Mexico has been involved in a crackdown on narcotics trafficking cartels that have been fighting turf wars over smuggling routes into the U.S.

More than 1.2 million people are in settlements, and close to 500,000 people have left Port-au-Prince for outlying regions.

A Vatican statement said that church leaders recognized the sense of “pain and anger, betrayal, scandal and shame” that the crisis provoked.

Catholic Relief Services’ anti-hunger programs during 2008 helped an estimated 49.3 million people.

Bishop William F. Murphy of Rockville Centre, N.Y., called the attacks "false" and "even calumnious.”

“Achieving our objectives in Afghanistan and Iraq has moved to the top of the institutional military’s budget priorities,” Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said.