Mayhem in Monterrey
2012-01-28
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here. For a map of Nuevo Leon state, click here. For a map of Monterrey, click here.

A total of six individuals were murdered in drug and gang related violence in Monterrey, Neuvo Leon.

• One unidentified man in his 50s was shot to death in an area northwest of Monterrey. The victim was found near the intersection of Avenida Aztlan and Calle Augusto Gomez in Valle de Santa Lucía colony after being shot as he was sitting in his vehicle.


• An unidentified man was shot to death in Monterrey, Wednesday afternoon. The victim had been pursued by armed suspects riding aboard a pickup truck. The victim was shot and killed near the intersection of calles Washington and Privada Colonial in Maria Luisa colony.


• Two unidentified brothers were shot to death at their residence in San Nicholas municipality Wednesday. The victims were shot in Constituyentes de Queretaro colony by armed suspects who then fled aboard a vehicle.


• A man was shot during an armed robbery in Monterrey Wednesday night. Wilfredo Urrutia Olmeda, 29, was a customer at the shop near the intersection of calles Las Palmas and Zapopan in Villa Dorada colony, when armed suspects committing a robbery shot and killed him.


• An unidentified woman was found shot to death in Monterrey Thursday morning. The victim was found near the intersection of Heroes del 47 and Riva Palacio.

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20 die in Jalisco state
2012-01-30
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here
A total of 20 unidentified individuals,including three municipal police agents, were killed Saturday in Jalisco state, according to Mexican news accounts. Every individual killed or found dead was at the apparent hands of organized crime.

At El Rancho La Estancia in Ejutla municipality, seven unidentified corpses were found in two graves. Four of the victims had been immolated, although reports do not say how any of the victims were killed. Ejutla municipality is south of the resort city of Guadalajara.

In Lagos de Moreno municipality, three municipal police agents were shot to death. The police were on a road patrol aboard an official vehicle between the villages of Ixtle and La Mesa when they were killed. The officers had been bound by handcuff, beaten, then shot by armed suspects. Two of the trio died on the spot,

El Diario de Coahuila reported that the third officer managed to escape his attackers and was the target of foot pursuit which ended at a medical clinic. The armed suspects entered the clinic and killed the third officer.

Lagos de Moreno municipality is in the extreme northeastern part of Jalisco state which borders Zacatecas state to the northwest and San Luis Potosi state to the northeast.

In Guadalajara, a total of seven individuals were found murdered Friday and Saturday, including two in the Colinas de San Javier colony.

In Ameca municipality, an unidentified man was shot to death at the bus station. Ameca is on Jalisco's western border with Michoacan state.

Between San Miguel de Alto and San Julien municipalities two unidentified men were found dead on a road. San Miguel de Alto and San Julien municipalities are 20 kilometers southwest of Lago de Moreno, Jalisco.

Criminal groups appear to be shifting their turf fights from the northern border states to escape the reinforced Mexican military presence there to north central states such as Zacatecas and San Luis Potosi and central states such as Jalisco and Veracruz.

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More Mexican Mayhem
2012-01-30
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here
How's that improved security working out for ya edition

12 die in northern Mexico

A total of 12 individuals were killed in ongoing drug and gang related incidents in northern Mexico including four inmates at the Achilles Serdan, Chihuahua CERESO.

• Four inmates were killed and another seven were wounded in a prison riot Sunday morning in Chihuahua, Chihuahua.
  
  The riot took place at the Achilles Serdan Centro de Readaptacion Social (CERESO) prison. The prison is only five kilometers due east of the capital. Reports are that inmates attacked guards with firearms and other weapons.
  
  The Achilles Serdan prison is one of the most violent prisons in Mexico, the location of many riots in the past.


• An unidentified man was found shot to death in Juarez Sunday afternoon. The victim was found near the intersection of calles Cerro Grande and 38th in UP colony. Although the report doesn't specifically state it, the victim was apparently attacked by more than one armed suspect.


• A youth was shot to death in Juarez early Sunday morning. José Ruben Ayala Bautista, 17, died as he was taken to receive medical attention by his family. The shooting took place when the victim and his friends decided to build a bonfire. An armed suspect came up to the youth and shot him repeatedly in the head.


• An unidentified woman was found shot to death near Chihuahua, Chihuahua Sunday. The victim was found on kilometer 23 of the Chihuahua city to Juarez highway.


• An unidentified man was found shot to death in Juarez Sunday. The victim was found near the intersection of calles José Maria Pereyra and Libertad in Barrio La Chavena.


• A man was found shot to death in Carborca, Sonora Sunday. Leopoldo de la Cruz Felix was found shot twice in the head aboard his wife's Chevrolet Avalanche near the intersection of avenida C and calle 19th in Lazaro Cardenas colony. Two .380 caliber spent shell casings were found in the truck. Cruz Felix was reportedly a local drug dealer.


• A man was found shot to death in Obregon, Sonora Friday night. Hernan Hernandez Navidad, 28, was found aboard a Toyota vehicle near the intersection of calles Chihuahua and Hidalgo in Centro colony. Several .40 caliber spent shell casings were found at the scene.


• Two men were found shot to death in Yecora, Sonora last Tuesday night. Benjamín Flores Mungarro, 26, and Claudio Anibal Buelna Encinas, 22 were found on a road leading to El Palmarito. Both men were shot several times with AK-47 and AR-15 rifles.

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5 die in Nuevo Laredo in Tamaulipas
2012-01-30
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here. For a map of Tamaulipas state, click here.
Four armed suspects and one Mexican soldier were killed in an armed confrontation in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas Saturday, according to a Mexican Army press release.

An army road patrol detachment was fired on on Bulevar Venustiano Carranza by armed suspects aboard a convoy of six vehicles. In the ensuing firefight, four suspects were killed by army return gunfire. It is likely an unknown number of armed suspects managed aboard the remaining five vehicles to escape the encounter, although the press report doesn't so state.
Almost reads like the RAB...
One unidentified Mexican rifleman was killed in the encounter, while five other soldiers were wounded.

In the aftermath, soldiers seized five rifles, 50 weapons magazines, 525 rounds of ammunition and one vehicle.

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5 die, 7 wounded in Torreon, Coahuila massacre
2012-01-30
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here. For a map of Coahuila state, click here
Five unidentified individuals were shot to death and another seven were wounded in an attack in Torreon, Coahuila Saturday night, according to Mexican Spanish language reports.

The attack began at around 2215 hrs when armed suspects travelling aboard a sedan shot into a group of people near the intersection of Avenida Eva Samano and Calle Septima in Nueva Rosita colony.

Local police patrols and a Mexican Army detachment first to arrive on the scene found an unidentified woman and a child dead. Three other victims died while receiving medical treatment.

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Madero Munoz files complaint with PGR over MP $25 million
2012-02-01
Posted by: badanov


For a map click here

By Chris Covert

Citing a concern to "justify the origins of such resources", Partido Accion National (PAN) president Gustavo Madero Munoz filed a complaint with the Procuradoria General de la Republica (PGR) or attorney general demanding an investigation into the origins of the MP $25 million (USD $1.9 million) seized from two Veracruz state political operatives in Toluca, Mexico state Friday.

The filing, colloquially known as a denunciation, follows the arrest of Miguel Morales Robles, an employee of Partido Revoluionario Institucional (PRI) Veracruz governor Javier Duarte de Ochoa, and Said Sandoval Zepeda, who is reportedly on Governor Duarte's security staff after the two men had flown aboard an official Veracruz state aircraft carrying two packages -- later revealed to be a suitcase and a backpack -- containing MP $25 million, all in cash.

With the new filing he is attempting to place the financial antics -- to call them what they are -- of PRI politicians and officials front and center in the debate over who should lead Mexico for the next six years.

The flight originated in Veracruz city, the capital of Veracruz state and ended in Toluca in Mexico state. There the two men and the aircraft were met by Policia Federal (PF) agents, who subsequently detained them and seized the cash.

Morales Robles reportedly had on his person a letter from Veracruz state offices stating the money is "transportation money", and was being flown to pay 3 Industries for services to be rendered in three upcoming festivals in Veracruz City.

