Chiapas/National: Femicides on the Rise

Compared to the period from January to March 2017, the number of femicides in Chiapas doubled in the same period in 2018. This is clear from the official data of the State Attorney General’s Office, when they state that in the first quarter of 2017 four femicides were registered and in the same period in 2018 the figure was eight. This database details that five of the eight femicides were committed with a knife and inside houses.

Faced with this growing problem, on May 13th, young students of the Bachelor of Communication from the Autonomous University of Chiapas presented the project ”Emergenti. Realidad que Duele”, a documentary about the Gender Violence Alert (GVA) promoted in Chiapas since November 2016, and two cases of victims of feminicide in the state: Maribel Vazquez and Yuri Mendez Trejo. “Public policies have to address this problem”, one of the documentary makers stated.

At the national level, statistics from the National Public Security System indicate that during the first quarter of 2018 there were 620 women victims of intentional homicide, a record 18% higher than in the same period of 2017. Organizations such as the National Observatory of Femicide have warned that the murders of women are not only increasing, but are increasingly committed with more brutality. The states in which the largest numbers of women have been victims of intentional homicides are Guanajuato, Mexico State, Guerrero and Baja California, with almost half of the victims.

The Center for Women’s Rights of Chiapas told us in an interview that, although the federal government and the entities agreed that the murders of women be investigated under protocols of femicide since December of last year, in practice there is still difficulty in registering the cases and a tendency to “make up the data” trying to “hide the real level of violence that exists in the state”; This is combined with a low culture of reporting crime generally, and particularly, in the face of gender violence.

For more information in Spanish:

Al alza los feminicidios en Chiapas; reportan ocho casos de enero a marzo (Proceso, 10 de mayo de 2018)

Proyectan documental ‘’Emergente. Realidad que duele’’ sobre los feminicidios en Chiapas (Voces Feministas, 14 de mayo de 2018)

Aumenta la cifra de feminicidios en el país (La Verdad, 13 de mayo de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Chiapas: otro feminicidio en este inicio de año (19 de enero de 2018)

Nacional/Chiapas: En el marco del Día Internacional para la Eliminación de la Violencia contra las Mujeres (1 de diciembre de 2017)

Chiapas: a un año de la Declaratoria de Alerta de Violencia de Género (AVG) en Chiapas (25 de noviembre de 2017)

Chiapas: Día Internacional de Lucha Contra la Violencia hacia las Mujeres (28 de noviembre de 2016)

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Guerrero/International: New Hearing of Ayotzinapa Case with Inter-American Commission for Human Rights

On May 8th, during the hearing held in the context of the 168th Period of Sessions of the Inter-American Commission for Human Rights (IACHR) that took place in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, prior to a report on the case that the IACHR will publish and to a visit to Mexico next July, relatives of the 43 Ayotzinapa student teachers who disappeared in Guerrero in 2014, and their legal representatives warned that the federal government intends to shelve the investigation before a possible alternation in the presidency of the republic this year. “These men know that their corrupt government is on the way out and they are afraid that the next government will want to get to where it [the current government] stops in our case. For that reason they want to close each line by acting like they are investigating,” said the father of one of the disappeared.

During his speech, Santiago Aguirre, deputy director of the Prodh Center, said that, “there are four signs that confirm our worst fears that the sole priority of this administration is to close the case given the high probability that those who made the historical truth will soon leave their positions of power.” These signs include: “the rejection of the federal government of the UN report, which documented torture of those allegedly basically responsible for the official theory; the filtering and misrepresentation of messages of the alleged perpetrators -provided by the DEA- with the purpose of exculpating state and federal officials; the failure of the Attorney General in his deficiency to make new accusations; and the refusal to comply with the psychosocial diagnosis.”

