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| Caribbean-Latin America |
| Mexican Supreme Court May Have Ended the Drug War: Part I |
| 2011-07-19 |
| To see a map, click here. To read Rantburg reports on Wednesday's ruling on Mexican Army jurisdiction in human rights cases, click here, here, here and here. This is big. Mexico is in all but a civil war pitting the narco-terrorists against the government. Both sides get nasty in a civil war. The Mexican Supreme Court, in engaging in lawfare (and in being cute in trying to walk it back) is trying to disarm the government and military. We can see how this will end if left unchallenged. The question: which justices on the Mexican Supreme Court could be 'influenced' by the narco-gangs? By Chris Covert As the first of the effects of last Tuesday's Mexican Supreme Court decision are felt throughout Mexico, the Mexican military establishment is warning that its troops may be forced back into the barracks unless clear rules are established for its deployment against organized crime. The July 12th decision that human rights cases involving soldiers and marines must be tried in civilian courts, not military has prompted some senior military to publicly voice their concerns about the applicability of the new law. Last Thursday, the president of the Supreme Court, Juan Silva Meza, said that the new law is not mandatory, but merely present guidelines for courts at all levels to deal with human rights complaints involving the military. It is becoming clear the military community is not buying into Silva Meza's contention that soldiers and sailors will be not dragged into court over potentially hundreds of unfiled, dismissed and new court cases dating as far back as the late 1960s, and have hinted that newly deployed troops in places such as Piedra Negras, Coahuila, Chihuahua state and Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, may be returned to the barracks. The newly deployed troops represent a considerable payout mandated by the Chamber of Deputies which expanded the Mexican Army by 18 rifle battalions to deal with the organized crime problem, mainly in the area of drug trafficking. To read the Rantburg report on the newly formed rifle units, click here According to an article published in Monday'sMilenio, senior military officials within the army and navy have been dispatched to the Mexican senate to lobby for new changes in the new national security law which currently languishes in the legislative process. Part of the reason the law has not been passed was the temper tantrum thrown by the Mexican and international left this past spring which included two peace marches and two well-timed reports on human rights in Mexico by both the US State Department and Human Rights Watch. For example, in an article published on the leftist weekly Proceso Sunday claimed that the new national security law was a done deal save for the activities of Javier Sicilia and his allies in the Mexican independent and international left. Throughout the past spring Sicilia publicly and loudly railed against the national security law, calling for the army to be returned to the barracks and, absurdly, for citizens to sign a pact on non-violence. It is unknown as of the date of this article if any of the leaders of the main drug cartels have been signatories to the pact on non-violence. To read a summary of the activities of Javier Sicilia, click here It should be noted the the drug cartels and Mexican organized crime are responsible for as many as 90 percent of the murders in Mexico since 2006. The new national security law has been in the process since last fall. One of the central changes proposed for the law has to do with Article 57 of the Code of Military Justice. President Felipe Calderon Hinojosa wanted to split three types of crimes committed by military personnel from being under Article 57: rape, torture and disappearances, and place them firmly within the purview of civil courts. Forced disappearances such as the one involving the case that brought the new decision, Radilla Pacheco, are the main issue with human rights cases in Mexico before 2006. Most if not all of those involve the Dirty War between 1968 nd 1982, in which as many as 1,200 individuals during that tie disappeared while under military custody. In such cases brought before civilian cases, the usually response for judges has been to refer the plaintiff to the military agency, which effectively dismissed the case. That was then. According to another article in Monday's Milenion, since 2005, a human rights department has been in place in all three military agencies, army, air forces and marines, to deal with human rights cases; investigation and recommendation for prosecution or dismissal. Since 1933, when oral trials becamee de rigueur in Mexican jurisprudence, they have also become a feature of military jurisprudence since 2005 as well. As the author of the article, Javier Oliva Posada, pointed out, all proceedings concerning military personnel and human rights are now open forums in which anyone can walk in and give testimony, or simply witness military justice system in action. Oliva Posada is a professor of Political and Social Sciences of Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico in Distrito Federal. Under such an open forum,it is hard to cover for military personnel. The Mexican left calls it impunity when covering for an errant soldier or sailor takes place, when cases are dismissed. But proof of those charges are the extreme exception in less than two percent of all cases the military deals with, according to statistics provided by the Mexican Army's Direccion General de Derechos Humanos (Human rights Directorate). Charges of impunity by he left simply have no basis of fact and are politically motivated. Said Posada: "In London, the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) classifies Mexico as a country experiencing an armed conflict not of rebellion, that is, an armed confrontation that has no political arguments or program no longer claimed by either party, but has a very high dose of violence. In this context, human rights can be used as a ploy to seek to contain the actions of the Mexican military with the possibility of being involved in a lengthy and complex litigation." Oliva Posada also pointed out that since 2005, just over 250 military personnel have been charged, and convicted of violating civilian human rights in some way. |
| Posted by:badanov |
