In both the United States and Canada there have been sustained grassroots efforts to spotlight the unjust mass incarceration and criminalization of poor people, and especially poor people of color, for drug-related arrests. But there has been too little analysis about the reasons behind and mechanisms of this war, and its economic impact on Mexico and beyond.
The new book “The Drug War in Mexico: Politics, Violence and Neo-Liberalism in the New Narco-Economy,” looks beyond the clichés to examine the causes of the violence associated with illegal drugs trafficking in Mexico. The Latin America Bureau talked to one of its authors, Peter Watt.
Original reporting on organized crime and the drug war is dangerous and sometimes deadly in Mexico. The Mexican magazine Contralínea reports that 93 journalists have been assassinated and 16 disappeared since 2000. The U.S. and Mexican police, army and government have become the principle sources of information for what is taking place in increasingly violent areas throughout Mexico. […]
In May, Televisa, the biggest communication company in the Spanish-speaking world, appeared to present student protests against PRI Party candidate Enrique Peña Nieto as populated by fake students. In response, students from the Ibero released a video showing their university ID cards. “There were 131 students,” says mathematics student Diana Ponce. “Those who support them are known as the 132.” The movement has swelled in numbers uniting students from both private and public universities.
Following the very successful first “week of worldwide struggle for the freedom of the political prisoners Alberto Patishtán Gomez and Francisco Sántiz López” which took place from the May 15-22, 2012, a second week is now being organised from June 8-15. Although there can be no doubt about the innocence of the two indigenous prisoners, they have not yet been released, and concerns for their physical and mental health are growing.
The War on Drugs is becoming another “Dirty War” in Mexico, with the tactic of enforced disappearances reappearing as a commonplace occurrence in the country. “The refusal of the authorities to recognize the true dimensions of this phenomenon and the involvement of public officials in these crimes – whether by commission, omission, or collusion with organized crime groups – has enabled this crime to spread to many parts of the country,” stated Amnesty International.
The mood was festive as groups of students, grass root organizations and individuals gathered in the city’s main square. With chants of “Not even one vote for the PRI” and “Out Peña” the crowd started moving. They sung as they moved forward, many wearing black t-shirts with anti PRI slogans. There were cheers and clapping as those standing on the sidewalk showered their support. “Join us, join us,” the marchers chanted.
In the last century and a half since the Decreto sobre Extranjería, in both the United States and Mexico, migrants have been wanted, put to work, granted amnesty, hated, oppressed, expulsed, and just about everything in between. The only thing that has remained constant has been the migrants. They keep moving. And the trend, on behalf of both the U.S. and Mexican governments, has been to pass legislation, including those laws that purport to protect, that makes migrants vulnerable.
Over 300 people from ten states in Mexico marched through the capital on Mother’s Day demanding an end to forced disappearances and calling on authorities to find their loved ones. With them marched brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles and grandparents. All of them asking the same question; where are they? Their question is met with silence from the government.
Intense activity is currently taking place on a global scale to demand the release of two indigenous men who have been jailed for their political beliefs and activism, and who have become emblematic figures for the struggle against injustice in prisons and against political repression. Although the prisoners are based in Chiapas, Mexico, activities are taking place in countries including South Africa, Brazil, France, England, Scotland, Spain, the United States, Switzerland, New Zealand and Argentina.
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