In an explanation provided Monday evening, Veracruz state government spokesman Gina Dominguez told an internet radio station that the cash had been gathered as a counter to the pre-holiday rush. The explanation has been met on Twitter with good deal of skepticism as various individuals have protested that the exchange looks like money laundering.

In Mexico it is not illegal for government officials to have large sums of cash on their person.

Charges were levelled by rival politicians in Veracruz state that the money had been taken to Mexico state to be used in the political campaign of PRI frontrunner Enrique Pena Nieto, which is illegal.

A similar charge that state money was being diverted to PRI electoral activities, was also laid against former PRI leader Humberto Moreira Valdes last fall as Moreira fought calls both from inside his own party and from rivals that he step down as PRI president until he provided an explanation to the massive run up of public debt in his state of Coahuila while he was governor.

Bowing to pressure, Moreira stepped down as PRI president last December 2nd.

To date the money seized last Monday remains in the possession of the PGR, which the agency refuses to release without an explanation of where the money originated.

In a press release PRI president, Pedro Joaquin Coldwell -- Moreira's replacement -- asked the two other major parties, PAN and Partido Revolucion Democratica (PRD), not to politicize the standoff between the government of Duarte de Ochoa and the PAN-staffed PGR.

Citing two other cases Pedro Joaquín Coldwell claimed were politically motivated, drug charges against former Jalisco state governor Arturo Zamora and against former Guerrero state governor Manuel Anorve, he said in his statement that charges that the money was being diverted from Veracruz state coffers to the election campaign of Pena Nieto were "willful and reckless" and "absolutely false."

Madero Munoz -- who is credited with forcing the resignation of Moreira, who left his state of Coahuila as governor with record breaking public debt -- is apparently taking a lesson from the saga of Moreira. With the new filing he is attempting to place the financial antics -- to call them what they are -- of PRI politicians and officials front and center in the debate over who should lead Mexico for the next six years.

At the moment, Madero Munoz is raising a ruckus over financial matters of PRI governors, which in Mexico is apparently a fat and easy target since PRI owns more than half of Mexico's statehouses. Last summer a report showing the large number of states with record breaking debt, including Coahuila, was used against Moreira and will likely be used in some way against PRI frontrunner Pena Nieto, who left his office as governor of Mexico state in 2011 when his term ended.

The Mexican electoral process is still in the candidate selection phase.

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Mexican political operatives caught with USD $1.9 million
2012-01-31
Posted by: badanov


For a map click here

By Chris Covert

Two Veracruz state Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI) political operatives were caught with MP $25 million (USD $1.9 million) in cash stuffed in two suitcases at the airport at Toluca in Mexico state following a flight from Veracruz city last Friday, according to Mexican news reports.

In a related report, a Veracruz state top cabinet minister resigned his post, possibly as a result of Friday's incident.

Mexican Policia Federal (PF) agents arrested Miguel Morales Robles, an employee for Veracruz governor Javier Duarte de Ochoa, and seized the cash -- all in Mexican pesos -- taking the money to a local PF office in Toluca.

Governor Duarte is a member of PRI and was elected to office in 2010.

Reports say after a brief exchange of messages between the Procuradoria General de la Republica (PGR), or national attorney general and the office of Governor Duarte, the money was returned. The reports were later retracted.

Morales Robles had on his person a letter explaining the cash he carried was official money. The money was reportedly "transportation money", which explained its presence but not how it was gathered or how it was to be used.

The two operatives, the other identified as Said Sandoval Zepeda, were travelling aboard a Veracruz state official aircraft. The aircraft was a Beech B200 King Air as identified by the registration marking and an aircraft database.

Sandoval Zepeda has been identified as a member of Governor Duarte's personal security detail.

A later explanation by the governor's office was that the money was to be paid to a private company in Mexico state, Industria 3, SA de C.V. for its participation in three upcoming events in Veracruz city.

In Mexico, it is not against the law for government officials to carry large amounts of cash. It is not, however, common practice for officials to do so. As of the moment of publication a PGR spokesman was quoted as saying the origin of the cash is still under investigation.

Despite reports in the Mexican press that the money was returned, as of 1632 hrs Monday on the website of El Diario de Coahuila, an unidentified PGR spokesmen said the money would not be returned until its origin could be proved.

In a reported internet radio interview, Veracruz state government spokesman Gina Domínguez told Formato 21 the cash was transported because an upcoming holiday made such as large transaction difficult. The implication is that Mexicans routinely get large draws on their accounts in cash for holidays and the state would be trying to compete for service with everyone else.

Later Monday Tomas Ruiz, Secretario de Finanzas de Veracruz, gave a broad outline for the cash outlays, mostly for artists and promotion materials.

However at 1836 hours Monday, a post at Animal Politico stated that Secretaria de Finanzas y Planeacion del Gobierno de Veracruz, the Veracruz treasurer's office, Vicente Benítez Gonzalez had abruptly resigned after only serving 14 months. In the news release Benitez Gonzalez thanked Governor Duarte for the opportunity to have served in Duarte's administration.

However, two Veracruz state politicans, Veracruz Partido Accion Nacional (PAN) senator Juan Bueno Torio and chair for the Partido Revolucion Democratica (PRD) Steering Committee unleashed charges that money was in fact intended to go to PRI presidential frontrunner Enrique Pena Nieto to finance his campaign, still in the primary stage of the national electoral process.

Mexico state, where the bust took place, is Pena Nieto's home state and as governor his last government post.

The charge is an oft repeated one levelled against former PRI leader Humberto Moreira Valdes and former Coahuila governor after Moreira had run up the heaviest per capita debt load of any state in Mexico during his tenure.

As for specifics for the charge of diverting public money to electoral campaigns, none actually exists, except that the confluence of events that led to Moreira's resignation looks terrible.

The potential of malfeasence that led to Moreira's abrupt resignation apparently still exists and now, less than two months later, a potential political firestorm surrounding large sums of cash and where it goes, revives those charges,this time in stark bas relief to the upcoming election.
To read Rantburg reports on the Humberto Moreira debt scandal in Coahuila and Moreria's subsequent resignation, click here and here and follow the links
As a related matter and for what it is worth, officially PAN president Gustavo Madero, the man who kept pressure on Moreira to resign has not publicly commented. However this writer could haver sworn that Madero did repeat the charge that the cash was intended for Pena Nieto, which was published on Animal Politico, but later removed.

However, in a Twitter post earlier on Monday, Madero asked, "Who do you think the PRI governor sends 25 million cash?"

Madero also posted a late, mischievous tweet calling the resignation of Benitez Gonzalez as being Moreira-ized.

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More Mexican Mayhem
2012-01-24
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here For a map of Chihuahua state click here
Been a while edition

20 die in northern Mexico

A total of 20 individuals were killed in drug and gang related murders in northern Mexican states, including a police commander in Juarez Sunday morning.

• A Juarez municipal police commander was shot to death in Juarez Sunday. Jose Luis Ruelas was visiting relatives at a residence near the intersection of calles Santiago Blancas and Miguel de la Madrid in Paseos del Alba colony when armed suspects abducted him, shot him to death and then left his body at the residence.


• In Chihuahua city, three unidentified men were shot to death at a residence near the intersection of calles Miguel Aleman and Avila Camacho in Díaz Ordaz colony. An unidentified female was wounded in the shooting.


• One unidentified youth was shot to death and three others were wounded in a shooting in Aldama city.


• An unidentified man was found shot to death outside his residence in the Oasis de Ciudad Juarez colony in Juarez.


• Another police officer was shot to death in Juarez Saturday. Francisco Javier Ramirez Perez was found shot to death aboard his vehicle near the intersection of calles Manganeso and Karl Marx in Mexico 68 colony.


• An unidentified man was shot to death in Chaveña colony on calle Libertad.


• Two men were shot to death Saturday in Chihuahua city. Eusebio Javalera and Jesus Saul Bujanda were shot inside the Villa Verde liquor store in Nombre de Dios colony.


• Two unidentified men were shot to death Monday in Chihuahua city. The first victim was shot near the intersection of calles Comunidad and Libertadores in Unidad colony and the second near the intersection of Industrias and Guadalupe Juarez.


