National: First Presidential Debate – Proposals and Accusations

Photo @ Univision

On April 22nd, the first presidential debate took place, in which the five candidates for the presidency had a space to present their proposals and ideas to the voters. In the following days, the media offered different types of analyses and evaluations, about the positions and mutual accusations of the candidates. Proceso concluded that for them the debate “had a different value but a single goal. For the PRI, it was the hope of a better position, for the PAN, the opportunity to position itself in second place, for the independents to make themselves known and for the leader of Morena to protect and maintain the distance in the polls.” La Jornada had a more critical position in which it considered that “the issue of corruption during the debate between presidential candidates was the setting for a feast of accusations in which everyone denounced the dishonesty of others and eluded the accusations against their people.”

Several media agreed that Lopez Obrador, candidate for MORENA, was the “common target of the debate”, an issue that was echoed even in the international press according to Forbes Mexico, or that is reflected in titles like “All against AMLO” in Proceso. “One of the most controversial proposals of the night,” as La Jornada called it, was the proposal of independent candidate Rodriguez Calderon to cut off the hand of those who stole from a public service post.

Disinformemonos commented that from the point of view of activists and civil society organizations it regretted that “during the presidential debate last Sunday the candidates did not examine in depth measures to solve the human rights crisis in the country, but instead concentrated on attacking each other without explaining the proposals.” Rocio Culebro, executive director of the Mexican Institute of Human Rights and Democracy, and Fernando Rios, executive secretary of the TDT Network, added that “neither did they address issues such as victim assistance, extrajudicial executions, arbitrary detentions, enforced disappearances, abuses by the police and armed forces, femicides, violence against the press, forced displacement and torture.”

For more information in Spanish:

El debate devino en festival de acusaciones mutuas de corrupción (La Jornada, 23 de abril de 2018)

Así vio la prensa internacional el debate presidencial de México (Forbes México, 23 de abril de 2018)

Lamentan que candidatos no profundizaran sobre derechos humanos en debate presidencial (Desinformémonos, 24 de abril de 2018)

Todos contra AMLO (Proceso, 25 de abril de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Nacional : arranca campaña electoral 2018 (6 de abril de 2018)

Nacional/Chiapas: El precandidato del PRI a la Presidencia inició su precampaña en San Juan Chamula (15 de dieciembre de 2017)

Advertisements

Guerrero/National: “43 X 43 in the Heart Day” Begins

On April 20th, the 43 X 43 in the Heart Day started, taking into account that April 26th will mark 43 months since the disappearance of the 43 students of the Normal Rural School of Ayotzinapa in Iguala, Guerrero. One of the main demands is to ask President Enrique Peña Nieto (EPN) to comply with the agreements he signed with relatives of those who disappeared in October 2014. At that meeting, EPN had committed himself to getting to the bottom of the matter until he found the students. However, “43 months after the disappearance of our children, there are no concrete advances, on the contrary, they intend to close our case,” they reported. Some of the actions are being carried out in Mexico City and others in Guerrero itself.

Meliton Ortega, spokesperson of the Nos Faltan 43 collective explained that “we want the Mexican government to comply with the four lines of investigation of the Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts (IGIE). Today it has been proven that there is transfer of drugs from Iguala to Chicago and we demand that this line be broadened.” He announced to the candidates for the Presidency of the Republic that they will maintain their protests while the case is unsolved: “Now that the election is on the doorstep, the government does not even intend to offer advances along the lines of investigation we have demanded (… ) That is why we say that the case should not be closed, as the government of Enrique Peña Nieto claims. What he did during 2017 was just killing time.”

For the same reason, on April 24th, students’ relatives tried to reach the official residence of Los Pinos to demand an audience with EPN, and demand that the case be solved before the end of his term. However, their attempt was blocked by more than 400 elements of the capital city police, which generated tension that resulted in a confrontation that left six demonstrators and two uniformed personnel injured.

The parents of the 43 also denounced the police harassment to which they were subjected, since at the end of the demonstration, police followed them to where they are staying to carry out the activities that will continue in Mexico City and there they remained several hours possibly to “arrest the student leaders and the parents of the 43 on charges of vandalism.”

