lo-de-alla.org

Four journalist killed in the state in the week preceding UN Press Freedom Day

[Translation of an article from La Jornada of Mexico City for May 4. See original here.]

by Luz María Rivera

Boca del Río, Veracruz, May 3 – The lifeless bodies of photojournalists Gabriel Huge, Guillermo Luna Varela and Esteban Rodríguez Rodríguez were discovered on Friday morning in the La Zamorana channel, which belongs to the Las Vegas II housing development north of this city, together with that of Irasema Becerra, a secretary at another newspaper and the girlfriend of one of the men. All the bodies had been dismembered and showed signs of torture. (more…)

[Translation of an article from Diario Tiempo of San Pedro Sula, Honduras, for October 17, from an Agence France Presse dispatch. See original article here and related articles here, here and here.]

Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Mexico – A proposal to create a document granting safe-conduct to Central Americans who enter Mexico on their way to the United States was offered by the governor of the Mexican state of Chiapas during a ministerial meeting of the Grupo de Tuxtla, made up of representatives of ten countries.

“We respectfully offer a proposal to create biometric identification, passports, official identification cards or some kind of document for entering our country and thus to combat the most despicable of businesses, which is the trafficking and dealing in persons,” said Juan Sabines, governor of the state of Chiapas, the capital of which is the site of the meeting, being held in preparation for a presidential summit planned for November. (more…)

Poet Sicilia demands resignation of public security minister

[Translation of an article from La Jornada of Mexico City for May 8. See original here.]

By Alonso Urrutia

Mexico City – The March for Peace with Justice and Dignity ended in the Zócalo in the capital city with a call for a national agreement to, among other things: put an end to Felipe Calderón’s military strategy against organized crime; to do away with impunity in the justice system by means of a thorough reform in the administration of justice; to clarify the cases that have most troubled society; to fight against the institutional corruption fostered by the violence the country is faced with. (more…)

Academics point out enormous disparity in costs to Mexico and US

[Translation of an article from La Jornada of Mexico City for January 26. See original here.]

By Emir Olivares, Andrea Becerril and Ciro Pérez Silva

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s visit to Mexico evoked several different readings among academics and politicians. For the former, it represents a demand by Washington that the federal government not change its strategy against organized crime; senators of the PRI (Partido Revolucionario Institucional), the PRD (Partido de la Revolución Democrática) and the PT (Partido del Trabajo), meanwhile, consider that the purpose was “damage control” in bilateral relations after Wikileaks revelations in which United States diplomats were critical of the army and government authorities.

Academics and politicians agreed that there are enormous disparities in the countries’ struggle against organized crime: while Mexico has spent more than seven billion dollars during the Calderón administration and has seen more than 35,000 deaths, in addition to the 55,000 military personnel occupied in the struggle, in some places in the United States there are efforts to legalize the use of drugs and the businesses of arms and drug dealing are reporting enormour profits. (more…)

“People will keep going to the US despite massacres”

[Translation of an article from El País of Madrid, Spain, for September 12. See original article here.]

by Pablo Ordaz

Fifty-year-old Mauricio Funes speaks without holding back. He assails equally the Right that ruled his country for two decades and the radical Left that raised him to the presidency of El Salvador a year ago. Despite the fact that his country continues to be mired in the deepest poverty and inequality, 74 percent of Salvadorans still trust him. This interview was conducted Friday in Mexico City, where he had gone to secure from President Felipe Calderón a commitment to fight together against organized crime.

——————————————————————————————————

Question: After the killings in Tamaulipas, in which 13 of the 72 murdered immigrants were Salvadoran, you sent a letter to the president of Mexico, Felipe Calderón. What did you say? (more…)

Government report says 3,365 killed between January and March alone

[Translation of an article from El Universal of Mexico City for April 14, based on a dispatch from the Spanish news agency Efe.]

According to official figures, violence linked to organized crime and drug trafficking has left more than 22,700 dead since December, 2006, when President Felipe Calderón launched an offensive against drug cartels.

In a confidential report to legislators, the Calderón government states that between January and March of 2010 alone 3,365 killings have been reported, that 2009 was the most violent year, with 9,635 deaths, and that the state of Chihuahua is the most heavily affected. (more…)