Commissioner Ernesto Vargas, of Colombian origin, emphasized his concern over the disqualifications against Jan Jarab, representative in Mexico of the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. He insisted on the concern that the office has discovered a “pattern of torture” that “can ruin the investigation.” It is worth mentioning that faced with the most recent questions from the Mexican government, the UNCHR defended the findings of the report “Double Injustice. Report on Human Rights Violations in the Investigation of the Ayotzinapa Case”, published last March, which includes allegations of torture and cover-ups in the Ayotzinapa case. It also reiterated its call to the Mexican authorities to implement their recommendations, in order to clarify the facts, guarantee justice, provide reparations to the victims and “guarantee the non-repetition of these tragic events.”

The representatives of the Mexican State in Santo Domingo were led by Ambassador Miguel Ruiz Cabañas, who presented the progress of the investigations made by the Attorney General’s Office on the leaks of information provided by the United States government of conversations of those implicated in the Ayotzinapa case. According to the person in charge of the Special Office for the Iguala case, of 5,000 images obtained, it was decided to explore 360 ​​places in search of the youths, of which, from November to last April, 325 were reviewed “without tangible results”. He also mentioned that 31 people have been considered responsible for having participated in the events, of which 16 would have open proceedings in progress for carrying weapons, organized crime, kidnapping and crimes against health [sic].

For more information in Spanish:

Alertan de intención de cerrar el caso Ayotzinapa ante probable alternancia presidencial (Centro ProDH, 8 de mayo de 2018)

En audiencia de la CIDH, activistas alertan contra carpetazo al caso Ayotzinapa (Proceso, 8 de mayo de 2018)

Este gobierno ya se va y quiere cerrar el caso Ayotzinapa, acusan padres de normalistas desaparecidos (Animal Político, 8 de mayo de 2018)

Caso Ayotzinapa en la CIDH: padres de los 43 exigen no olvidar a los jóvenes (CNN México, 9 de mayo de 2018)

La ONU-DH en Ginebra defiende informe sobre Ayotzinapa y reitera llamado a acatar sus recomendaciones (Proceso, 9 de mayo 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)

Oaxaca: 17 Men Pose as Transgender to Register as Candidates

Photo @ Colectivo por la Ciudadanía de las Mujeres (Women’s Citizenship Collective)

On May 7th, the Women’s Citizenship Collective and women belonging to the muxe and trans community, originating from different regions of the state of Oaxaca, demanded in the framework of a press conference the cancellation “of the records of the men who illegally registered their candidacy to participate in the electoral contest, occupying spaces destined for women.”

17 of the 19 candidatures registered by the Electoral Institute and of Citizen Participation of the State of Oaxaca (IEEPCO in its Spanish acronym) of the self-affirmed transgender candidates were identified as fraudulent. These male candidates are not part of “the trans or muxe community of Oaxaca, and contrary to this, in most cases, their marital relationship and the procreation of children with women is publicly known”, according to the press release. They also state that “even some of the candidates are seeking re-election as municipal presidents and during their previous positions they did not declare to be transgender.”

All this occurred in order to evade the requirement of gender parity and place men in non-corresponding spaces. Since Article 16 of the Guidelines on Gender Parity 2018 states that: “In case of nomination of transgender, transsexual, intersex or muxes, the nomination will correspond to the gender to which the person is self-assigned and said candidacy will be taken into account in compliance with the principle of gender parity.”

Only two registered candidatures were accepted by the LGBTI community and the Women’s Citizenship Collective, since they are candidates, “who in addition to self-affirming as muxes, socially name themselves with those names in their daily lives (…) and in addition, their daily statements and actions reaffirm and consolidate that muxe identity as part of the free development of their personality.”

For more information in Spanish:

Comunicado de prensa  | Exigen cancelar registros de hombres que usurpan espacios de mujeres trans (Colectivo por la Ciudadanía de las Mujeres, 7 de mayo de 2018)

Hombres se hicieron pasar por transgénero para ganar candidaturas en Oaxaca, acusa Colectivo (Proceso, 7 de mayo de 2018)

Hombres simulan ser trans para ocupar candidaturas de mujeres (Cimacnoticias, 7 de mayo de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Oaxaca: Mujer transgénero recibe su credencial de elector de una representación del INE (8 de agosto de 2017)

Oaxaca: Cautionary Measures after Journalist Receives Death Threat on Facebook

(@Artículo 19)

“On May 1st, the reporter of Piñero de la Cuenca digital media, Juan Alberto Carmona Contreras, better known as Betillo, was threatened with death on Facebook by unknown persons in Tuxtepec, Oaxaca, as well as being harassed by unknown people outside of his home”, the organization for freedom of expression Articulo 19 reported.

