Posted on 03/16/2010 12:31:22 PM PDT by AuntB
The State Department's latest report on human rights practices in nations around the world mentions the 8,000 people, mostly Mexicans, who have died in Mexico from drug-related violence. Some of those victims are named, and details of their deaths are disclosed.
But none of the 30 U.S. citizens who were murdered in Mexico between Jan. 1, 2009 and June 27, 2009 are included in the report.
When asked why that was the case, Michael Posner, assistant secretary of the State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, told CNSNews.com that the report “is intended to give a broad view.”
“I think the report is – we deal with those issues a range of ways, including through our Consular Affairs Bureau and people working in embassies on the ground,” Posner said. “This report is intended to give a broad view. The State Department released the "2009 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices " on Thursday.
“There is a lot of violence in Mexico, as you rightly point out,” Posner said. “American citizens – because we’re neighbors, because it’s – there is so much violence related to drugs, crime, et cetera, American citizens are among those who are the victims.
“And we obviously pay greater attention – we have an obligation to pay attention to protecting American citizens,” Posner said. “But it’s not – those cases are not necessarily highlighted first and foremost in the report.”
According to the State Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs, 30 U.S. citizens were victims of homicide in Mexico over the first six months of 2009. Citing privacy laws, the Death of U.S. Citizens Abroad by Non-natural Causes database only reports the date, location and cause of death. No names are provided of any victims, including those who were murdered.
Despite Posner’s claim of the human rights report giving a broad view of human rights violations in Mexico, many details are given about Mexican victims who were victims of homicide, including their names and the circumstances of their deaths.
One portion of the report details several homicides by Mexican security forces:
On May 5, the bodies of civilians Miguel Angel Gama Habif, Israel Ayala Ramirez, and Aaron Rojas de la Fuente, who were detained by soldiers on March 17, were found near Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas. On May 8, the Secretariat of Defense (SEDENA) acknowledged responsibility and announced that 12 members of the army's First Regiment of the Motorized Cavalry, Eighth Military Zone, had been formally indicted for the killings.
Another section details the death of a civilian:
On July 17, soldiers from the army's First Regiment Motorized Cavalry (Eighth Military Zone) in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, shot and killed 18-year-old Jorge Eduardo de Leon Vela while he was going to work. After the shooting the victim was taken to the hospital and kept under military guard. His wife found a patient in a local hospital with characteristics similar to those of her husband, whom soldiers had registered under another name. She was not allowed access to identify him. Two days later the victim died and was transferred to a local funeral home. When the mother and the wife of the victim went to claim the remains, they were interrogated and briefly detained. They never received an official explanation. A subsequent SEDENA press release claimed that the victim possessed drugs and weapons, assertions that were questioned by the victim's relatives and human rights organizations.
Repeated requests by CNSNews.com to the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor press office asking if any of the 8,000 people referred to in the report were U.S. or Mexican citizens were not answered by the deadline for filing this story. The bureau also was asked if the 30 homicide victims in the State Department’s death of U.S. citizens database were included in those 8,000 noted in the report.
CNSNews.com also did not get a response after repeated calls and e-mails request asking the Bureau of Consular Affairs press office if the 30 U.S. citizens listed in its database were included in the human rights report. The bureau’s press office also did not answer a request for data on the deaths of U.S. citizens in Mexico for the second six months of 2009.
The report does include a long list of human rights concerns in Mexico, as listed in the introduction to the 26-page portion of the report focused on that country.
“The government generally respected and promoted human rights; however, the following problems were reported during the year by the country’s National Human Rights Commission (CNDH) and other sources: unlawful killings by security forces; kidnappings; physical abuse; poor and overcrowded prison conditions; arbitrary arrests and detention; corruption, inefficiency, and lack of transparency that engendered impunity within the judicial system; confessions coerced through torture; violence and threats against journalists leading to self-censorship,” the report introduction says.
“Societal problems included domestic violence, including killings of women; trafficking in persons; social and economic discrimination against some members of the indigenous population; and child labor.”
SEE:
A Deliberate act of Terrorism - Mexico http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2472183/posts
The US State Dept prays to murderers of Americans
like Arafat and in no way, shape, or form,
represents anything American.
