Franziska Keller, Satu Hassi, and Gabriela Küppers @ Oaxaca entrelíneas.com
The Eurodeputies Franziska Keller, Satu Hassi, and Gabrielle Küppers met on 3 September during their tour from 2 to 7 September with Governor Gabino Cué Monteagudo to request information regarding the advance of investigations into the murders of the Mexican activist Beatriz Alberta Cariño and the Finnish observer Jyri Jaakkola that occurred on 27 April 2010 in San Juan Copala. The representatives of the European Parliament lamented that to now those responsible for the deaths of Jyri Jaakkola and Bety Cariño have to date not been detained, though they see progress in that the government at least attends to them, given that the previous administration of Ulises Ruiz Ortiz denied audiences with the Commission of the European Parliament altogether.
Seventeen months after the crimes, which also led to more than a dozen injuries and the disappearance of four persons for 60 hours, no one responsible has been arrested. “This is a problem of impunity that prevails in all of the country,” say Hassi and Keller. Though they noted the arrest of Rufino Hernández, leader of the Union for Social Welfare of the Triqui Region (UBISORT), as a positive development, given that he presumably participated in the death of the Finnish citizen and Bety Cariño, they indicated that this arrest has to do with other crimes committed by the leader.
In May of this year, on days 18 and 20, a delegation of the Subcommittee for Human Rights from the European Parliament visited Mexico. In a recent report they observed that the “militarization” of the war against drugs launched by the government of Felipe Calderón itself represents “a problem in terms of human-rights violations.”
The document also indicates that despite the fact that high officials within the Calderón government with whom they interviewed “have expressed a storng commitment to bring national law into conformity with international conventions,” the representatives of the National Commission on Human Rights (CNDH) have complained that the same authorities “very rarely” take seriously the rights-violations documented by them.
The Eurodeputies expressed their concerns regarding the “excessive power of the military.” Mexican senators, according to the report, “have told us that they do not have any interest in allowing the military to break the law, but that in fact the Army enjoys a much greater public trust than any other public organization, including the Church and obviously the Congress.”
In other news, the visitor of the CNDH confided to the Eurodelegation that “the lack of ongoing investigations into the murder in Oaxaca of Jyri Jaakkola, whom he knew personally, is emblematic of the climate of impunity” that prevails in the country.
“The European Parliament respects the concern Mexico has for its international standing, but the spirit of solidarity with the NGOs and the victims obliges us to continue demanding that Mexico observe its obligations under international human-rights law,” says the report.
For more information (in Spanish):
Contradicciones de México en derechos humanos: Parlamento Europeo, Proceso, 23 September 2011
Paramilitares de Oaxaca, en la impunidad: eurodiputadas, Contralínea, 29 September 2011
Lamentan representantes de Parlamento Europeo que aún no haya detenidos por muerte de Jaakola y Cariño, Oaxaca Entrelíneas.com, 3 September 2011
Eurodiputadas visitan Oaxaca para conocer avance sobre caso Copala, Ciudadanía Express, 1 September 2011
Eurodiputadas en Oaxaca, para pedir resultados de casos Cariño y Jaakkola, E-Oaxaca, 3 September 2011
Contradicciones de México en derechos humanos: Parlamento Europeo, Chacatorex, 28 September 2011
Para más información de SIPAZ:
Oaxaca: following the caravan “Bety Cariño y Jyri Jaakkola” to San Juan Copalá (21 June 2010)
Distrito Federal: visiting Mexico, the parents of Jyri Jaakkola demand justice for the case of their son and that of Bety Cariño (9 September 2010)
Oaxaca: Attack on observation caravan–2 dead and 4 missing (29 April 2010)
sipazen.wordpress.com 