• An unidentified youth was found tortured and beaten to death in Nuevo Lardo Monday. The victim was found near the Benito Juarez memorial on Avenida Reforma. A message left at the body was signed by Los Zetas.


• Two men were shot to death and a third was wounded in an intergang firefight in Juarez Monday. The first shooting took place when armed suspects dismounted a Dodge Neon near the intersection of calles Bernardo Balbuena and Camilo Cien Fuegos, shooting Gabriel Mares, 41, to death. As the shooters attempted to flee the scene, they were intercepted by another armed group on Avenida Ejercito Nacional who then shot one unidentified individual to death and wounded another.


• An unidentified man in his 20s was shot to death in Juarez Monday. The shooting took place near the intersection of calles Montes de Oca and Primera in Papalote colony.


• Four unidentified youths were shot to death and another three were wounded in a shooting in Juarez Monday. The shooting took place near the intersection of calles Guinea and Rodesia where armed suspects entered two different residences and started firing their weapons.

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5 bad guys die in Zacatecas
2012-01-27
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here. Fora map of Zacatecas state, click here
A total of five armed suspects were killed in Zacatecas Tuesday and Wednesday, according to Mexican news accounts.

A Policia Federal unit encountered an armed group in Guadalupe municipality early Wednesday morning in the village of Martinez Dominguez on a road to Trancoso. Four armed suspects were killed in the gunfight.

No federal personnel were wounded in the exchange of gunfire. Agents seized four rifles and some ammunition in the aftermath.

In Zacatecas Tuesday, the capital of Zacatecas state, one armed suspect entered a hospital to obtain treatment for gunshot wounds sustained in a firefight between Mexican Army personnel and an armed group Monday afternoon in Saltillo, Coahuila, some 150 kilometers to the northeast.

In that battle four armed suspects were killed following a brief pursuit, ending in a gun battle when suspects dismounted their vehicles and attempted to hold off Mexican troops in the garage of a residence.

The suspect seeking treatment later died, while his companion was detained.

Zacatecas is considered Los Zetas territory, except that since early last summer their power has been reduced owing to the increased presence of Mexican federal security forces in the region and several counternarcotics operations.

The encounter at Guadalupe is but one example of the problems Los Zetas face in retaining control in the state.

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15 die in fighting in Guerrero state
2012-01-23
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here
A total of 15 individuals were killed in a 24 hour period in Guerrero state, according to Mexican news accounts.

At about 2200 hrs in the village of False Carral in Atoyac de Alvarez municipality unidentified armed suspects entered a number of residences and shot the occupants. Press reports do not indicate the reasons for the shootings. Reports do say between six and 10 armed suspects did the shooting.

The dead include Lazaro Pineda Mayo, 62, Rogelio Ramirez Ramos, 43, Cristobal Hernandez Valle, 42, Diego Pinzon Mora 40, and José Rios Lacunza, all of False Corral. Also dead were Hector Radilla Bello, 42 and Carmelo Hernandez Radilla, 45, from the village of La Fonseca, as well as Ruben Ramirez Martinez and Miguel Angel Hernandez Vazquez, both from the village of Los Organos in Benito Juarez municipality

Wounded in the shootings were Eduardo Duran Coden, 38, Vladimir Perez Ibarra, 13, and his brother, Eduardo Perez Ibarra, 18, Francisco Javier Garcia Gomez, 55, and Leobardo Dorantes 38.

At around the same time in San Marcos in the Costa Chica region police officer Cirenio Sanguilan Aquino and Juan Carlos Barcenas Villasana, 19 were shot and wounded by armed suspects while attending a party.

In Acapulco, three unidentified dead bodies were found inside a vehicle Saturday.

Atoyac de Alvarez has in the past been known as a hotspot for armed radical activities and is the home of the Maoist Ejercito Popular Revolucionario (EPR) group that is still operating in the area. It is also the same municipality where 17 individuals were massacred allegedly by Guerrero state police operatives. The massacre, known as the Aguas Blancas Massacre has been used by the EPR as the cause of war against the Mexican Army.

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8 die in Monterrey, Nuevo Leon
2012-01-27
Posted by: badanov


For a map, click here. For a map of Nuevo Leon state, click here. For a map of Monterrey, click here.

By Chris Covert

A total of eight men were shot to death in Monterrey, Nuevo Leon early Wednesday morning, according to Mexican news accounts.

The shootings took place near the intersection of calles Aramberri and Martín de Zavala near Zona Centro, where the victims were lined up and shot at least once in the back of the head. Reports say 20 9mm spent cartridge casings were found at the scene. The ages of the victims ranged from 15 to 35.

Local police made the discovery of the bodies while on routine patrol.

Reports say the victims had been kidnapped from throughout the city, gathered to the location and shot.

The method recalls a similar hit in Guadalajara in November when several individuals, presumably unrelated to organized or gang crime activity, were kidnapped over a brief period of time and then executed all at once.

That murder was performed in response to a similar hit against Los Zetas in Veracruz just weeks before by Los Matazetas group. That group was once thought by authorities to be a vigilante group, but it was later determined Los Matazetas were in fact affiliated with the Gulf and Sinaloa cartels.
To read the Rantburg report on the Veracruz mass murder by Los Matazetas in September, click here.
Guadalajara at the time was considered a Sinaloa/Gulf territory. Monterrey as late as the summer of 2010 was considered disputed, but mainly Los Zetas territory.
To read the Rantburg report on the Guadalajara mass murder, click here.
Currently, both the Los Zetas and gangs allied with the Sinaloa and Gulf cartels have been hitting each other in response to the others' attacks throughout Mexico.

The last mass murder by either side was performed near the end of 2011 year when 39 individuals were murdered in northern Veracruz state and southern Tamaulipas state.

Those hits were said by press reports to be the direct result of a massive redeployment of Mexican Army troops to northern border areas in Nuevo Leon, Coahuila, and especially in Tamaulipas state. The tightened security had apparently forced organized crime gangs out of the north into previously unfamiliar territory.

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Mexican Army bags 4 bad guys in Saltillo
2012-01-24
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here. For a map of Coahuila state click here
A total of four armed suspects were killed in a gunfight in Saltillo, Coahuila Monday, according to Mexican news reports.

The brief exchange of gunfire took place near the intersection of bulevars Luis Donaldo Colosio and Venustiano Carranza, in Ramos Arizpe colony at around noon.

The gunfight was preceded by a brief pursuit by a Mexican Army unit. The suspects had apparently abandoned their vehicles to seek shelter inside the garage of a residence.

One Mexican soldier was wounded in the firefight.

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Human rights report on Mexico suffers from timing and ignorance
2012-01-24
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here

By Chris Covert

Human Rights Watch (HRW) issued its annual report on human rights worldwide Sunday, including Mexico, which said the Mexican Army and the legal system routinely violates human rights in the war on drug cartels.

The report focuses on several areas such as military impunity, freedom of expression, human rights defenders and other areas as areas of concern.

Specific in the report is HRW's contention that of almost 5,800 cases of human rights abuses by the military, only 90 have been investigated. The ratio comports correctly to what the two military agencies say are the number of cases in which actual crimes have been involved, or about two percent.

Additionally, the report says that since 2007, 3,671 cases of human rights abuses by the military have been resulted in actual investigations, for which only 15 military have been convicted. That number seems low. The report does, however, say an additional 14 soldiers have been sentenced for crimes committed in the normal course of fighting drug cartels. In the report it is unclear if those 14 are included under the rubric of resolved cases.

One case involving an individual in Apodaca, Nuevo Leon last September was included in the report, that of Gustavo Acosta.

That month there was increased armed gang activity in which several police facilities were attacked by armed suspects in Monterrey metropolitan area. Apodaca is a suburb of Monterrey.

The reports, not surprisingly, fail to give much in the way of detail. Indeed, while this writer covered Monterrey metropolitan area that month, the shooting of Gustavo Acosta by Mexican Marines was not reported or had been missed.

