday evening in Washington, ahead of a release scheduled for Monday, published its assessment of Spanish banks, providing a rationale for the weekend rescue deal. The I.M.F. said that Spanish banks would need at least 37 billion euros in extra capital. The European finance ministers decided to lend out nearly three times that amount.

“Everybody moved too fast, based on too little information,” Mr. Sala-í-Martin said. “The I.M.F. report comes out looking a little bit superficial, and certainly can’t be used to conclude exactly how much money needs to be put on the table.”

One thing the I.M.F. report did, however, is split Spanish banks into different risk categories, which in itself has fueled another debate within Spain’s banking industry. Some of the best-situated commercial banks are now resisting receiving any of the European loans.

Spain and its European partners have not yet drawn up a memorandum of understanding for the deal. Many basic aspects of the loan also remain under discussion, even though Mr. de Guindos, the Spanish economy minister, has already said that Spain will receive “very favorable” terms for the European loan.

Among the few certainties is that the emergency loan will be channeled to the banks through the Fund for Orderly Bank Restructuring, which Spain set up in 2009 and has already used to wipe out the losses of some smaller collapsed banks.

The Spanish deal comes at an awkward time because Europe is in transition to a new emergency funding program, making it uncertain exactly how and when the money will be disbursed to Spain. Some holders of Spanish bonds are worried that Europe’s loan will be given seniority over existing government debt. The new fund, known as the European Stability Mechanism, goes into effect next month and guarantees that its creditors have preferred status to other bondholders.

And even though Madrid obtained a much cheaper European lifeline for Spain’s troubled banks than it could have raised on the debt markets, opposition politicians are blaming Mr. Rajoy for letting the banking crisis spin out of control in the first place.

Mr. Rajoy, however, has turned down calls to answer such criticism before Parliament. His next scheduled appearance there is in the second week of July.

“What is there to make of somebody who has enough time to watch a soccer match but not to appear before Parliament?” asked Mr. Sala-í-Martin, the Spanish economist.

It is a view shared by many Spaniards.

“I don’t understand whether such a rescue will really save the banks, but what I do know is that the only ones who will be forced to tighten their belt again will be ordinary taxpayers,” Cristina Senac Amigo, a 42-year-old hairdresser, said Tuesday.

“And if you’re telling your people to prepare for a disastrous year, you don’t then leave to watch a game — however much we all love soccer and want Spain to win.”

Marbella has no money to pay its 3,400 workers in future months. The workers have been paid for May, but the Mayor, Ángeles Muñoz, has warned that they will see problems over the next few months as the council struggles to find the monthly wage bill of ten million €. It’s not the only Ayuntamiento with problems for paying its workers. Vélez-Málaga and Coín are both paying wages late, and the 600 workers in Manilva have had problems since the start of the year.

