Some human rights groups in Mexico want Pres. Felipe Calderon,
who visited Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger Wednesday,
to pull some Mexican troops away from the drug war.
Posted on 02/14/2008 12:43:02 AM PST by restornu
New York group says government is failing to halt or prevent abuses
MEXICO CITY — A leading international organization charged Wednesday that the Mexican government's human rights commission has proved largely impotent in preventing abuses of its citizens.
Human Rights Watch, the New York-based organization, said in a report that Mexico's National Human Rights Commission, a semi-autonomous body, has proved adept at criticizing violations of citizens' rights but has failed to halt or prevent the practices.
"The commission could have a much greater impact on human rights in Mexico, but it doesn't," Jose Miguel Vivanco, the group's director for the Americas, said. "While it does a decent job documenting abuses and identifying problems, it doesn't take crucial steps needed to bring about change."
"The (commission) should be a catalyst for human rights progress, not merely a chronicler of the status quo," Vivanco said.
Backroom deals The 128-page report documents the commission's alleged impotence in the investigations of recent abuses — including a police crackdown on leftist radicals in a village near Mexico City, the rapes and killings of villagers by troops in Michoacan and Coahuila states, and the unsolved murders of hundreds of women in Ciudad Juarez.
Too often, the report said, the commission's investigators merely recommend fixes to government agencies and then fail to check whether they are ever implemented. Backroom deals whose details remain obscured from the public are the norm, the study said.
The study did not come as a surprise to human rights advocates here. Indeed, the report merely served as "a well-made confirmation that exposes one of the tragedies of Mexico," said political scientist Sergio Aguayo, a founder of one of Mexico's largest private human rights organizations. "The citizens are defenseless."
Pleas for action The Human Rights Watch critique came amid an offensive by President Felipe Calderon's administration against the country's drug cartels. Calderon and other officials have ignored calls from Jose Luis Soberanes, president of the human rights commission, to pull troops from the front lines of the drug wars and return them to their barracks. The United Nations' top human rights official, Louise Arbour, made a similar recommendation during a visit to Mexico last week.
Calderon is traveling in the United States this week on a five-city tour to promote the rights of Mexican immigrants.
The American chapter of Amnesty International urged Calderon to take the same interest in promoting the rights of his countrymen back home, especially those caught in the crossfire of the drug war.
"Much more must be done to end grave human rights violations in Mexico," Larry Cox, the organization's U.S. director, said in a letter to Calderon.
Institutions face attacks Former President Carlos Salinas de Gortari created the human rights commission 18 years ago amid political turmoil over his fraud-marred election and outrage over the murder of a human rights activist.
Aguayo wrote in a newspaper piece that the commission no longer responds to the president but to powerful members of Mexico's Senate. As a result, he said, citizen protection is now trumped by deal-making.
"The drug traffickers terrorize us, the political parties don't represent us," Aguayo said in an interview. "And institutions like the human rights commission are a farce."
Huh...are Mexican citizens allowed to own firearms as in the U.S.A.?
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The would need to be here legally to own firearms.
Forget that !!!
Wake Up America!
I have Mexico on “google watch” and sometimes these are the things I catch on my hook!
>>
“The would need to be here legally to own firearms.”
>>
I’m sorry, but I can’t tell if that means “yes” or “no”. Are Mexicans allowed to have firearms in Mexico, like we do here?
Mexico has gun laws that are far worse than the US. There is also no death penalty. The so-called government of Mexico is nothing but the personal property of the drug cartels and monopolies that run the place.
Thank you for your reply.
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