It is important to note that during the first week of last October, following the death of Gustavo Acosta, 157 municipal police agents were detained and tested for their involvement with drug trafficking. It is not hard to see how Gustavo Acosta could have been involved in drug trafficking and did fire a weapon on marine units operating in the area -- drug cartels routinely employ lookouts they term as hawks -- just as it is not hard to see how Gustavo Acosta could have been accidentally shot by marines. In an environment in which drug gangs routinely infiltrate state agencies, information is often lacking or is of poor quality

The Secretaria de Defensa Nacional (SEDENA), the controlling agency for the Mexican Army, is not squeamish about investigating abuses. It remains to be seen how the Gustavo Acosta shooting will turn out with the Secretaria de Marina (SEMAR), the controlling agency for Mexican Naval Infantry.

It is worth noting that the Mexican military have publicly stated their commitment to policing their ranks of those who commit abuses, but that is never enough for the human rights watching agencies who swim in the arcane insistence that not only must every t get crossed, but get crossed their way.

It is also worth noting that drug cartels routinely pay poor citizens -- in cash or in kind -- to lodge complaints against the military when a loss of life or other abuse has taken place. SEMAR chief Admiral Mariano Francisco Saynez Mendoza has said as much, and indeed in Mexican press there have been descriptions of individuals who have been paid to perform such services as protesting the Polica Federal presence in an area, for example.

Naturally, the HRW report does not touch on that little bit of window dressing courtesy of drug cartel operatives, predictably preferring to rake a government institution over the coals for its failings. Government agencies are easier to deal with.

The report also fails to address the fact that many Mexican local human rights groups do not vet their members with any of the vigor the Mexican military vets its own. In such an environment, it would be easy for drug cartels, indeed even for operatives of violent Marxist groups such as Guerrero state's Ejercito Popular Revolucionario (EPR) to infiltrate and create the kind of reports groups such as local human rights watch groups have released to the public in the past.

Perhaps the most irritating aspect of the report is the way HRW redact critical facts in cases it champions.

Rodolfo Montiel and Teodoro Cabrera were two ecologistias working in southern Guerrero in 1999 when they were detained for planting marijuana and for possession of military weapons.

The two were convicted for those crimes and sentenced. Then in 2001, they were released on humanitarian grounds by order of then president Vicente Fox. The convictions, however, were not vacated The two men promptly fled to the US, where they live today.

According to internet reports, in 2011 the Inter-American Court of Human Rights declared the two innocent of their crimes and released a report saying they had been tortured while in military custody.

The report IACHR failed to detail the nature of the torture, nor does any report on the IACHR ruling say if the two actually did the crime for which they were convicted.

The strangest aspect of the case revolves around stories of threats against Montiel and Cabrera. They were ecologistas, according to environmental groups' reports, seeking to defend southern Guerrero from logging, i.e. commercial interests.

If the two ecologistas were indeed threatened, it would not have been by the military, whose involvement was complete when they were by law turned over to local legal authorities. In the past Guerrero state and local officials have been linked to human rights violations. Those violations were part of a war instigated by local Marxist groups who were fighting commercial activities such as logging, and were known to enjoy support in some local communities in southern Mexico, including Guerrero state.

The year 1999 was just one year after the famous encounter at El Charco, which human rights groups claim -- disingenuously -- was a massacre of unarmed farmers. The area at the time was already at hot zone for the Mexican military trying to deal with hostile and armed Marxist groups in the area, as well as drug traffickers.

A lot of information framing the arrest and conviction of Montiel and Cabrera remains shrouded in a penumbra of ecological agenda increasingly favored by human rights organizations, and probably funded by global warming alarmists.

Citizen involvement in righting wrongs is always a good thing in a republic, but the additional dimension of the drug cartels and organized crime, whose economic profits sometime depend on smearing their opponents -- like the drug trade it is an intolerable element in discussions of human rights, and a conversation in which HRW refuses to engage.

The HRW report in its rush to judgement fails to make any distinctions when it attempts to decry human rights violations in Mexico. That rush to judgement is the result of sloppy reporting and dishonest ecological agenda building.

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Mexican IX Region commander kicked upstairs
2012-01-18
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here. For a map of Coahuila state, click here

By Chris Covert

The commander of the Mexican IX Military Region was appointed to a staff post in Mexico City, to be replaced by General de Division Roberto de la Vega Diaz, according to Mexican news accounts.

General Marco Antonio Gonzalez Barreda was appointed Inspector General and Comptroller of the Army and Air Force and will likely move to Distrito Federal.

General Gonzalez Barreda oversaw security operation dubbed Laguna Segura since late October of last year. That operation is still ongoing.

A recent press press report said that intentional homicides were down significantly in the region, possibly as a result of the tightened security. Laguna Segura was instituted to deal with jurisdictional difficulties since the La Laguna region is astride two states, Durango and Coahuila.

The La Laguna region includes the twin cities of Gomez Palacio, Durango and Torreon, Coahuila, as well as Ciudad Lerdo. La Laguna is a critical east west road, the most northerly contiguous east west road system in Mexico. A portion of Mexico Federal Highway 40 running from the port of Mazatlan, Sinaloa to Durango city in Durango state was recently completed to four lanes to aid in commercial traffic in the north.

General de la Vega has held command of the Mexican 35th Military Zone in northern Guerrero, the 41st Military Zone in Puerto Vallarta, and was military attache in Bolivia.

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Death toll in Tarahumara famine begins with 4 dead
2012-01-16
Posted by: badanov


For a map, click here For a map of Chihuahua state, click here.

By Chris Covert

The latest news from the western side of Chihuahua, especially around San Juanito, was grim last Thursday when news came four indigent Tarahumara Indians were found dead from starvation.

Even more grim was the news published by La Polaka news daily on Sunday that as many as 50 Tarahumara may have committed suicide last December 10th because they were unable to find food for their families.

The claim came in an interview on Channel 28 in Cuauhtemoc city from Ramon Gardea, a local indigenous peasant organization leader.

The suicide claim was vehemently denied by a Chihuahua state government official. The unidentified official was quoted in Milenio news daily as saying, "Only he who does not know the idiosyncrasies of the Tarahumara race could believe such a version ..."

"Them peasants is all liars, ya know."

No bodies have yet been found which would support the claim.

The news has revved up social networks which has in turn aided the gathering of food aid for the region with collection points in Mexico City and other cities across Mexico. A Mexican Catholic Church organization has been formed and bank accounts set up to deal with the influx of monetary aid.

Last week, Proceso, the Mexican leftist weekly characterized the food situation as a famine, and so now as numbers are beginning to come in, and with spring several months away, the characterization is becoming realized.

To use an overwrought phrase -- albeit accurate in this case -- indigent Indian tribes such as the Tarahumara are going to be the hardest hit in this apparent coming calamity.

According to Mexican national sources, the drought at the crux of the problem started back in the summer of 2010, and it started as a problem hardly anyone in the press and in government noticed. Record numbers of Mexican citizens were being killed overwhelmingly by drug cartels that summer and into the following spring.

Who pays attention to crop reports, which do not sell advertising for newspapers and electronic media anyway?

So it wasn't until the summer of 2011 with the drought tightening its hold over northern Mexico that institutions began to notice. The record cold in the mountains only compounded the problems. The numbers from the last harvests tell the story.

• Affected by the record cold, 250 million serrano peppers have been destroyed.


• In 2010, 180,000 metric tons of maize were harvested. In 2011 less than 500 metric tons were harvested.


• In 2010, 123,000 tons of beans were harvested. In 2011, less than 20,000 tons went to market.


• The drought in the summer of 2011 has killed 200,000 head of various livestock in western Chihuahua, and the cost to feed and water them has skyrocketed to four times normal.

Crop and livestock insurance exists for those who have it, but according to Martin Solis of El Barzon, only MP $115 million is available for losses amounting to a little more than MP $600 million.

The leader of Mexico's Confederacion Nacional Campesina, a leading peasant farmer organization, Gerardo Sanchez Garcia, has told Milenio that the scope of the problem requires a much larger relief effort, totalling MP $10 billion.

The drought, characterized as the worst in almost 90 years, has already affected 989 000 hectares of agricultural land and 1.75 million head of cattle, according to Sanchez Garcia.

Only three days ago, the Mexican secretary of agriculture, Francisco Mayorga, announced that MP $11 billion would be made available in relief efforts.