The next day, the parents of the 43 had planned to speak at the Ministry of the Interior to request an audience with minister Alfonso Navarrete, who has not received them since he took office. On the 26th, marking one more month of the disappearance of the student teachers, a march from the Angel of Independence to the capital’s Zocalo.

For more information in Spanish:

Granaderos impiden a padres de los 43 llegar a Los Pinos (La Jornada, 25 de abril de 2018)

Más de 400 policías intentaron encapsularnos para detenernos: padres de los 43 (Desinformémonos, 25 de abril de 2018)

Por las elecciones, olvidan a normalistas desaparecidos: padres de los 43 (Proceso, 23 de abril de 2018)

Los 43 latidos del corazón de México (Tlachinollan, 23 de abril de 2018)

Inició jornada “En el corazón 43 x 43” para exigir la aparición de los normalistas de Ayotzinapa (Desinformémonos, 21 de abril de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Internacional/Guerrero: Exigen que la PGR agote todas las líneas de investigación que surgen de nueva información en caso Ayotzinapa (18 de abril de 2018)

Guerrero/Nacional/Internacional : Nuevos informes sobre caso Ayotzinapa (15 de marzo de 2018)

Guerrero: PGR buscará cerrar caso Ayotzinapa antes de diciembre (6 de marzo de 2018)

Guerrero / México – Nacional: Ayotzinapa: Caravana Rompiendo el Silencio y el Olvido (3 de marzo de 2018)

Guerrero / Nacional-México: Ayotzinapa a 40 meses de la desaparición de los 43 sigue la “indolencia” del gobierno (30 de enero de 2018)

Guerrero : Caso Ayotzinapa: reunión con el Consejo de la Judicatura Federal y 5ta visita oficial del Mecanismo de Seguimiento de la CIDH (8 de febrero de 2018)

Guerrero / Nacional-México: Ayotzinapa a 40 meses de la desaparición de los 43 sigue la “indolencia” del gobierno (30 de enero de 2018)

International/Guerrero: Demands for Attorney General to Exhaust All Lines of Investigation Following New Information in Ayotzinapa Case

On April 12th, the newspaper Reforma reported that intercepted telephone conversations between members of the Guerreros Unidos de Chicago cartel and “armed en from Iguala” show that the disappearance of 43 students from the Ayotzinapa Normal Rural School in 2014 was ordered from the United States. According to the text revealed by the newspaper, the heads of that criminal organization gave orders from Chicago to involve police in the detention of students.

According to the Miguel Agustin Pro Juarez Human Rights Center (PRODH in its Spanish acronym), an organization that accompanied the families of the students, “the messages show the weakness of the so-called “historical truth” of the PGR [Attorney General]. Particularly we refer to the message published with the words: “60 packages already saved and others with San Pedro”, assuming that the word “packages” refers to people, the message was sent on September 27th at 3:28 pm, which is in clear contradiction with the official theory: according to the Attorney General of the Republic (PGR) at that time the students would have been executed and incinerated, while the message is clear that at that time they had “saved” packages.

The civil organizations Serapaz, the Tlachinollan Human Rights Center, Fundar and the Miguel Agustin Pro Juarez Human Rights Center, noted that what was published by Reforma corroborates that the Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts (IGIE) of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) was right to urge the Mexican State to open and exhaust the line of investigation related to the transfer of drugs from Mexico to the United States, specifically from Iguala to Chicago.

The PRODH Center stated that, “almost 43 months after the events, the messages confirm that the case cannot be closed and that the official explanation that has been given is unsatisfactory. In light of the revelation of Reforma, we demand that the PGR exhaust all lines of investigation that emerge from the messages, avoiding a hasty closure with electoral overtones and that the scrutiny of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) and the collaboration of the North American agencies are increased.”

