Mexico defies US warnings to bask in tourist boom The bullets keep flying and the bodies keep piling up but more foreigners than ever are choosing to spend their holidays in Mexico. About 50,000 people have been killed in drug-related violence since the centre-right government of President Felipe Calderón made fighting the country's drug cartels a priority in December 2006. Yet Latin America's second largest economy expects 25m foreign visitors this year in what would be the strongest year for tourism on record. In an interview with the Financial Times, Rodolfo López-Negrete, chief operating officer of the Mexico Tourism Board, says he expected 2012 to be 10 per cent up on last year, when a record 22.7m foreigners visited the country. "Unless something dramatic occurs, we should be able to meet those numbers," he says. The Mexican government is hoping that this year's celebrations to mark the start of the new Mayan calendar - it is about to launch its Mundo Maya, or Mayan World campaign - will provide an additional boost. His comments come after the US Department of State recently advised its citizens to avoid "non-essential travel" to almost half of Mexico's 31 states and the federal district of Mexico City in the broadest travel warning issued since Mr Calderón took office. "Gun battles between rival TCOs [transnational criminal organisations] or with Mexican authorities have taken place in towns and cities in many parts of Mexico, especially in the border region," it reads. Gun battles have occurred in broad daylight on streets and in other public venues, such as restaurants and clubs. It points out that the number of US citizens reported to the state department as murdered in Mexico increased from 35 in 2007 to 120 in 2011. Mr López-Negrete says the record numbers are the result of an aggressive campaign, started two years ago, to defend the country's traditionally large share of US holidaymakers as well as to conquer new markets from the so-called Bric nations, which include Brazil, Russia, India and China. "We went ahead and started tackling untapped markets that had tremendous potential," he says. At the heart of the multimillion-dollar campaign is the message that Mexico is a big and diverse country. In other words, while Ciudad Juárez in the northern state of Chihuahua may have gained a reputation as one of the world's most dangerous cities, the state's Copper Canyon, which is even bigger than Arizona's Grand Canyon, remains attractive to tourists. The campaign has included streamlining visa-application processes - anyone holding a valid US visa may now enter Mexico without further paperwork - and working with tour operators throughout the emerging markets. To judge by recent figures, it has worked: visitors from China, Russia and Brazil all grew at least 50 per cent last year.