The future human cost, save for the dead already known, could also add to the catastrophe. At the moment in western Chihuahua reported thefts are on the rise and concentrated around food supplies. In normal times thefts are for items to be sold, but now food is the number one target.

A flip side of the calamity is that heads of households leave their land to find work to buy food. At this point in the growing season and in a few months those individuals will not be on the land ready for the next crop.

According to an article in El Heraldo de Chihuahua news daily, quoting Chihuahua state Tarahumara state coordinator, Jesus Velazquez, some farmers in the area are resorting to renting out their lands to drug cartels which are known to operate in the area, including the Sinaloa and Los Zetas. The ratio quoted by Jesus Velazquez is one in five farmers whose lands are dedicated to growing drugs such as marijuana and poppies.

In the same article the Chihuahua state Rural Development Secretary, Octavio Legarreta, said that problems on some farms have developed because pot plants tend to act as weeds choking the agave and avocado trees. The marijuana plants keep the trees from growing more than two meters high, effectively killing production.

But the impact on indigent farmers is the worst. Tarahumara Indians are subsistence farmers. Heads of household cannot file insurance claims to ride out the drought and famine because they have no insurance. Everything they grow is for their own consumption.

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Mexican official says rumors are "tinged with evil"
2012-01-18
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here. For a map of Chihuahua state, click here

By Chris Covert

A top Chihuahua state cabinet official charged individuals who spread the story of mass suicide of Tarahumara Indians as "tinged with evil" and "irresponsible", according to Mexican news reprots.

Rafael Servando Portillo, Secretaria de Fomento Social del Gobierno de Chihuahua, or Secretary of Social Development of Chihuahua told writers at Mexico's Organisacion Editorial Mexicano (OEM) news offices, that the story of a mass suicide last December was totally false.

Last Sunday an indigent peasant leader, Gardea Ramon, recounted a story in an interview at an independent television station in far western Chihuahua state, saying that 50 Tarahumara Indians had collectively committed suicide presumably because the victims were unable to provide for their families.

The television interview had been given prominent play in some social media circles, so much so the story reached some national media,such as Milenio news daily and Proceso, the leftist weekly magazine.

To date, however, no bodies have been found which would verify the story. Indeed in a nation which recently experienced two of the largest mass graves discoveries in its modern history in Durango city in Durango state and in San Fernando municipality in Tamaulipas state, the finding of such a large number of bodies would be de rigeur in establishing the story.

In stories recently published in Mexican press, unidentified non-governmental organizations have been trying to establish a pattern by reporting a number of orphans have appeared in some areas, suggesting the suicide rumors could be true. But if NGOs have an opportunity to create a statistic from anecdotal information, they will create a statistic which will then be transcribed by a pliant press as established fact. To date NGOs have failed to do so, suggesting suicide stories are probably apocryphal.

Indigent Indian groups and others in the Mexican Sierra in the north have suffered a massive crop failure due to a drought and record cold. The problems are so severe, the word famine is being used even in larger news outlets in Mexico. While the famine -- to call it what it is -- may not be as widespread as one in Somalia, for example, the near total lack of food has galvanized some sectors of Mexican society into rapidly bringing relief to the area.

Many Tarahumara Indians living in higher altitudes in the Mexican Sierras will -- and have already, due to the early and extreme cold -- temporarily migrate to lower altitudes and hole up for the winter in the many caves in the region. It is unclear what those families do for food during that time. A Mexican official told the press Monday that many areas in the Chihuahua Sierras are not suffering from a water shortage at all, especially in the higher altitudes.

Much of the drought has affected the desert areas to the immediate east of the Mexican Sierras, where ranching is done.

Servando Portillo told OEM that his organization has already begun their relief efforts in the region delivering 6,000 food aid packages consisting of 50 kilograms each of rice and beans, two kilograms each of sausage and dried milk to be delivered every two weeks, and blankets.

The first of the aid is to be delivered to the village of Pitoreal in Bocoyna municipality, which is about seven kilometers south of San Juanito.

Servando Portillo also said some of the aid is coming from private groups as well as government departments, such as the Fundaci"n del Empresariado or Business Foundation.

According to Servando Portillo, the crisis has affected 22 municipalities of Chihuahua state and 260,000 individuals in 64,000 families.

El Diario de Coahuila news daily posted a Notimex wire service story on its website Tuesday that the Mexican Red Cross is planning delivery by January 21st of 55 metric tons of food and 4,000 clothing items, also to Bocoyna. The Mexican Red Cross said it has already delivered 220 metric tons of aid to 42 municipalities in the region, including Bocoyna, Urique, Guazapares and Morelos municipalities in Chihuahua state.

The Mexican Red Cross has already made aid deliveries to San Luis Potosi and Hidalgo states, according to the Notimex.

In related news, a Partido Revolucion Democratica (PRD) federal deputy has proposed that every legislator donate one day's salary to the relief effort.

Guadalupe Acosta Naranjo, a Nayarit deputy proposed the Chamber of Deputies Standing Committee meet Wednesday to condider his proposal. Guadalupe Acosta Naranjo said legislators cannot "remain oblivious" to suffering of the 250,000 affected by the crisis.

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Suicide rare among Tarahumara, say church, political leaders
2012-01-19
Posted by: badanov


For a map, click here. For a map of Chihuahua state, click here

By Chris Covert

Suicide among the Tarahumara Indians of far western Chihuahua is rare, according to Chihuahua state and church officials.

News reports had surfaced last weekend saying that 50 Tarahumara Indians in western Chihuahua had thrown themselves over cliff in the Tarahumara region over despair from the lack of food.

The news was recounted by a local peasant leader, Ramon Gardea, in an interview on an independent Chihuahua television station last Sunday.

Later press reports have Gardea walking back the mass suicide aspect of the story saying the 50 Tarahumara deaths were a cumulative number for 2011 and did not occur as a single event.

Gardea is also quoted as distinguishing between despair and the lack of food.

"Spiritually, the Tarahumara are strong, " Gardea is quoted as saying.

Gardea's evidence of the large number of suicides rests in an apparent story that a number of Tarahumara families had been asking for money for funeral expenses.

Gardea's interview (in Spanish) can be seen here.

Gardea's contention was relayed by social media sites and picked up later by Mexican national media. Since Tuesday, however, Chihuahua state officials have vehemently denied the story.

So far no bodies of the presumed dead have been found.

According to a news story appearing on Milenio's website Wednesday night, suicide among the Tarahumara is rare. When it does happen, those deaths are the result of alcohol consumption, not depression due to economic circumstances.

Alcoholism is rampant in Tarahumara communities, according to a news article appearing on an Organizacion Editorial Mexicano (OEM) news story last Monday evening, running as high as 67 percent among adult males in some communities.

According to a published interview of an unidentified spokesman with the Chihuahua state attorney general's office (FGE), in 2011 for the 23 municipalities which comprise the Sierra Tarahumara region of western Chihuahua, 26 deaths occurred which were ruled suicide. Of those, three were deaths of Tarahumara Indians, and at least two of those were from excessive consumption of alcohol.

According to the article, the 60 suicides that were reported in a news release by an unidentified subprocuradoria or district attorney earlier in the week, were apparently the 2010 death by suicide statistics for the region.

Of the 26 suicides occurring in the Sierra Tarahumara, the remainder -- 23 -- were mestizos, which is a Mexican term for mixed race Mexicans. Those deaths were attributed to alcoholism, mental illness and other factors.

According to the Chihuahua FGE, no deaths have taken place in 2011 that can be traced to starvation.

According to the official, in the Sierra Tarahumara region, 1,200 individuals are suffering from malnutrition, while that number is doubled due to the current food shortage crisis.

The denials still do not address reports two weeks ago by Proceso, the Mexican leftist news weekly -- distributed by APRO, Proceso's wire service -- detailing a report which recounted no fewer than three Tarahumara Indian children dying from complications due to starvation while the reporter, Marcela Turati, was present around Christmas time. In that report, nothing had been discussed of the December 10th mass suicide Gardea retailed in his interview over the weekend

The report was graphic enough at the time, and dramatic, characterizing the food shortage a "Somalia-style" famine, a characterization which was parroted by some Mexican mainstream national media, such as Milenio.