Given the elements of context and concern, the organization stressed that “the threat that circulated on Facebook was accompanied by the dissemination of a photograph that was taken of the reporter in December 2017 when he was threatened by public officials of the Attorney General’s Office (PGR in its Spanish acronym). At that time, a police agent was annoyed with the reporter while covering an fireworks operation in Loma Bonita, Oaxaca and, according to the report of the journalist to Articulo 19, the public official stated: “I’ll get you, even if I lose my job and it’s not a threat, it’s a promise.”

For this reason, and from that date, Carmona Contreras requested the intervention of the Federal Protection Mechanism for Human Rights Defenders and Journalists. However, Articulo 19 stressed that, “it have not been enough to stop the aggressions against him.”

In view of the most recent events, the Ombudsman for Human Rights of the People of Oaxaca issued precautionary measures in favor of the reporter and opened file DDHPO/CA/504/(01)/OAX/2018.

For more information in Spanish:

Amenazan de muerte a periodista de Oaxaca en redes sociales (Artículo 19, 6 de mayo de 2018)

Defensoría de Oaxaca emite medidas cautelares para periodista amenazado de muerte en Facebook (Proceso, 7 de mayo de 2018)

Dictan medidas cautelares a reportero de El Piñero, quien anteriormente fue amenazado por agente de la PGR (Página3.mx, 7 de mayo de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Oaxaca: Denuncian la desapareción de un periodista en el Istmo de Tehuantepec (23 de enero de 2018)

Nacional/Internacional: relatores de la ONU y la CIDH sobre Libertad de Expresión llaman a México a redoblar esfuerzos para proteger a periodistas (7 de diciembre de 2017)

Nacional/Oaxaca: Red nacional de periodistas exige detener la violencia contra comunicadora (17 de octubre de 2017)

Nacional/Internacional: Espionaje a periodistas y activistas en México (27 de junio de 2017)

National: 20,390 Forcibly Displaced in 2017 – Over 329,900 in the Last 12 Years

(@CMDPDH)

On May 2nd, the Mexican Commission for the Defense and Promotion of Human Rights (CMDPDH in its Spanish acronym) published a report on forced internal displacement in Mexico that indicated that in 2017, the climate of violence that prevails in the country caused 25 internal forced mass displacement events in nine states of the Republic, which affected 20,390 people. In the last 12 years at least 329,917 people have had to flee their homes, a figure that is “extremely conservative” as it only includes the cases in which entire communities have had to move. The CMDPDH estimates the figure could exceed one million people, although it affirms that the government has not published figures due to not wanting to “recognize the scale of the problem and the existence of an armed conflict.”

The report states that the states of Guerrero (seven cases), Sinaloa (five), Chihuahua (three), Chiapas (three) and Oaxaca (three) concentrated practically all mass displacement episodes registered in 2017. Chiapas was the entity where the phenomenon affected the largest number of people: 6,090, most of them originating in the municipalities of Altos de Chalchihuitan and Chenalho. 60.44% of the people affected were indigenous and the vast majority lived in rural areas

Of all the factors that led to forced displacement, the majority of them were caused by armed organized groups. Other causes were political violence, social conflict and territorial disputes and, to a lesser extent, the implementation of extractive mining projects.

The CMDPDH regretted that in Mexico the issue of forced internal displacement remains an issue without diagnosis, without public policies or official responses: “Internally displaced people do not have a framework of protection, they are like a kind of legal limbo where nobody confers them rights. The displaced people are left at the mercy of the will of local governments.” In addition, although it acknowledged the existence are two local laws, in Chiapas and in Guerrero, lack of regulations has prevented their proper enforcement to date.