It was sundowner time at the Cantina tapas bar in the picturesque village of Frigiliana, a few miles inland from the Costa del Sol town of Nerja. Inside, local men were watching bullfighting on television and smoking cigars in quiet contravention of the smoking ban. Outside, expatriate Britons were discussing the vagaries of living in Spain while downing glasses of tinto de verano, the popular summer drink of red wine and lemonade. Mark Jones, who runs his own gardening and pool maintenance company, had spent two days queuing at the local municipal office to renew his residence permit. "I got there at 9am on the first day and my number was 26; by lunchtime they were only up to number 6 and they close at 2pm," he complained. "You have to renew every bit of paper here every few years but I can't afford two days off to queue in an office. There are no staff now because of the cuts, so it all takes longer. It's like everywhere – as soon as the recession hits, it's the immigrants who cop it worst."  Conversation turned to a local couple, who are desperate to leave Spain but who can't because their house is still unsold after four years on the market - despite dropping the asking price from €1 million to €750,000. In 1992 the BBC spent millions of pounds launching an ill-fated soap opera, Eldorado, following the fortunes of British expats on the Costa del Sol. The project flopped and was cancelled a year later. Now, 20 years later, the real-life diaspora is experiencing an equally disastrous end to its Iberian dream. Times are desperate in Spain. More than a million people took the streets earlier this month to protest at budget cuts, 24 per cent unemployment and the rising cost of living. The price of milk and bread has risen by 48 per cent during the last year, according to a recent study, and of potatoes by 116 per cent. Electricity bills are up 11 per cent while property prices are in free fall; they have declined for 15 consecutive quarters and are 41 per cent lower than in 2006. Several of its banks are faltering: this weekend Spain's government is preparing to pump a further €19 billion into Bankia, the country's fourth-largest lender, in the biggest single bank bailout in the country's history. Trading in the bank's shares was suspended on Friday until negotiations over the rescue were complete. Santander, Europe's largest bank, was among 11 Spanish financial institutions to be downgraded by the credit rating agency Standard and Poor earlier this month; and there's no sign of anything like economic recovery on the horizon. Expats are finding life hard in a country where they once basked in a cheaper way of life. Around one million Britons spend part or all of the year in Spain, but thousands are now returning home – and more want to, but say they can't afford to because their property is no longer worth what they paid for it. For the first time since 1998, Spain recorded a drop in foreign residents last year, according to newly released figures. With its narrow cobbled streets, whitewashed houses and children riding horses down the main road, Frigiliana lives up to most tourists' idea of an authentic Spanish village. But appearances can be deceptive. Out of its 3,000-strong population, 1,280 are foreign nationals including 700 Britons, making the village one of the most expat-dominated in Spain. The school advertises itself as bilingual. The British population is so large that the local council pays Kevin Wright, a former travel rep from Leicestershire who has lived in Spain for more than 20 years, to run a "foreigners' department". He helps expats deal with everything from local business permits to burst pipes and land disputes with neighbours, and has noticed changes since the eurozone crisis began. "Before, I was getting 10 newbies a week moving here from the UK; now I get one," he said. "Some Brits have lived here for 20 years but now families move out here then six, eight months later pack up and go back because they can't find work, or didn't realise what the cost of living would be." Mr Wright says many Britons fail to learn Spanish or to assimilate, so that the community becomes dependent on itself – to its cost. "People think they can set themselves up doing business to other Brits, like finance or house sales and rentals, or pool maintenance, gardening and cleaning. "But the property market isn't there any more and people have cut back and do their own maintenance, so there's less work." In desperate economic times, the expat community is increasingly vulnerable to financial trickery. "The worst people for scamming you are other Brits," said Gary Smith, a builder, who emigrated two years ago. "You trust them more but they just take your money for an investment and you never see a penny." Elderly residents are particularly vulnerable. The exchange rate - still far less favourable than five years ago - has meant British pensions and other income in sterling do not stretch as far as they once did. Julia Hilling moved from the UK to Fuengirola, along the coast from Frigiliana, 20 years ago with her husband. They bought a spacious, three-bedroomed apartment with two balcony patios in an upmarket area, overlooking the town's castle. Six years ago, Mrs Hilling, by then a widow aged 83, was persuaded by an independent financial adviser to take out a full mortgage on the apartment. She was told the equity raised would be invested, risk-free, to provide an income, while the mortgage would help offset Spain's 34 per cent inheritance tax when she died. Now 89, Mrs Hilling has never seen any return on her money, owes more than €300,000 to Rothschild Bank on the mortgage and relies on handouts from her children to stay in Spain. "It's devastating," she said. "The man was British, very charming, and said there was no risk. My children said 'Mummy, please don't do this', but I needed the extra income. Now I'm fighting for my life and my home." She is one of more than 100 mainly elderly British expats who have banded together in a Spanish court action to have their mortgages voided, arguing they were mis-sold. Rothschild and several Scandinavian banks also named in the legal action claim the financial advisers are to blame; and the advisers, who are not regulated in Spain as they are in Britain, insist the risk was mentioned in the small print. In a country fighting for its own survival, Spanish politicians are not unduly concerned with the plight of British residents, particularly when many are retired so do not actively contribute to the national economy. Spain's government is currently involved in a dispute with Britain over extent of free health care for Britons under EU law and there are moves to force them to pay 10 per cent of their prescription costs. But for some, returning home remains unthinkable. Former fitness instructor and gym owner Jo Morrison, 49, moved to Spain from London with her partner Lloyd 11 years ago. In 2008 she sold her house in Putney so she could open a gym in Nerja but the project failed after her business partner pulled out, and then the global financial crisis erupted. She now works as a cleaner while renting a one-bedroom home. "Sometimes we've gone without food and I still can't believe that I don't have my house or any savings any more," she said. "But Spain is my home now. I'd rather sleep on the beach than go back to the UK."