The report also quotes a Jesuit priest and head of the Comision de Solidaridad y Defensa de los Derechos Humanos (COSYDDHAC) or Commission of Solidarity and Defense of Human Rights stating that starvation is a constant problem in the Sierra Tarahumara region, and that the current raft of media reports seem to have a partisan purpose.

A national election to elect a new president takes place in July, 2012.

However, even the Tarahumara diocese has warned against sensationalizing a food shortage. The Bishop of the Tarahumara Diocese, Rafael Sandoval Sandoval issued a press briefing Tuesday evening through an OEM news daily El Occidental.

According to Bishop Sandoval Sandoval, Tarahumara Indians "can always find meaning in life even in difficult circumstances."

"Hiding the truth and looking at the Tarahumara culture in an unreal way is always detrimental to the Tarahumara's culture," paraphrasing the translation.

"They are a people who resist and struggle to be self-supporting, to the emergency, go to get the necessities of life without some despair. (They) do not sit waiting, but walk to find food for his people still alive," according to Bishop Sandoval Sandoval.

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Mexican security forces bag 9 bad guys
2012-01-13
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here. For a map of Zacatecas state, click here. To read the Rantburg report on the last encounter between Mexican security forces and criminal groups in Zacatecas state, click here.
A gunfight between Mexican security forces in Fresnillo, Zacatecas, ended up in several separate gunfights killing nine armed suspects, according to Mexican news accounts.

The confrontation began in Fresnillio, Zacatecas state's second largest city and then spread to several other municipalities on roads leading to the neighboring states of San Luis Potosi and Aguascalientes.

Apparently security encountered a convoy of armed suspects, which prompted a pursuit and running gunfight in Fresnillo. A total of six armed suspects were killed in that clash.

The remaining supects presumably split up into two groups, one fleeing for San Luis Potosi to the east and to Aguascaliente to the south. During the pursuits and exchange of gunfire -- which wended its way through Enrique Estrada, Calera, Morelos, Zacatecas and Guadalupe municipalities -- federal security forces put up four roadblocks attempting to capture the suspects. Criminal groups presumably aligned with the group under pursuit also put up roadblocks attempting to thwart the pursuit and aid the escape of the suspects, this according to an account published on the website of El Diario de Coahuila Thursday evening.

An additional three more armed suspects were killed in those subsequent encounters.

One Policia Federal Preventativa agent was wounded in the gunfights, but is expected to survive his wounds.

Zacatecas state has in the past been known as a Los Zetas stronghold, but it probably not the case any more as rival gangs and a reinforced and reinvigorated federal effort has led to the killing and capture of several operatives in the area.

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Zedillo Lawsuit will be decided on sovereignity claims
2012-01-15
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here

By Chris Covert

A detached observer might get the idea that a 15 year old massacre, all of whose relevant legal and moral issues had been resolved long ago -- its resurrection the basis for a debate of the worthiness of long standing principles such as national sovereignty -- would be a good starting point to discuss those issues now.

But a detached observer might also get the impression that, were the impetus for resurrecting such a calamity to simply beat a political opposition over the head with it, such a resurrection could potentially bring out some less than savory actors.

When the September, 2010 lawsuit was filed against Mexican former president Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de Leon, it seemed to be news of a perfunctory nature; as if the lawsuit was expected inasmuch as the issues had long ago been resolved.

Consider the law firm filing the lawsuit.

Up until the September 2010 filing in Hartford, Connecticut, the two attorneys named as the lead attorneys, Roger Kobert and Marc Pugliese, were known as civil litigators in a law firm with a small, international clientele. Indeed, the most public civil litigation to date involving the two lawyers was an adverse verdict which cost their clients several millions of dollars including interest.

Usually when a high profile civil suit amounting to a public interest lawsuit is filed, it is filed by a firm with a known background in public interest law. Some element somewhere in the firm's background would lead any interested party to conclude that this is an experienced law firm seeking justice for victims somehow wronged.

And make no mistake: the 45 victims in Acteal were wronged on that the day on December 22nd, 1997. The day the attack took place nearly every individual shot dead or wounded was unarmed; many of the victims knew the attack was coming but chose, as their belief dictated, to pray they would be spared the coming massacre; many of the victims were children caught up in a social and political calamity, placed in the kill zone by their parents' own choosing. It is impossible to consider that the Mexican chief executive would somehow have had a hand in that attack; that the victims themselves, as passive as they were, supported a violent Marxist group that had attacked Mexican soldiers -- patriots -- in their drive for autonomy, and possibly provided some material support to the group.

This writer could find no nexus or connection whatsoever that would give a hint as to the impetus behind the suit. A request by email submitted last week to answer the question has never been answered Little was to be gained financially even by the lawyers because they had failed to provide an idea of the compensation being sought for the 45 victims at Acteal. Former President Zedillo at the time the lawsuit was filed was heading up an institution at Yale University. Comparatively speaking. Zedillo had moved from living in the opulence as a Mexican president to the relative penury of a private college. It is very unlikely that any one of the victims one day booked a flight to Miami to speak with the attorneys, nor is it likely in as backward a state as Chiapas, Mexico any of the victims or their progeny could afford to do so.

No even a hint of politics could be determined from the background of the attorneys.

It is almost as if one of the lawyers woke up some fine day and said, "Hey, you know what? Let's sue Zedillo! We'll make a bundle!" Given the past 20 months of Righthaven, far more absurd legal activities have profitably taken place in US federal courts.

What politics that could be considered resided in materials filed by Zedillo's attorneys last week. Among the exhibits was a program from a 2002 awards ceremony by the Franklin Delano Roosvelt Institute, dubbed the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Four Freedoms Awards. In 2002 the awards ceremony held in Middleburg Abbey in Zeeland province in the Netherlands was held to honor five recipients of the awards. Among those recipients was Zedillo, who received the Freedom from Fear Award that year.

The politics involved are an exemplar of the politics of the American left. In Hartford, Connecticut resides a former head of state working as a professor, recipients of a human rights ward giving by individuals with radical leftist connections.

One of those associated with the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Center was none other than William vanden Heuvel, its co-chair, former US diplomat and icon of the old left. In 2002, William vanden Heuvel gave a presentation for the awards ceremony. His daughter is Kartine vanden Heuvel, editor and partial owner of The Nation, of the the oldest leftist publications in the world.

Previous recipients have included Amnesty International, Olof Palme and Armand Hammer, all individuals who maintain the good relations of the old Left.

Ms. vanden Heuvel is a representative of the new Left, a self described progressive, the current buzzword for socialist. The self identification is appropriate since it has long been an established pattern of leftists to call for socialistic reforms without calling such reform anything other than progressive. Ms. vanden Heuvel has been antiwar in the past and anti conservative, and her publication has been showing its view for a long time.

Except for references to Acteal. A quick search of the archives of The Nation shows no references to Acteal or to the EZLN. The omission is odd because in prior editions The Nation favorably presented material for violent Marxist groups, such as the Sandinistas and Castro's Cuba.

But among the oddest individuals to have emerged in the controversy surrounding the lawsuit has been Spanish jurist Baltasar Garzón Real. Garzón Real has in the recent past immersed himself into several controversies, including his attempt to charge the Bush Six, Alberto Gonzales, John Yoo, Douglas Feith, William Haynes II, Jay Bybee and David Addington for their alleged roles in offering justifications to torture.

The Spanish legal system must have scrambled to keep the cases away from Garzón Real's courtroom, eventually assigning it to another judge who dropped the case.

This time Garzón Real said to the press last week, absurdly, that immunity "did not apply" to Zedillo, all without describing how immunity did not apply. His remarks came in the wake of news that an application had been made from the Mexican Foreign Ministry to the US State Department requesting Zedillo receive immunity as a former chief executive.

What made Garzón Real's remarks charmingly irrelevant was the fact that Garzón Real never met a camera he could put his mug in front of or a microphone before which he had nothing to say.

Perhaps the clearest remarks came from Mexican leftist politician Andres Manuel Lopoez Obrador. In remarks published last Saturday, Lopez Obrador hinted that Carlos Salinas de Gortari, Zedillo's predesssor, may share in the blame for the events leading up to the massacre.

