US-MEXICO: Rights Group Urges Review of Aid in Light of Abuses

• by Marina Litvinsky (washington)
• Monday, July 13, 2009
• Inter Press Service

The letter expresses concern over the rapidly growing number of serious abuses committed by the Mexican military during counternarcotics and public security operations, including rapes, killings, torture, and arbitrary detentions, and the failure to bring those responsible to justice.

The Mérida Initiative is a 1.4-billion-dollar, multi-year regional aid package to help address the increasing violence and corruption of heavily armed drug cartels that President George W. Bush requested in June 2007.

The U.S. Congress mandated that 15 percent of funds to be provided to Mexico should be withheld until the secretary of state reports to Congress that the Mexican government has met four human rights conditions. They include the requirement that military abuses be investigated and prosecuted by civilian rather than military authorities.

'The Merida Initiative provides the Obama administration with an important opportunity to strengthen U.S.-Mexican drug enforcement and human rights cooperation,' Kenneth Roth, executive director of HRW, said in the letter. 'To capitalize on this opportunity, however, the Obama administration should vigorously enforce the human rights requirements included in the aid package.'

Since the 1970s, the U.S. has collaborated with Mexican authorities and provided assistance to Mexico to combat transnational crimes associated with drug trafficking. With support from the U.S., President Felipe Calderón has deployed nearly 45,000 troops in parts of Mexico and along the border in the last three years.

Mexican drug cartels handle 90 percent of all cocaine that enters the U.S. and, as was revealed in a June U.S. Government Accountability Office report (GAO), obtain many of their firearms from the U.S.

While the violence in some parts of the country has subsided since the military took over public security, complaints of human rights abuses have increased.

HRW's April report, 'Uniform Impunity: Mexico's Misuse of Military Justice to Prosecute Abuses in Counternarcotics and Public Security Operations', showed that Mexican soldiers engaged in counternarcotics and public security operations routinely commit egregious human rights abuses, including rapes, killings, torture, and arbitrary detentions-and that impunity for these abuses is the norm.

The number of complaints of human rights abuses committed by the Mexican military has increased six-fold in the time since the troops' deployment. The number of complaints filed before the National Human Rights Commission was 182 in 2006, 367 in 2007, and 1230 in 2008.

The commission has documented 26 cases of abuse, 17 of which involved torture, including asphyxiation and the application of electric shocks to the genitals of drug suspects, according to the report.

'What happens is the army takes [suspects] back to their bases - and of course a military base is not a place to detain people suspected of a crime - and they begin to ask questions,' Mauricio Ibarra, who oversees investigations for the commission, told the Washington Post. 'And to help them remember or to get information, they use torture.'

In the past 10 years, Mexican military courts - which routinely take over the investigation of military abuses against civilians - have not convicted a single member of the military accused of committing a serious human rights violation.

According to HRW, there are several basic flaws within the military justice system which have led to this: the secretary of defence wields both executive and judicial power over the armed forces; military judges have little job security and may reasonably fear that they will be removed if they make decisions that the secretary dislikes; and there is virtually no public scrutiny of military investigations and trials.

'The need to improve public security in Mexico is clear,' said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at HRW. 'But, to be effective, any strategy to address security must also deal with the rampant impunity for military abuses committed during public security operations.'

According to the Washington Post, Mexican officials acknowledged that abuses have occurred in the fight against traffickers but described the cases as isolated. In some instances, drug traffickers may be accusing the army of human rights violations as propaganda and to deflect attention from the government's efforts to dismantle their operations, the officials said.

'I know that the armed forces are not acting inappropriately, although there have been some cases,' Interior Minister Fernando Gómez Mont, who is responsible for coordinating security operations across Mexico told the paper. 'The government honestly believes that. There is no incentive for abuse.'

Maureen Meyer, the Associate for Mexico and Central America at the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA), said the increase in reported abuses by the Mexican military is an example 'of the risk involved of having continued presence of the Mexican army in drug operations.'

She added that this is a long-term trend of militarisation, with the U.S. promoting the use of the military, instead of supporting more structural improvements to the Mexican police.

U.S. officials told the Washington Post that Calderón has initiated reforms that they think ultimately will increase respect for human rights among soldiers and police.

The State Department's Mérida human rights report will be delivered to Congress within weeks, according to a U.S. official involved in the process, reported the Washington Post. The official described Mexico's human rights record as 'a mixed bag' and said it remains unclear whether the report will be enough to satisfy the conditions to release the money.

'It is very hard for the U.S. government to honestly say that steps are being taken' by the Mexican government to investigate abuses, as there have been 'no cases where you can point to someone in the army actually being sentenced,' said Meyer.

HRW recommended that Clinton issue a written report certifying Mexico's compliance with the Merida Initiative's human rights requirements only if and when she can determine that Mexico has effectively reformed its military justice system to ensure that alleged serious human rights abuses will by law be tried before civilian authorities, and are in fact being investigated and prosecuted by civilian authorities.

© Inter Press Service (2009) — All Rights ReservedOriginal source: Inter Press Service