Trading in shares in the Spanish lender Bankia have been suspended in Madrid. The market regulator CNMV said it was "due to circumstances that may affect the normal share trading". Bankia is reported to be due to ask the government for a bailout of more than 15bn euros ($19bn; £12bn) after a board meeting later on Friday. Bankia, which is Spain's fourth-largest bank, was part-nationalised two weeks ago because of its problems with bad property debt. Any extra government money would be on top of the 4.5bn euros in state loans that the government had to convert into shares in the group in the part-nationalisation process. Shares in Bankia's parent company Banco Financiero y de Ahorros (BFA) have also been suspended. Bankia was created in 2010 from the merger of seven struggling regional savings banks. It holds 32bn euros in distressed property assets.

Spain's prime minister voiced concern on Wednesday about the state's ability to finance itself as fears mounted over a spread of the euro zone debt crisis from Greece and a nationalised bank delayed publishing accounts amid talk of it needing more aid. With creditors spooked by Greece's difficulties further east along the Mediterranean, the cost of borrowing for Mariano Rajoy's government hit 6.5 percent on benchmark 10-year bonds, more than 500 basis points above German debt and a record in the 13 years the two states have shared the common currency. "It's a difficult and complicated situation," the premier told reporters in parliament as traders wondered whether Madrid might one day, like smaller Greece, Portugal and Ireland, need foreign help. "The risk premium has risen a lot and that means that it is difficult to finance yourself at a reasonable price."

Queen Sofia of Spain has cancelled a visit to the UK to mark Queen Elizabeth's Diamond Jubilee because of disputes over Gibraltar. A Spanish government statement said it was "hardly appropriate" for Queen Sofia, 73, to attend a lunch on Friday. The UK and Spain have been in dispute over fishing rights off Gibraltar, a UK territory which Spain also claims. Spain has also protested over a visit to Gibraltar by Queen Elizabeth's son Prince Edward and his wife Sophie. The prince and the Countess of Wessex are to visit Gibraltar on 11-13 June as part of the celebrations to mark the 60th anniversary of the Queen's reign. Complaint Spain continues to claim sovereignty over Gibraltar, which has been ruled by Britain since 1713 under the terms of the Treaty of Utrecht. Queen Sofia's husband, King Juan Carlos, had already declined his invitation to the lunch at Windsor Castle on Friday. He is recovering from surgery last month after he fell and broke his hip while hunting elephants in Botswana. In 1981, the Spanish royal couple declined an invitation to Prince Charles's wedding to Diana, Princess of Wales because they planned to visit Gibraltar as part of their honeymoon. And a visit by Princess Anne to Gibraltar in 2009 sparked an official complaint from the Spanish government. An additional cause of unhappiness for the Spanish royal household is the fact that the British regimental band of Gibraltar will be performing at the Diamond Jubilee, reports the Spanish news agency Efe. A spokesman for the UK Foreign Office told the AFP news agency: "The visit was a private commitment and we don't comment on private visits." Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko left Japan on Wednesday for a five-day visit to the UK Sovereign's lunch Officials at Buckingham Palace have refused to confirm which monarchs are attending the lunch on Friday, but the BBC's royal correspondent Peter Hunt said Prince Albert of Monaco and the Emperor of Japan would be at Windsor Castle. Emperor Akihito, who is 78, underwent heart surgery in February and only returned to full official duties in April. Swaziland's King Mswati III, who critics accuse of leading a "lavish lifestyle" while his people starve, is among those attending. Protests were held outside the Savoy hotel in London on Wednesday by Swazis living in the UK, who claim two-thirds of people in Swaziland are living in extreme poverty. Our correspondent said the King of Bahrain, Sheikh Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, could also attend, despite public unrest in the country and accusations of human rights abuses.

Queen Sofia had earlier accepted the invite to Friday's celebration at Windsor Castle, but in a last minute snub by Spain's government she has been told not to attend because it would be "inappropriate in the current circumstances". Last week Spain's foreign ministry issued a formal complaint to Britain's Ambassador in Madrid over the planned visit in June of The Earl and Countess of Wessex to the disputed territory of Gibraltar to mark the Queen's Diamond Jubilee year. The Spanish government expressed its "upset and concern" over the visit by the Queen's youngest son and his wife to the territory, a tiny peninsula sitting at Spain's southwestern corner over which it still claims sovereignty. At the time however, it seemed unlikely to take the matter further. In fact, when asked if Queen Sofia would still be attending the Windsor Castle event, Jose Garcia-Margallo, Spain's foreign minister confirmed she would be free to do so in a "private capacity". However, in a sudden U-turn and with less than 48 hours until the lunch, Spain's royal household disclosed that the government had ordered Queen Sofia to reject the invitation to Windsor Castle, where kings and queens from around the world will convene to celebrate the Queen's 60 years on the throne.