For more information in Spanish:

Caso Ayotzinapa: Nueva Información de telefonía muestra falencias de versión oficial e impide dar por concluido el caso (Centro Prodh, 12 de abril de 2018)

Guiaron narcos desde Chicago ataques en Iguala (Reforma, 12 de abril de 2018)

Mensajes entre ‘Guerreros Unidos’ muestran “debilidad” de “verdad histórica” del caso Ayotzinapa: Centro Pro (Aristegui, 12 de abril de 2018)

Conversaciones entre líderes de Guerreros Unidos revelan que fueron hasta 60 los desaparecidos en Iguala (Animal Político, 12 de abril de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Guerrero/Nacional/Internacional : Nuevos informes sobre caso Ayotzinapa (15 de marzo de 2018)

 

Guerrero: PGR buscará cerrar caso Ayotzinapa antes de diciembre (6 de marzo de 2018)

Guerrero / México – Nacional: Ayotzinapa: Caravana Rompiendo el Silencio y el Olvido (3 de marzo de 2018)

Guerrero / Nacional-México: Ayotzinapa a 40 meses de la desaparición de los 43 sigue la “indolencia” del gobierno (30 de enero de 2018)

Guerrero : Caso Ayotzinapa: reunión con el Consejo de la Judicatura Federal y 5ta visita oficial del Mecanismo de Seguimiento de la CIDH (8 de febrero de 2018)

Guerrero / Nacional-México: Ayotzinapa a 40 meses de la desaparición de los 43 sigue la “indolencia” del gobierno (30 de enero de 2018)

Guerrero: caso Ayotzinapa: se exige la entrega de vídeos del Palacio de Justicia de Iguala para conocer lo ocurrido (19 de enero de 2018)

Guerrero: Ayotzinapa, tercera audiencia de oficio en la CIDH: “el gobierno federal no quiere resolver el caso” (26 de octubre de 2017)

Guerrero/Nacional : A tres años de Ayotzinapa (2 de octubre de 2017)

Guerrero: tercera visita del mecanismo de seguimiento de la CIDH sobre le caso Ayotzinapa a casi tres años de los hechos (7 de septiembre)

Guerrero: Sesión de seguimiento de la CIDH del caso Ayotzinapa : avances nulos (10 de julio de 2017)

Guerrero/ Nacional: Madres y padres de los 43 consideran no acudir a la reunión con la PGR y la CIDH (20 de abril de 2017)

National/Guerrero: CNDH Report Causes PGR Criticisms

Photo @ Milenio

On March 28th, the president of the National Human Rights Commission (CNDH in its Spanish acronym) delivered his 2017 Activities Report where he took the opportunity to ask the Federal Government for the security that Mexico needs.

Regarding the government of the current president Enrique Peña Nieto, it noted “Mexico has not experienced a significant and objective change towards greater respect and validity of human rights; nor has our democratic state of law been substantially strengthened, nor has the environment been changed positively, when millions of Mexicans confronted each other on a daily basis, characterized by the binomials of insecurity and violence, impunity and corruption, inequality and poverty.”

He also regretted that there were major attacks against women, journalists and migrants.

The CNDH “asserted that the law enforcement system “is overwhelmed” and warned that in the current six-year term of office the human rights situation is unfavorable, including the Iguala case, where crimes against students of the normal school of Ayotzinapa were perpetrated.”

On these allegations in the case of Iguala, the Attorney General of the Republic (PGR) responded by means of a statement that “it does not correspond” to the CNDH to make inquiries into it and that this agency “cannot replace” the office of the Attorney General in its functions.

Given these criticisms of the PGR, the Office in Mexico of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) supported the CNDH’s actions and assured that “autonomous human rights organizations do not seek confrontation, but rather contribute to truth and justice.”

For more information in Spanish:

González Pérez demanda más seguridad a Peña Nieto (Sexenio, 10 de abril de 2018)

Desfavorable balance en derechos humanos: González Pérez  (La Jornada, 28 de marzo de 2018)

ONU respalda investigación de CNDH por caso Ayotzinapa (La Jornada, 4 de abril de 2018)

Molestia de la PGR, porque somos “incómodos”: CNDH (Vanguardia, 3 de abril de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Guerrero/Nacional/Internacional : Nuevos informes sobre caso Ayotzinapa (15 de marzo de 2018)

Guerrero: PGR buscará cerrar caso Ayotzinapa antes de diciembre (6 de marzo de 2018)

