Mexican aid lags for starving Tarahumara Indians

GUACHOCHI, Mexico (AP) — It's been months since Maria Luisa Gonzalez and her husband have been able to harvest anything from their drought-parched land or catch fish in a lake that's become little more than a muddy puddle.

Like other Tarahumara Indians suffering from severe drought in Mexico's vast northern canyons, Gonzalez said she had yet to receive any aid last week, nearly two months after President Felipe Calderon said that he had assessed the drought's damage and his government was tending to the crisis.

The federal Interior Department declared a state of emergency in 37 Sierra Madre municipalities in the Tarahumara region on Jan. 3.

The first major batch of federal help showed up Thursday with great media fanfare,