Expats will be barred from playing poker with fellow English-speakers internationally, while those who enjoy virtual bingo are likely to be frustrated in Spain. From June 1, only companies with a Spanish government-issued licence and an .es domain will be allowed to run online gambling sites in the country. The previous Socialist Party government passed a new gambling law last year that introduced the new rules, but the implementation of this was delayed when they lost power to the Popular Party in November. The new law doesn’t, however, cover bingo, meaning those who’ve taken to substituting the UK’s bingo halls for a bit of a flutter online will be out of luck. It has not been banned but the legal assumption is that if it isn't on the list of regulated products, it isn't legal. While sports betting is permitted under the new law, live in-play betting has been excluded and there has been speculation that the regulation of betting exchanges — such as that run by Betfair — will be delayed.

The Spanish government is facilitating a potential merger between struggling lenders Banco Mare Nostrum, Liberbank, Unicaja, and Ibercaja, reports the Financial Times . The combined entity resulting from such a deal would wield a 270B euro balance sheet, making it Spain's fifth-largest by asset size. Bankia, Spain's last attempt at a similar arrangement (formed in December 2010 as a merger of 7 banks) was bailed out by the government to the tune of 4.5B euro last week when that amount of government-held debt was converted to equity. From the FT: Analysts have expressed concerns that the government could repeat the mistakes of Bankia, a merger of seven savings banks in which Spain took a €4.5bn stake last week – the country’s largest nationalisation since the crisis began. “Merging weak banks does not create a strong bank. That should be obvious by now,” said one banking analyst.

The ex Municipal Real Estate Assessor in Marbella Town Hall, Juan Antonio Roca, now at the centre of the Malaya case on corruption, has offered for properties in Marbella to pay Marbella Town Hall after being found guilty in another case, ‘Caso Saqueo’. He was sentenced to six years and ten months in the case and he and two others sentenced with him, José Luis Sierra who was judicial advisor to Jesús Gil, and the accountant Jorge Castel, have each to pay 23 million € compensation to Marbella Town Hall, in addition to whatever jail sentences they have been given. Reports say Roca wants to clear this debt so that he can benefit from improved conditions in jail. So far he has only paid 600,000 € and there talks with the Town Hall on the payment of the rest. The properties offered are the Finca La Caridad in San Pedro Alcántara, a half-built building next to the motorway and the Costa del Sol Hospital, and two plots of land in Urbanisation Las Brisas in Las Chapas, one of which has a heliport which he used to travel to Murcia and Huelva.

The Brink’s-Mat curse even touched on the Great Train Robbery gang of 1963. One of them, Charlie Wilson, found himself in trouble when £3 million of Brink’s-Mat investors’ money went missing in a drug deal. In April 1990, he paid the price when a young British hood knocked on the front door of his hacienda north of Marbella and shot Wilson and his pet husky dog before coolly riding off down the hill on a yellow bicycle.

Play was possible earlier on, but only 12 of the 68 players completed their day's work before the hold-up came at lunchtime. 

Rain in Spain: Players hit the driving range at a wet Spanish Open

Frenchman Bourdy, with only one top 10 finish in the past year, led on five under par by one from England's Simon Dyson and Robert Rock, 19-year-old Italian Matteo Manassero and home hope Jorge Campillo, a graduate from last season's Challenge Tour. 

The best early move came from Ireland's Peter Lawrie, whose only victory in nearly 300 Tour events came on the course four years ago. 

He birdied the first and third to climb into a share of 10th spot on two under, but had completed only one more hole when officials decided to bring the players in. 

With conditions improving and the threat of lightning passing it was announced that play would resume at 3pm local time, but with almost two hours lost the third round looked likely to spill into Sunday.