For more information in Spanish:

Informe 2017 : Desplazamiento interno forzado en México (CMDPDH, informe completo, 2 mayo de 2018)

La violencia provocó el desplazamiento forzado de 20 mil 390 personas en 2017: CMDPDH (Proceso, 2 de mayo de 2018)

Más de 20 mil desplazados en México durante 2017; la mayoría, indígenas: Informe (Aristegui Noticias, 2 de mayo de 2018)

En 12 años, 329.9 mil víctimas de desplazamiento forzado en el país (La Jornada, 3 de mayo de 2018)

Los conflictos territoriales y la violencia llevan al éxodo a más de 12.000 indígenas en México (El País, 3 de mayo de 2018)

Por la violencia, más de 325 mil personas han dejado sus hogares a la fuerza en México (Animal Político, 3 de mayo de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Chiapas : Persiste riesgo a la vida de indígenas tsotsiles en Aldama, denuncia el Centro de Derechos Humanos Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas (26 de abril de 2018)

Chiapas: SIPAZ visitó a personas desplazadas de Chalchihuitán (20 de abril de 2018)

Guerrero: De la civilidad truncada a la desaparición de la razón, informe final de la Misión de Observación al Estado de Guerrero (16 de abril de 2018)

Chiapas: Plantón desplazados ejido Puebla, Chenalhó (10 de abril de 2018)

Chiapas: Otro conflicto agrario en los límites de Chenalhó provoca desplazados en el municipio de Aldama [blog incluye antecedentes] (27 de marzo de 2018)

Chiapas: desplazados de Chalchihuitán denuncian condiciones en las que se siguen encontrando(23 de marzo de 2018)

Chiapas : sin condiciones de seguridad regresan a casa más de 4000 desplazados en Chalchihuitán (4 de enero de 2018)

SIPAZ: BOLETÍN URGENTE – Reactivación del conflicto agrario entre Chenalhó y Chalchihuitán : violencia generalizada e impunidad (16 de diciembre de 2017)

National: CNI Will not Support any Presidential Candidate and Calls on Peoples to Organize

Marichuy in Oventik (@SIPAZ)

At a press conference in Mexico City on May 2nd, the National Indigenous Congress (CNI in its Spanish acronym), the Indigenous Council of Government (CIG in its Spanish acronym) and its spokesperson, Maria de Jesus Patricio Martinez, “Marichuy”, announced that they will not “seek or accept any alliance with any political party or candidate” before the elections on July 1st. They said that they will not call to vote or to abstain, but will continue looking for “all those below to dismantle the pestilent power from above”: “Vote or not vote, get organized. We will walk building the keys to heal the world.”

In a statement written after the second working session of the CIG, held on April 28th and 29th in Mexico City, they gave indications as to what they learnt when trying to collect signatures across the country so that Marichuy could participate as an independent candidate for the presidency: “We hear the pain of all the colors that we the Mexico of below are” and “we made our political proposal grow from below, from where the struggle of many native peoples, their problems and their proposals were made visible.” They affirmed, on the other hand, that “the electoral process is a great cesspit in which those who could falsify thousands of signatures and who have the billions of pesos that allow them to coerce and buy the vote contend, while most of the people of Mexico is torn between poverty and misery”; and that “the original peoples and those who walk below and to the left do not fit into their game; not because of our color, our race, our class, our age, our culture, our gender, our thinking, our heart, but because we are one with Mother Earth and our struggle is that it does not turn everything into a commodity.”

They asked “all of us who are the people of Mexico, the compas of the networks of support for the Indigenous Council of Government in all the states of the country, the compañeras and compañeros who made up the Hour of the Blossom of the Peoples Civil Association to continue consulting and evaluating us, making assessments, finding and walking the new paths that we decide, always organizing, even if they vote or do not vote for any candidate. Your words, feelings and proposals matter to us.” Finally, they revealed that in the month of October they will hold a General Assembly of the National Indigenous Congress, to know the results of the assessment of the original peoples grouped in the CNI, and to advance in the next step.

