Promote Justice for Mexico and the Borderlands

Migrants in our region are experiencing a human rights crisis, particularly those who journey northward through Mexico en route to the United States.  Just this past August, 72 migrants from Central and South America were found massacred in northern Mexico. Far from an isolated occurrence, this incident is a terrifying example of the experiences that countless migrants suffer on a daily basis. 

Click here to read the letter that LAWG and concerned faith, labor and human rights groups sent to President Obama urging him to demonstrate leadership at home to promote and protect the migrants’ human and civil rights, as well as work with counterparts in Mexico to ensure that migrants receive the basic rights inherently afforded to all humanity. 

Mounting pressure from rights groups in Mexico and the Obama Administration, and a ticking clock on an order by the Inter-American Court, spurred President Calderón to unveil his long-anticipated proposal to reform Mexico’s military justice code. But while reform is desperately needed to end the historic impunity for members of the Mexican military that have committed human rights abuses, Mexican and international human rights groups agree that President Calderón’s proposal doesn’t do nearly enough.

You probably heard the news this past August: 72 Central and South American migrants were brutally massacred after resisting their kidnappers’ extortion attempts and demands to work for them as drug smugglers–teens and a pregnant woman among the dead. It was the worst mass-killing in Mexico since Calderón launched his “War on Drugs.”

It isn’t news that journalists around the world risk their safety and security everyday to cover the stories that keep us informed and hold the powers that be accountable, but many people are surprised to learn that neighboring Mexico is an increasingly hostile environment for reporters. Press freedom watchdog International Press Institute (IPI) recently ranked Mexico as the most dangerous country for journalists and media personnel in the world so far this year.

They did it again. Despite the fact that not a single soldier responsible for human rights violations has been held accountable by civilian authorities in the years since the onset of the Merida Initiative, the State Department released its second report on September 2nd  affirming that the Mexican government has met the Merida Initiative’s human rights requirements. This report not only recommends the release of roughly $36 million in Merida funds that had been previously withheld from the 2009 and 2010 budgets, but also sends the wrong message to Mexico on human rights.

Persistence, local organizing, effective advocacy and international pressure have ultimately won out in bringing justice to Raúl Hernández Abundio, an indigenous rights defender from Guerrero, Mexico who was targeted by authorities and unjustly imprisoned. Since we wrote about his case in July, international and local human rights groups have been working tirelessly to clear his name of the murder charges for his exposure of abuses committed by soldiers and local authorities.

Across the nation, SB 1070 has arguably become one of the most notorious bill numbers in recent history (certainly among state legislation). Mere mention of this bill number has become synonymous with threats of racial profiling, counterproductive “attrition through enforcement” approaches, and criminalization of “driving while Latino” – a sad political commentary for a SW border state with strong historic, cultural and economic ties to neighboring Mexico.

Run, don’t walk, to your computer to check out Presumed Guilty (Presunto Culpable in Spanish), an incredibly powerful and insightful documentary on the injustices in Mexico’s criminal justice system.  You can see the film in its entirety on the PBS/Point of View website through August 4th.  To watch it online, click here.

In their work to promote and defend indigenous peoples’ rights in the Costa Chica region of Mexico, a highly militarized zone in the state of Guerrero, members of the Me’phaa Indigenous People’s Organization (OPIM) and their partner organizations have had to overcome repeated harassment, threats, and even murders of leading members. Now add imprisonments and baseless prosecutions by the government to that list.

In April 2008, Raúl Hernández and four fellow OPIM members were arbitrarily arrested and charged with the murder of a suspected army informant—a murder which Mr. Hernández did not commit. The other four human rights defenders were released due to lack of evidence.  But even though the only witness that directly identified Mr. Hernández as having taken part in the murder was found to have lied, he has remained in prison for over two years.  

Just days ago, Sergio Adrián Hernandez Güereca, a 15-year-old from Ciudad Juárez, was shot and killed by a Border Patrol agent on the banks of the Rio Grande, not far from downtown El Paso.   The fatal shooting of this teen came on the heels of the death of Anastasio Hernandez Rojas, a longtime San Diego area resident and father of five U.S.-born children, who died from injuries suffered when Border Patrol and other federal officers responded with a baton and taser gun when he resisted deportation. His death has been ruled a homicide by the San Diego coroner’s office.  LAWG extends our condolences to both families.