Cloudy skies: Italian Matteo Manasser

Instruction court two in Granada has ordered the reopening of the possible theft of a baby girl in 1990 in the Hospital Clínico in Granada. The case had previously been closed because of a lack of evidence. The hospital supposedly gave the family the body of dead baby in the place of their newly born daughter. Now a new report from a prestigious laboratory, quoted by the father Eduardo Rayo, says the DNA given to the parents did not correspond to the mother, but came from an adult and not newly born baby. The National Toxicology Institute had said that the DNA test was non-conclusive. As the instruction case gets back underway the family have indicted 15 people.

The airline has been objecting to the obligation of using the walkways, preferring their passengers to walk to the planes on the tarmac Ryanair has said it will not launch an appeal against the prohibition of embarking by foot at El Altet airport in Alicante. The sentence from Mercantile Court 3 in Alicante on March 26 ruled in favour of AENA, the Spanish Airports Authority, regarding the use of the airbridges allowing passengers to walk directly onto the planes. The ruling, ordering Ryanair to use the airbridges could have been appealed by the airline, but they have decided not to do so. The sentence considered the procedures in use at Alicante airport ‘are not arbitrary decisions by the authorities, but the fruit of their obligation to provide a service with all guarantees’. AENA said that they had always been open to study any operations with Ryanair, but provided that quality and safety in the provision of services are not put at risk. Neither can it be a discrimination against the other airlines.

There has been another incident between the Gibraltar Police and Spanish Coastguards. The Gibraltar authorities say the scuffle came about over the persecution of inflatable boats last Wednesday in the waters around the Rock. Reports indicate that a boat from the Spanish Coastguard approached an inflatable containing three people. Another boat from the Royal Gibraltar Police, also approached the inflatable, to arrest the occupants. Such inflatable boats have been banned under Gibraltar law for some ten years, to avoid their use for drug or contraband trafficking. The Gibraltar Government has issued a statement claiming that the Spanish Coastguard ‘assisted’ the three people on the boat ‘to avoid Gibraltar jurisdiction’ in ‘Gibraltar territorial waters’. However the Spanish do not recognise such waters. While the two sides were conversing about what was going on, two other boats, ‘suspected of carrying objects of prohibited importation’ were seen going from Punta de Europa and the bay, and both the Royal Gibraltar Police and SVA started a chase. The Gibraltar Police told the Spanish Coastguard to stop their chase as they were ‘in Gibraltar territorial waters’ but this request was ignored. The Gibraltar Government considers the Spanish Coastguard assisted the traffickers, stopping their arrest by the Gibraltar Police and describing that as ‘lamentable’. The British Foreign Office has confirmed it is taking up the matter with Spain. Gibraltar First Minister, Fabian Picardo, is asking why one of the Royal Navy vessels stationed in Gibraltar did not act. The Gibraltar Government says it ‘will be seeking clarification of the actions of the Royal Navy vessel ‘Scimitar’ which, although in the area, did not assist the Gibraltar Police engaged in the events’.

23 year old British tourist has fallen to her death from the third floor balcony of her hotel in Magalluf, Mallorca. Emergency sources said it happened at 4.25am Saturday morning at the Hotel Teix in Calle Pinada. Local police and emergency health services went to scene. After 20 minutes of an attempt to re-animate her heart, the woman was pronounced dead. Online descriptions for the Hotel say it is the best place to stay of you are looking for non-stop partying, adding it not suitable for families.