For more information in Spanish:

Falta lo que falta (CNI, 2 de mayo de 2018)

El CNI no buscará ninguna alianza política… el proceso electoral “es un gran cochinero”, dice “Marichuy” (Proceso, 2 de mayo de 2018)

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“No vamos a apoyar a ningún candidato”: CNI (La Jornada, 2 de mayo de 2018)

Marichuy dice que su movimiento no apoyará a ningún candidato: “esta elección es un cochinero” (Sin Embargo, 2 de mayo de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Chiapas/Nacional : Conversatorio “Miradas, escuchas, palabras: ¿prohibido pensar? (27 de abril de 2018)

Nacional : CNI convoca al “siguiente paso en la lucha” (17 de marzo de 2018)

Nacional: CNI denuncia ataque contra la caravana del CIG. (22 de enero de 2018)

Nacional: Marichuy critica trampas del INE a su candidatura (26 de octubre de 2018)

Nacional: Marychuy se registra como candidata independiente a la Presidencia de la República (18 de octubre de 2017)

National/International: Mexico – First Country to Ratify TPP-11

(@Convergencia)

On April 24th, the Chamber of Senators ratified in plenary session the Integral and Progressive Treaty of Transpacific Association (TPP-11) with 73 votes in favor, 24 against and four abstentions. With this, Mexico became the first country of those that make up this agreement to ratify it. For the treaty to effectively enter into force, it will be necessary for it to be ratified by at least 5 other countries.

The Mexican business sector greeted this new agreement: “Today, businessmen are convinced that its entry into force will benefit Mexican companies, workers and consumers by generating a more competitive and dynamic economy, for the benefit of Mexican families. The countries that are part of the CPTPP constitute 14% of the annual production of the entire world, with which they become one of the largest free trade zones at an international level. This agreement opens the doors to ten Pacific economies to Mexican producers and entrepreneurs, who will have preferential access to these markets. Therefore, new opportunities are created for the generation of formal and better paid jobs in our country.”

In return, the Convergence of Social Organizations and Citizens “México mejor sin TLCs” (Mexico Better Without FTAs), which brings together 200 social organizations, campesinos, trade unions, human rights organizations and academics, demanded in a statement “that this Treaty not be ratified and negotiated in our name without transparency and without public participation.” It said that it requested an “audience with the Presidency of the Senate Board of Directors to express its appreciations and alternatives to the contents of the Treaty that compromise human rights and the care of the land, unfortunately to date we have not been received which deepens concerns.”

It criticized the fact that in less than a month, the senators intend to approve TPP-11, “since it will affect various productive sectors and the guarantees of Mexicans in different areas, including labor and health, without having held public hearings as provided by the Law on the Approval of Commercial Treaties with all sectors involved.”

It attributed the hurry “to the fear of the current government that with the elections of July the composition of the Legislative Power changes and whoever wins the presidency does not endorse the TTP-11.” In addition, it finally noted with concern that “it is feared that with the same hurry and before the new government and the next legislature take office, they intend to approve the recently concluded modernization of the Free Trade Agreement between the European Union and Mexico as well as the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) that should end in the first week of May.”

For more information in Spanish:

Piden a CNDH intervenga contra ATP por violar las leyes (La Jornada, 23 de abril de 2018)

México se convierte en el primer país en ratificar el TPP-11 (El Financiero, 24 de abril de 2018)

El sector privado celebra la ratificación en el Senado del Tratado Integral y Progresista de Asociación Transpacífico (CCE, 25 de abril de 2018)

Los pros y contras del TPP11 para México (Expansión, 25 de abril de 2018)

Por un modelo económico que ponga al centro los derechos humanos y el cuidado del medio ambiente (Convergencia “México mejor sin TLC’s”, 25 de abril de 2018)