BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (Reuters) - An Argentine mayor is so fed up with crimes on his patch he has told farmers to go ahead and gun thieves down in cold blood."I endorse killing criminals on your farmland, I endorse it," said Jorge Simoni, mayor of the municipality of Villarino in southern Argentina.
"The life of the guy who gets up at 5 a.m. to produce, to work, comes first," he said in a television interview aired on Thursday. "There will be a thousand reasons why people go out and steal, but I don't excuse them."
Provincial farmers say robberies and violent crimes have risen sharply since Argentina plunged into its worst economic crisis in 2002. One in two of Argentina's 36 million population live below the poverty line.
Argentina's police say poor budgets and wages are taking their toll on fighting crime, but the government is seeking to improve policing.
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