Indeed Salinas' indifference to the growing threat of the EZLN was a contributing factor; in Mexico such a concept could be considered a statement of fact.

However, his other remarks left no doubt where he stood on the matter and what he would do were he elected to president of Mexico.

According to Proceso, Lopez Obrador made references for his supporters to eschew "revenge"and to "seek justice." Lopez Obrador is likely referring to other members of Mexico's leftist mainstream, including Jesus Zambrano (PRD), who suffered horribly under a succession of Mexican presidents. Lopez Obrador has in the past made no secret of his disdain for the Mexican Army and other arms of Mexican security. Those forces arrayed against Grijalva and other political allies could conceivably suffer the worst under a Lopez Orbador administration, as he has stated on more than one occasion his intention to end the drug war by simply not prosecuting it any longer.

Lopez Obrador is currently in the midst of the PRD primary season attempting to make a second successive run to be president of the republic, a goal in which he came up short by less than one percent of the popular vote last time.

The Petition

At the heart of Zedillo's defense against the lawsuit is the principle of sovereign immunity. Simply stated, sovereign inmunity is immunity government officials enjoy when they leave office for crimes they may have committed durig their term in in office.

The crux of the plaintiff's argument is that Zedillo enjoys no immunity if those acts were committed outside the color of their authority. The concept is that if a government official commits an act that was illegal at the time he committed it as head of state, sovereign immunity would no longer apply, since those acts were outside the scope and color of his authority.

The intention of the plaintiffs then seems pretty clear. The plaintiffs are asking the court to allow them to proceed on the matter even though nothing Zedillo had done during his term in office was considered illegal. The plaintiffs want a chance to prove what Zedillo did was illegal even though no charges had been filed since the alleged crime. The plaintiffs are asking for court permission to grant that a crime has taken place outside Zedillo's authority, even though no charge civil or otherwise has been forwarded, and for relief so their part of the charges may be proved he did in fact act outside his authority as president.

The issue being argued at the moment is foreign official immunity from prosecution for acts committed while in office. What lies at the basis of the lawsuit is an attempt by the plaintiffs to supend the concept of sovereignty inasmuch as Zedillo's attorney's have argued he was not responsible for the Acteal massacre in 1997.

If Zedillo committed any act, gave any order, was aware of any act or order of any significance which led to the massacre, the plaintiffs claim, it would represent an act outside Zedillo's authority. But any one of those putative acts must be considered in context of the Chiapas Conflict in 1994.

The EZLN [Ejercito Zapista Liberacion Nacional] attacked in January 1994, the last year of the term of President Carlos Salinas de Gortari. Despite warnings by local and state government officials that the national government needed to do something about the increased activity of Guatemalan rebel's use of Mexico as a haven against Guatemalan Army counterinsurgency operations since 1992, Salinas seem to have been caught with his pants down. It was probably an unlikely combination of intervention by the Liberation Theology wing of the Mexican Catholic church and EZLN logistics that ended the hottest portion of the war.

It had to have been an embarrassing fiasco for Mexico's national government, and one for which the Mexican Army developed a solution.

The Plana Campana de Chiapas 94, the document the plaintiffs plan to use against Zedillo was developed by Carlos Salinas' government and implemented by the Mexican Army months before Zedillo actually took office. Part of the plan included using Mexican former and current military to establish patrols in the area to gather intelligence and act as a police presence in Chiapas. Implicit in that was for those elements to be armed with firearms. That part of the plan is often described as pro se evidence of the Mexican government's involvement in the 1997 Acteal massacre. The charge that the Mexican Army was arming civilians is largely true despite the fact that committed Marxist rebels in the area and many of their supporters also had weapons at their disposal, and used them repeatedly against political opponents throughout the region for at least two years before the massacre.

Between 1994, when the Chiapas war started and the end of 1997, not only was the EZLN actively pursuing its goals of taking over some municipalities in Chiapas, a violation of the Peace Accord, but Mexico saw no less than two new violent and armed Marxist insurgencies formed, which attacked Mexican government facilities including army bases in Guerrero and Oaxaca. Although the EZLN did not vocally support the EPR and the EPI, those two groups expressed support for the EZLN. Both groups performed the same information operations as EZLN, without respite in Chiapas, Oaxaca and Guerrero state during that time, which included representatives taking tours of various villages and ejidos in the mountains where indigent Indian groups were the most susceptible to Marxist propaganda.

Universally reviled by the Mexican left when it was released was the Blanco Libro Sobre Acteal or White Paper on Acteal released by the national attorney general,which described some of the events which preceded the massacre. Prominently displayed were numerous acts of vandalism, murder and intimidation of Mexican citizens in the area by individuals and groups sympathetic to the EZLN, and responses by Mexican citizens towards EZLN supporters. The main thrust of the document was to demonstrate that both sides had contributed to the hostile conditions which led to the massacre.

The document has been dismissed as a whitewash, yet even presumed whitewashes contain some elements of truth. In this "whitewash" the Mexican government sought to flood any debate about the Acteal massacre with a description of the near total breakdown of authority in the state, fostered by ELZN in illegal attempts take control of municipalities without state legislature approval, and unchecked citizen involvement in the situation by both sides which led to the massacre.

The plaintiffs used the document to point out that Zedillo had no intention of negotiating with the EZLN, despite the agreement to end the war. The contention is absurd in light of of the historical record and the government's intention to maintain its sovereignty in the area. It is an amazing thing both sides agreed to the accord in 1994 since at the time the US was ruled by the most liberal government in generations and was likely to side with the rebels. It is hard to consider how showing a US federal court that a natural act of a government to exert its sovereignty could prove that such an act was outside the scope of a chief executive's authority.

More so, it is astonishing that the plaintiff's attorneys would expect the US Court system to adjudicate a 150 year old record of stare decis, as well as common law which goes back even farther than that.

Sovereignty is the basis and job description of the top political executive in every nation on the planet. You have to wonder why Zedillo, outside the normal illogical arguments leftists may make to the contrary, would be denied this basic requirement of his office, short of a weakly argued lawsuit, and possibly politics.

The lawsuit also describes the measures taken by the Mexican Army to counter EZLN and their supporters in Chiapas, including arming and training of "villagers" described as "Anti-EZLN villagers" with military grade assault rifles, very similar to the military assault weapons carried by EZLN guerrillas and their supporters, a fact the petition does not address.

One of the differences between the Acteal White Paper and the petition concerns rifles. The petition claims the the Mexican Army armed and trained civilians, a fact which is borne out by the White Paper. The petition charges that the Mexican Army directed the killers during the attack, which is arguable. However, the White Paper said that many of the participants did not have rifles; that the weapons were given to them by local and state police forces along with police uniforms, who then allowed them to carry out the attack. The White Paper said some of the weapons used were AK-47 rifles, a weapon which would not be available to government supporters and the weapon of choice of revolutionary movments since the 1960s; rather, the venerable US-made M16 would have been handed out. The issue of the rifle type used to kill Los Abesas, critical in the matter is simply not addressed in the petition.

The petition does not address in any way the nexus between the apparent ad hoc and impromptu raid and the office of the president, save for his role as commander in chief of Mexico's armed forces. It appeared that raid was conducted by Anti-EZLN villagers independent of the Mexican Army, save for the Plana Campana Chiapas and the apparent presence of large numbers of rifles. The petition claims units of the Mexican Army were in the area at the time of the massacre, but also claims army units heard shots but did not respond. That claim is contrary to the petition's contention that the Mexican Army directed the attack.

The White Paper claims that human rights groups and observers, known to be sympathetic to the EZLN, were not in the area at the time of the attack, which is confirmed in the petition when it states that Mexican Army units in the area heard shots but failed to enter the area until almost 14 hours after the shootings had ended.

The petition also claimed that Zedillo was taping a message to the nation when news of the Acteal shootings reached him. According to the petition Zedillo briefly stopped taping before resuming the recording of his message. If Zedillo was directly involved in an operation such as killing members of an obscure religious sect seen as a potential threat, he could have conceivably been at a command center waiting news, instead of conducting his normal duties.