Four of the last reporters and photographers willing to cover crime stories have been slain in less than a week in violence-torn Veracruz state, where two Mexican drug cartels are warring over control of smuggling routes and targeting sources of independent information. The brutal campaign is bleeding the media and threatening to turn Veracruz into the latest state in Mexico where fear snuffs out reporting on the drug war. Three photojournalists who worked the perilous crime beat in the port city of Veracruz were found dismembered and dumped in plastic bags in a canal Thursday, less than a week after a reporter for an investigative newsmagazine was beaten and strangled in her home in the state capital of Xalapa. Press freedom groups said all three photographers had temporarily fled the state after receiving threats last year. The organizations called for immediate government action to halt a wave of attacks that has killed at least seven current and former reporters and photographers in Veracruz over the last 18 months. Like most of those, the men found Thursday were among the few journalists left working on crime-related stories in the state. Threats and killings have spawned an atmosphere of terror and self-censorship, and most local media are too intimidated to report on drug-related violence. Social media and blogs are often the only outlets reporting on serious crime. Veracruz isn't the only battleground for Mexican media. In at least three northeastern states, journalists are under siege from assailants throwing grenades inside newsrooms and gunmen firing into newspaper and TV station buildings. In the state of Tamaulipas, on the border with Texas, local media stopped covering drug trafficking violence, mentioning drug cartels or reporting on organized crime shortly after two gangs began fighting for control of Nuevo Laredo in 2004. As part of that war, reporters were targeted to keep them silent or because they had links to gangs. Mexico has become one of the world's most dangerous countries for journalists in recent years, amid a government offensive against drug cartels and fighting among gangs that have brought tens of thousands of deaths, kidnappings and extortion cases. Prosecutions in journalist killings are almost nonxistent, although that is widely true of all homicides and other serious crimes in Mexico. The latest killings came in Boca del Rio, a town near the port city of Veracruz where police found the bodies. The victims bore signs of torture and had been dismembered, the state prosecutors' office said. One victim was identified as Guillermo Luna Varela, a crime-news photographer for the website http://www.veracruznews.com.mx who was last seen by local reporters covering a car accident Wednesday afternoon. According to a fellow journalist, who insisted on speaking anonymously out of fear, Luna was in his 20s and had begun his career working for the local newspaper Notiver. The journalist said Luna was the nephew of another of the men found dead, Gabriel Huge. Huge was in his early 30s and worked as a photojournalist for Notiver until last summer, when he fled the state soon after two of the paper's reporters were slain in still-unsolved killings. He had returned to the state to work as a reporter, but it was not immediately clear what kind of stories he was covering recently. State officials said the third victim was Esteban Rodriguez, who was a photographer for the local newspaper AZ until last summer, when he too quit and fled the state. He later came back, but took up work as a welder. The London-based press freedom group Article 19 said he, like the other two, had been a crime photographer. The fourth victim was Luna's girlfriend, Irasema Becerra, state prosecutors said. Article 19 said in a report last year that Luna, Varela and Rodriguez were among 13 Veracruz journalists who had fled their homes because of crime-related threats and official unwillingness to protect them or investigate the danger. The Committee to Protect Journalists said in 2008 that Huge had been detained and beaten by federal police as he tried to cover a fatal auto accident involving officers. Last June, Miguel Angel Lopez Velasco, a columnist and editorial director for Notiver, was shot to death in Veracruz along with his wife and one of his children. Authorities that month also found the body of journalist Noel Lopez buried in a clandestine grave in the town of Chinameca. Lopez, who disappeared three months earlier, had worked for the weeklies Horizonte and Noticias de Acayucan and for the daily newspaper La Verdad. The following month, Yolanda Ordaz de la Cruz, a police reporter for Notiver, was found with her throat cut in the state. Lopez was found after a suspect in another case confessed to killing him, but the other two murders have not been resolved. The cartel war in Veracruz reached a bloody peak in September when 35 bodies were dumped on a main highway in rush-hour traffic. Local law enforcement in the state was considered so corrupt and infiltrated by the Zetas and other gangs that Mexico's federal government fired 800 officers and 300 administrative personnel in the city of Veracruz-Boca del Rio in December and sent in about 800 marines to patrol. Mike O'Connor, the Committee to Protect Journalists' representative for Mexico, said journalists in Veracruz were exercising an unusual degree of self-censorship even before Ordaz and Lopez were killed. He said media avoided much coverage of crime and corruption. "Important news was not covered because it might upset the Zetas. Then these guys were killed and self-censorship cracked down even more," O'Connor said. "Almost all of the police beat reporters left town after those killings." Regina Martinez, a correspondent for the national magazine Proceso, continued to cover crime-related stories along with a handful of other journalists, however. On Saturday, authorities went to her home in Xalapa, the state capital, after a neighbor reported it to be suspiciously quiet. They found the reporter dead in her bathroom with signs she had been beaten and strangled. "Self-censorship was extraordinarily strong but whoever killed these journalists wanted more," O'Connor said. "It still wasn't enough to satisfy whoever killed these journalists." Mexico's human rights commission says 74 media workers were slain from 2000 to 2011. The Committee to Protect Journalists says 51 were killed in that time. It noted in a statement on the Mexico killings that Thursday was World Press Freedom Day.