Guerrero / México – Nacional: Ayotzinapa: Caravana Rompiendo el Silencio y el Olvido (3 de marzo de 2018)

Guerrero / Nacional-México: Ayotzinapa a 40 meses de la desaparición de los 43 sigue la “indolencia” del gobierno (30 de enero de 2018)

Nacional : EPN promulga Ley de Seguridad Interior. CNDH promoverá acciones de inconstitucionalidad. (29 de diciembre de 2017)

National: Relatives of the Disappeared Oppose Changes to General Law of Forced Disappearance

Members of the Movement for Our Disappeared in Mexico considered “unacceptable” and a “setback” that the National Search Commission (CNB in its Spanish acronym) is under the tutelage of the National Security Commission (CNS in its Spanish acronym), so they demanded that the operation of the body be in charge of the Ministry of the Interior (SEGOB in its Spanish acronym) as agreed with the groups of relatives of disappeared persons in the framework of the elaboration and approval of the General Law on Enforced Disappearance, Disappearance by Individuals and the National Search System.

In a letter addressed to President Enrique Peña Nieto and to the Secretary of the Interior, Alfonso Navarrete Prida, on the occasion of the publication in the Official Gazette of the Federation of the “Agreement by which the decentralized administrative bodies of the Ministry of the Interior are organically assigned”, The Movement expressed that it regretted “profoundly that the Secretary of the Interior has broken commitments previously taken on by that secretariat and that, unilaterally, it has decided to organically weaken the body responsible for facing the most important challenge in Mexico in the area of ​​human rights ( …) with his decision, the Secretary of the Interior sends a message of disdain to the work carried out jointly with dozens of collectives of relatives and civil society.”

They pointed out that “due to the extreme gravity and political relevance of the problem of disappearances in our country, the position and organic structure of the CNB must reflect the government’s commitment to this issue.” They stated that, “the appropriate thing is for the CNB to be directly attached to the Secretary of the Interior, since this would allow it to better fulfill its attributions of coordination, conduction and inter-institutional linkage of a comprehensive policy for the search of persons”. They also indicated that they do not trust the CNS, because “it has not favored the clarification of the multiple cases of missing federal policemen, how can we expect them to help find others?”

For more information in Spanish:

Familiares de desaparecidos exigen a Peña que Comisión de Búsqueda dependa de Segob (Proceso, 2 de abril de 2018)

Comisión de Búsqueda dejará de ser un órgano independiente; es un retroceso: activistas (Animal Político, 2 de abril de 2018)

Se oponen a reformas a la Ley de Desaparición Forzada (Vanguardia, 2 de abril de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Nacional : ONU se pronuncia ante entrada en vigor de Ley sobre Desaparición forzada (19 de enero de 2018)

Nacional: Promulgan Ley contra la Desaparición forzada (25 de noviembre de 2017)

Nacional: aprueban Ley de Desaparición forzada (17 de octubre de 2017)

Guerrero/National/International: New Reports on Ayotzinapa Case

(@Serapaz)

On March 15th, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights presented the report “Double Injustice”, which analyzes the human rights violations that were committed in the context of the Ayotzinapa investigations (forced disappearance of 43 students from the Normal Rural School of Ayotzinapa in Iguala, Guerrero, in 2014). 129 people were arrested in this framework. The UN-HR analyzed 34 cases and found “strong evidence of the use of torture, arbitrary arrests and other human rights violations” during and after the arrests. Those involved in these abuses would be elements of the prosecution, the federal police and members of the Navy. For all of the above, the UN-HR urged the Mexican government to identify those responsible for these abuses, as well as their superiors, and bring them to justice. It also called on the prosecution and the judiciary to dismiss evidence obtained under torture.

In response to the report, The Office of the Attorney General of the Republic (PGR in its Spanish acronym) said that it is “particularly concerned that the OHCHR report draws conclusions on situations that are currently under investigation, or that are under analysis by the Judiciary”, and specified that the tortures referred to were “exceptional.”