In the response Zedillo's attorneys claim Zedillo was stunned by the news, which is borne out by most accounts.

In discussing charges of a coverup, the petition blows by the long time frame between investigation -- which was rapid -- and the eventual conviction of the alleged perpetrators of the crime almost 10 years later. For example, within 48 hours of the end of the shootings, representatives of Zedillo's attorney general's office, the Procuradoria General de la Republica (PGR) were at the scene gathering evidence and testimony. For individuals accused of planning and executing a massacre, the investigation went forward with due dispatch.

The petition also claims a number of irregularities surfaced when the convictions of the 33 individuals who were convicted of the crime were tossed out.

In Mexican jurisprudence, a year is a long time. When a prosecutor charges an individual, they go to jail and there they will stay until they can prove their innocence. The conviction for the 33 individuals for their role in the crime took place in 2007, almost 10 years after the act and, the petition claims, done under a completely different political party, the Partido Accion Nacional (PAN).

The petition claimed a number of irregularities in gathering evidence and references a number of juicio de amparo, or procedural appeal decisions in the matter which showed irregularities may have occurred. The petition fails to note for the court that in Mexican jurisprudence juicio de amparo suits are an extremely common counter to prosecutors and are a routine matter. Those lawsuits do not per se demonstrate a pattern of abuse.

The Politics

The real basis of the lawsuit is Mexican and American politics. Mexican presidential elections are coming by July and it is entirely possible that the Partido Revolucionario Institucional, Zedillo's party, will return to the Mexican White House known as Los Pinos.

The motivation of the towo attorneys in prosecuting this lawsuit will probably remain shrouded and are almost completely irrelevant to the massacre itself. If the plaintiffs win their contention that Zedillo does not enjoy immunity as a former chief executive, it will throw several decades of law into a new standard where sovereignty doesn't matter. Indeed the goal of the lawsuit may be just that: wrecking US concepts of sovereign immunity. The international legal community would love to get their hands on George W, Bush and his liberation of Iraq and Afghanistan, and an adverse decision could engender that environment.

But even more relevant could be the ongoing drive by the Mexican mainstream and independant leftists to get access to decades of US National Security material on the Dirty War and in the Chiapas War.

A fair amount of those materials were already released under the liberal Clinton administration.

Revelations of US involvement, and any Mexican politicians involved could invoke an orgy of "justice" as Lopez Obrador has termed it.

Fire Away!
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A Mexican Spring?
2012-01-05
Posted by: badanov

For a map, click here. This article originally appeared on Borderlandbeat.com

By Chris Covert
Rantburg.com

The leftist newsweekly, Proceso, arguably one of the best written publications in the world in any language last week released through its APRO news service a dour assessment of the most recent violence at the southern border of Tamaulipas state and the northern border of Veracruz state.

Liberals have agendas and so do those who read and support Proceso, by this writer's estimate about five percent of Mexico's adult population max. So, it is horrible that drug gang violence is taking place in this area, around Tampico, and it probably always has been. No one really likes violence except maybe for the gangbanger shooters the cartels hire these days.

Most conveniently left out of Proceso's prose is the reason why violence has spiked in the area.

The last major shootings in Tampico before last December took place around Easter weekend of 2011 when groups of truck-borne armed suspects decided to celebrate the Resurrection of Our Lord by shooting up the place at night, then going into hiding the next day.

A common event for Mexicans in Tampico on that weekend, undoubtedly a very warm holiday weekend, is to take to the beaches and generally have a good time for Easter, after church of course. This writer has never been that far south in Mexico, but were I a betting man, that would be my bet.

Mexicans are no different that anyone else, They love their families; they like to have a good time, and they don't want to see anyone get hurt having a good time.

The Summer of 2011 was a terrible summer in Tamaulipas.

For some unknown reason the leader of a Los Zetas gang in San Fernando, Tamaulipas began sometime in April, 2011 to hijack buses, rob everyone, rape women, and allegedly recruited shooters into their ranks, killing those that were not to be used for their cannon fodder. That was but for a brief time in March and April. The crimes that group committed stretched from at as far back as the Summer of 2010 into spring 2011, when the first of the mass graves around San Fernando were discovered.

A total of 193 individuals were murdered and buried in mass plots in and around San Fernando, many of them migrants from Mexico as well as central and south American and all likely victims of extortion, robbery and rape. The death toll in San Fernando that summer has been eclipse only by the graves discovered in and around Durango city in Durango, which at last count totaled 280. Unlike San Fernando, the Durango graves were from victims stretching back as far as 2004. San Fernando went back only as far as the summer of 2010. In terms of abject bloodiness, San Fernando almost certainly eclipses Durango.

Tamaulipas has long had a problem with the drug trade. The three major crossings from Tamaulipas, Reynosa, Matamoros and Nuevo Laredo have been points of contention between Los Zetas, and the Gulf and now Sinaloa Cartels. Reading some of Proceso's articles on the area, a heavy political and social cost had been imposed on the state as well.

The heavy political cost was represented by an exemplar of cartel governance of an area. On any given day when clashes took place between drug gangs and federal security forces, newspaper websites in those three crossings cities were strangely quiet, almost as if nothing was really going on. Whenever an ongoing battle took place, the only news leaking out would be Twitter posts by private individuals and local government officials, advising residents about ongoing gun battles.

Proceso in one article in 2010 explained that the reason for press silence was cartels were constantly threatening newspapers and their reporters for their reportage. Some comments made in national publications said, without much attribution, that some newspapers in Tamaulipas were under control of drug gangs. So why risk personal harm reporting violent event when you can report on the latest government news release that would not incur cartel anger?

So without really showing it, the press in Tamaulipas made a quite public display of how a cartel in control of municipalities in Mexico would be: Press freedom at the whim of a well-heeled criminal, backed by the force of arms. The curbing of press freedoms were not nationwide to be sure. In Juarez for example, the press is vigorous and critical of both criminal gangs and of government. Northern Tamaulipas was similar to the Mexican Sierras where cartels continue to operate with complete impunity.

On February 2011 on Army Day, Mexican General Guillermo Galvan Galvan announced that four new rifle battalions were to be deployed to Tamaulipas. Somehow the PRI dominated Chamber of Deputies only a few months before released funds sufficient to raise new troops to aid in the fight against the drug cartels, enough for 18 new units. Apparently in the intervening time as the Mexican Army reinforced its efforts in Tamaulipas, two rifle units were deployed to Nuevo Laredo, a crossing virtually owned by Los Zetas, and the other two elsewhere. What apparently was going on was a massive reinforcement for the state. SEDENA, the controlling agency for the Mexican Army added five thousand troops to the state, the equivalent of two rifle brigades. Last week an additional 8,000 troops were deployed temporarily to the state from other states in Mexico such as Chiapas state.

A total of 13,000 army troops have been moved into Tamaulipas since the summer of 2011.

January 2nd, Policia Federal announced the additional of an additional 1,500 effectives to the state.

The week before came in a Milenio news daily article about the first of the shootings that took place the last week of December. The violence between cartels apparently were because of the troop movement. Criminal gangs in northern Tamaulipas were moving their activities south in response to the buildup in the north. In this writer's opinion it was a startling revelation, given the absolute attacks on the press in Mexico against the the national government's policy of using the military to fight the cartels.

Where the new deployment leaves the cartels is anyone's guess at the moment. But it is a clear major challenge to criminal gangs in the state that not only must they deal with reach others rivals, they must deal with an unprecedented buildup of military power in the area.

Perhaps the most visible evidence of the buildup of forces in the area are the output of several newspapers in the region. Judging by articles posted on newspaper websites, which now include reports sourced through SEDENA about several raids, busts and armed encounters -- which is something that would be unheard up only a year before -- the virtual shuttering of local press has ended.

The willingness of local press to report on the drug war whereas before it was cowed by cartel governance is perhaps the biggest change in the last summer outside of the massive reinforcement in Tamaulipas.

In Tamaulipas, encounters between Mexican security forces and drug cartel bad guys will likely continue, and until cartel power in the region is finally broken. But even if that does not or cannot happen, Mexican can at least now revel in the Mexican spring, provided courtesy of the Mexican military.

Fire Away!
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