At night, the streets leading to Omonoia Square are empty. That wasn't always the case. The area was the premier multicultural neighborhood of Athens and one of the first quarters to be gentrified. Jazz bars and Indian restaurants lined the streets, separated by the occasional rooms-by-the-hour hotel. It was a quarter full of immigrants, drug addicts and African prostitutes, but also of journalists, ambitious young artists and teenagers from private schools. Today, the immigrants stay home once night falls. They are afraid of groups belonging to the "angry citizens," a kind of militia that beats up foreigners and claims to help the elderly withdraw money from cash machines without being robbed. Such groups are the product of an initiative started by the neo-Nazi Chrysi Avgi -- Golden Dawn -- the party which has perpetrated pogroms in Agios Panteleimon, another Athens neighborhood with a large immigrant population. There are now three outwardly xenophobic parties in Greece. According to recent surveys, together they could garner up to 20 percent of the vote in elections on Sunday: the anti-Semitic party LAOS stands to win 4 percent; the nationalist party Independent Greeks -- a splinter group of the conservative Nea Dimokratia party -- is forecast to win 11 percent; and the right extremists of Golden Dawn could end up with between 5 and 7 percent. My name is Xenia, the hospitable. Greece itself should really be called Xenia: Tourism, emigration and immigration are important elements of our history. But hospitality is no longer a priority in our country, a fact which the ugly presence of Golden Dawn makes clear. A Personal Attack Shaved heads, military uniforms, Nazi chants, Hitler greetings: How should a Greek journalist deal with such people? Should one just ignore them and leave them unmentioned? Should one denounce them and demand that they be banned? One shouldn't forget that they are violent and have perpetrated several attacks against foreigners and leftists. I thought long and hard about how to write about Golden Dawn so that my article was in no way beneficial to the party. On April 12, the daily Kathimerini ran my story under the headline "Banality of Evil." In the piece, I carefully explained why it was impossible to carry on a dialogue with such people and why I thought the neo-Nazi party should disappear from media coverage and be banned. Five days later, an anonymous reply to my article appeared on the Golden Dawn website. It was a 2,500-word-long personal attack in which the fascists recounted my entire career, mocked my alleged foreign roots (I was born in Hamburg) and even, for no apparent reason, mentioned my 13-year-old daughter. The unnamed authors indirectly threatened me as well: "To put it in the mother tongue of foreign Xenia: 'Kommt Zeit, kommt Rat, kommt Attentat!'" In other words, watch your back. Most Greeks believe that Golden Dawn has connections to both the police and to the country's secret service. Nevertheless, I went to the authorities to ask what I should do. I was told that I should be careful. They told me that party thugs could harass me, beat me or terrorize me over the phone. It would be better, they said, if I stopped writing about them. If I wished to react to the threats, they suggested I file a complaint against Golden Dawn's service provider. That, however, would be difficult given that the domain is based somewhere in the United States. Like Weimar Germany A friend told me that I should avoid wearing headphones on the street so that I can hear what is going on around me. My daughter now has nightmares about being confronted by members of Golden Dawn. Three of her classmates belong to the party. The three boys have posted pictures of party events on their Facebook pages. For their profile image, they have chosen the ancient Greek Meandros symbol, which, in the red-on-black manifestation used by Golden Dawn, resembles a swastika. The group's slogans include "Foreigners Out!" and "The Garbage Should Leave the Country!" The fact that immigration has become such an issue in the worst year of the ongoing economic crisis in the country can be blamed on the two parties in government. The Socialist PASOK and the conservative Nea Dimokratia (New Democracy, or ND) are running xenophobic campaigns. ND has said it intends to repeal a law which grants Greek citizenship to children born in Greece to immigrant parents. And cabinet member Michalis Chrysochoidis, of PASOK, has announced "clean up operations" whereby illegal immigrants are to be rounded up in encampments and then deported. When he recently took a stroll through the center of Athens to collect accolades for his commitment to the cause, some called out to him: "Golden Dawn has cleaned up Athens!" Yet, Chrysochoidis is the best loved PASOK politician in his Athens district, in part because of his xenophobic sentiments. His party comrade, Health Minister Andreas Loverdos, is just as popular. Loverdos has warned Greek men not to sleep with foreign prostitutes for fear of contracting HIV and thus endangering the Greek family. High unemployment of roughly 22 percent, a lack of hope, a tendency toward violence and the search for scapegoats: Analyses in the Greek press compare today's Greece with Germany at the end of the Weimar Republic. "We didn't know," said many Germans when confronted with the truth of the Holocaust after Nazi rule came to an end. After elections on May 6, no Greeks should be able to make the same claim.