The State Department is careful to not criticize Saudi Arabia for supressing all religious freedom because the talking point is, “they’ve never permitted religious freedom”.
Are common crimes being mixed with government-on-citizen crimes and lumped into one category of “human rights violations”?
More info on this weekends killings:
Mexican drug war killings hit closer to U.S.
Two of the victims were U.S. citizens; one of them a U.S. government employee. The apparently coordinated attacks took place in broad daylight as the three were leaving a consulate children’s party. Three children were with them when the two separate assaults took place.
Now, the international investigation has expanded****** to both sides of the border in the search for clues *****about the killers as well as their motives.
“There are leads to follow up on this side, witnesses to be interviewed,” said Andrea Simmons, spokeswoman for the FBI in El Paso, which is across from Juarez. “We are going through intelligence now.”
Mexican state and federal authorities are in charge of the investigation, as blood was spilled on Mexican soil, but an array of U.S. agencies are backing them up, including the FBI and State Department.
The murders immediately triggered a spate of theories as to what the killers attempted to accomplish by striking out at the Americans.
“My theory at this point is it was a reaction by the narcos to announcements of greater involvement of Americans in the drug war,” said Gustavo de la Rosa, a Chihuahua state human rights official who was forced to flee to El Paso because of death threats.
The killings came three weeks after news reports described how U.S. drug agents were going to become more closely involved in Mexico’s war against the drug cartels.
De la Rosa theorized that******* the narcos perversely hope to tap a deep Mexican resentment against any American meddling in domestic affairs, a sentiment that dates back to the Mexican Revolution.**********
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2010/03/16/MN171CG7RA.DTL
That's the mindset at the State department over the last 40 years. They view their clients as the foreigners themselves, and they concern themselves only with their welfare, not ours.
Try getting help from an American Embassy or Consulate when you have a problem. All you'll get is "sorry, that's not our job".
It's not that they just don't care about us. It's that they actually agree that we're the problem, and the foreign nations are our victims, and that their job is to somehow, someway aid and comfort the poor darlings who we have so wantonly abused.
Alienated Xenophiles, anti-American bigots. That's all the DoS people are.
"Analysts seem to think this is a message the killers are sending to US and foreign officials, saying that they don't want them here - they don't want any meddling.[snip]
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/bloggers/2472183/posts?page=14#14
A curfew is required from 10:00 pm to 0500 AM, army to patrol the streets, shoot on sight anyone outside....
“A curfew is required from 10:00 pm to 0500 AM, army to patrol the streets, shoot on sight anyone outside....”
Problem is, most of their army is in the control of the cartels.
Intimidation is what they do better than anything else.
It's the foundation of their culture. Only a Beeg Man can push everyone else around. If he can, then he's El Jefe.
And so the whole world is watching....will Uncle Sammy (oops, I mean Uncle Bammy these days) back down? Will he turn tail and run?
'Cuz if he does, that means he's weak.
And in Mexico, if you're weak, you're dead.
A bit more:
Juárez killings bring chaos closer to home
[snips]
“There are leads to follow up on this side, witnesses to be interviewed,” said Andrea Simmons, spokeswoman for the FBI in El Paso, across from Juárez. “We are going through intelligence now.”
Both President Barack Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderón condemned the apparently coordinated attacks, as did Gov. Rick Perry and border congressmen.
Perry blamed the federal government for failing to secure the border and renewed his recent call to deploy military drones for border surveillance.
“My theory at this point is it was a reaction by the narcos to announcements of greater involvement of Americans in the drug war,” said Gustavo de la Rosa, a Chihuahua state human rights official who was forced to flee from there because of death threats.
The killings came three weeks after news reports described how U.S. drug agents were going to become more closely involved in Mexico’s war against the drug cartels.
Mexican authorities said Monday that the Azteca gang, which is affiliated with the Juárez Cartel, might have had a hand in the killings.
*******Azteca members are known to have gone into Mexico to murder, kidnap or commit other crimes for the cartel, then dash back to the U.S. to hide from Mexico’s military, according to U.S. authorities.*******
They’ve been hired in Mexico as the cartel has grown desperate for manpower as it battles to hold its place along a crucial corridor for trafficking drugs into the U.S.
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/mexico/87737227.html
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