One day before, 41 months after the forced disappearance of the 43 students, several NGOs including Fundar, the Center for Analysis and Investigation, the Miguel Agustin Pro Juarez Human Rights Center, La Montaña Tlachinollan Human Rights Center and Serapaz, presented the report “I just wanted dawn to come. Psycho-social impacts of the Ayotzinapa case”. They pointed out that “the study shows how these impacts have deepened over three years due to impunity, understood not only as the lack of investigation and punishment of those responsible, but also includes the actions of the authorities that have hindered the investigation and manipulated the truth.”

For more information in Spanish:

Autoridades torturaron a detenidos por caso Ayotzinapa para obtener confesiones: ONU (Animal Político, 15 de marzo de 2018)

ONU-DH sobre Ayotzinapa: al menos 34 casos de tortura y una ejecución extrajudicial (Proceso, 15 de marzo de 2018)

Excepcionales, los casos de tortura en caso Ayotzinapa: PGR a ONU-DH (Proceso, 15 de marzo de 2018)

Presentan informe de los “Impactos psicosociales del Caso Ayotzinapa” (Regeneración, 14 de marzo de 2018)

“Te van a ofrecer una cantidad muy alta” (Informe sobre #Ayotzinapa) Aristegui Noticias, 14 de marzo de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Guerrero: PGR buscará cerrar caso Ayotzinapa antes de diciembre (6 de marzo de 2018)

Guerrero / México – Nacional: Ayotzinapa: Caravana Rompiendo el Silencio y el Olvido (3 de marzo de 2018)

Guerrero / Nacional-México: Ayotzinapa a 40 meses de la desaparición de los 43 sigue la “indolencia” del gobierno (30 de enero de 2018)

Guerrero/Mexico–National: Ayotzinapa: Breaking the Silence and Oblivion Caravan

From February 15th to 23rd, the mothers and fathers of the 43 disappeared students of Ayotzinapa made the caravan “Breaking the Silence and Oblivion”. The caravan was divided along three routes: to the north of the country, in the center, and in the south. The purpose was to continue demanding the appearance alive of the disappeared students in Iguala and “denounce the atrocities committed by the Mexican State through disappearance, murders, the imprisonment of the dignified voices that come out to fight for better conditions and life”, lawyer Vidulfo Rosales said. The members of the caravan said that this tour also aimed to refresh the collective memory of the forced disappearance of the Guerrero students and reaffirm that they will not surrender until they find justice.

The parents demanded that the case of their children not be used for electoral opportunism, a few months before President Enrique Peña Nieto leaves office. They accused that at the height of the conflict, no presidential candidate spoke out in support of the students. “We are not going to let the case go unpunished, that the PGR [Attorney General] shelve it when Enrique Peña Nieto is about to leave the Presidency, they deserve to be in jail”, they warned.

On September 26th, 41 months after the events, a march was also held in Mexico City to denounce that the four lines of investigation proposed by the Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts (IGIE) have not been followed up on. “We have strength, faith and hope to find the truth and our children, and for that we must unite and not rest until we achieve it”, Cristina Bautista, mother of Benjamin, one of the missing students, said.

For more information in Spanish:

Ayotzinapa43 | De la Caravana de padres y madres en Nochixtlán (Centro de Derechos Humanos de la Montaña Tlachinollan, 20 de febrero de 2018)

La esperanza y el dolor: “Rompiendo el silencio y el olvido” (Centro de Derechos Humanos de la Montaña Tlachinollan, 20 de febrero de 2018)

No permitiremos carpetazo de la PGR a investigaciones, advierten padres de los 43 (La Jornada, de febrero de 2018)

“No permitiremos que Peña dé carpetazo antes de irse”, advierten padres de los 43 , (Proceso, 20 de febrero de 2018)

Padres de los 43 marchan a 41 meses de los hechos y previo a la audiencia en la CIDH (Proceso, 20 de febrero de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Guerrero: Ayotzinapa: Fallece Minerva Bello sin haber obtenido justicia para su hijo desaparecido (8 de febrero de 2018)

Guerrero / Nacional-México: Ayotzinapa a 40 meses de la desaparición de los 43 sigue la “indolencia” del gobierno (30 de enero de 2018)

Guerrero: caso Ayotzinapa: se exige la entrega de vídeos del Palacio de Justicia de Iguala para conocer lo ocurrido (19 de enero de 2018)