tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-80586110922239844482024-03-08T13:48:13.644-06:00Americas MexicoBlogThe MexicoBlog of the Americas Program, a fiscally sponsored program of the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR), is written by Laura Carlsen. I monitor and analyze international press on Mexico, with a focus on security, immigration, human rights and social movements for peace and justice, from a feminist perspective. And sometimes I simply muse.Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.comBlogger5776125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-71095077130735368772021-10-03T13:14:00.000-05:002021-10-03T13:14:04.147-05:00From women's rights to women's liberation <p><i> Note: For some time, we have noted the dangers of a narrow human rights focus in viewing emancipation struggles of women in our countries and coined the term "rights-washing" to warn against the attempted cooptation of women's movements. This article seeks to deepen that debate.<br /></i></p><div class="metadata"><i>
</i><h4>By Colectivo Desde el Margen</h4><div class="dePhmb"><div class="eyKpYb" data-language="en" data-original-language="es" data-result-index="0"><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span>In Latin America there are more women killed by femicide than in Afghanistan1. This statement scares us, but it allows us to think of femicide as a political, state and corporate act that threatens the life of our bodies, our peoples and our territories; that are occupied by the great empires, transnational companies, local governments and NGOs. </span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span> </span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span>Currently, we are experiencing a broad media campaign that portrays Afghan women as passive victims of the horror of the Taliban, in a society that is horrified by the photographs of women wearing burqas, and countless foundations that advocate for the formation of a democratic and secular government, where Afghan women enjoy the same rights as women in Western countries. </span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span> </span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span>This social panorama reduces all the struggles of the women of the Middle East to the implantation of a modern state and the accumulation of rights.
From Abya Yala we question the idea that the struggle of women is limited to the dispute for rights within a patriarchal state. During our republican history we have experienced the promise of liberation through western citizenship, which offers us the full enjoyment of rights and equal opportunities. However, to this day, in most of the countries that make up our region, women do not have choice and control over our bodies, because abortion is criminalized; even in circumstances of sexual violence. </span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span> </span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span>We propose a critique of institutional feminism that falls into the state trap of rights. This framework restricts the fight for women's liberation, because it is satisfied with small constitutional and judicial crumbs that the governments promise. We firmly believe in the need to debate in the streets about our rights, however, we know that this cannot be the main objective of the agenda of the women's movement. </span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span> </span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span>For this reason, we propose the need to build an anti-patriarchal project in which no empire, government, company or individual can violate our lives and our territories. This project is nourished by the permanent dialogue between the local struggles of different territories.
From this anti-patriarchal project, arises the criticism of NGOs and other foundations dedicated to capturing Afghan women's figures and exposing them in international forums and conversations, turning them into simple passive objects in the midst of a dispute over Western ideas. Many of these organizations limit themselves to developing humanitarian assistance projects and pro-rights campaigns, without even listening to the realities and demands of the women in question. Furthermore, the paternalistic orientation of these organizations seeks to annul women's struggles politically, weaken us and make us doubt our political and revolutionary capacity.</span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span> </span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span>We canot ally ourselves with Western and racist interpretations of what is happening in Afghanistan. The international press and analysts are scandalized byAfghan women's inability to access education; the next day, the Taliban announce that women will be able to study, as a strategy to achieve international approval. This is just a sample of how the pieces are played on the chessboard of power, where the nation-state manages the lives of women according to their interests. </span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span> </span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span>In our country, where women have had the right to study for more than 100 years, the classrooms of public schools and colleges continue to be overcrowded spaces of indoctrination, instead of spaces for play, reflection, dialogue and collective liberation. For these reasons, the Taliban's decision to restore women's right to education should not be cause for celebration, as it is only a move to maintain international alliances. </span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div class="J0lOec"><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span><span class="VIiyi" lang="en"><span class="JLqJ4b" data-language-for-alternatives="en" data-language-to-translate-into="es" data-phrase-index="0"><span> </span></span></span></span></span></span></div></div></div></div><p><a href="https://desinformemonos.org/del-uso-de-los-derechos-de-las-mujeres-a-la-liberacion-de-las-mujeres/#sdfootnote1anc">1</a> https://www.milenio.com/politica/afganistan-cifra-mujeres-asesinadas-compara-mexico</p><p><i>Publicado originalmente en Desinformémonos. 6 septiembre 2021. <a href="https://desinformemonos.org/del-uso-de-los-derechos-de-las-mujeres-a-la-liberacion-de-las-mujeres/">https://desinformemonos.org/del-uso-de-los-derechos-de-las-mujeres-a-la-liberacion-de-las-mujeres/ </a></i><span class="comments"></span> </p>Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-30295494805893031262020-07-11T18:34:00.003-05:002020-07-11T18:35:51.880-05:00AMLO-Trump, An Ugly Alliance Against People's Movements<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
When Andrés Manuel López Obrador said he was making his first diplomatic trip abroad to thank Donald Trump for being a good friend to Mexico, at first I didn't believe it would really happen, mainly because I couldn't want to conceive of such an enormous betrayal of principles and coherency.<br />
<br />
Why on earth would a left-leaning leader of the nation that has experienced the worst of Trump's white supremacist attacks decide to travel to Washington in the middle of a pandemic to pat him on the back? And mostly, four months before elections, why would he set himself up to be a ploy in Trump re-election campaign? Couldn't he stay home like he has for the past year and a half? After all, his country is roiled by a deadly disease and unnecessary travel over the border is banned (for the poor--if you can pay for a plane ticket, you can come and go as you like).<br />
<br />
Trump doesn't do anything these days that isn't directly related to his bid for reelection, which is clearly flailing. He needs to woo the Latinx vote--a tough crowd given the reign of terror he has unleashed on them and their families since taking office.<br />
<br />
Shortly after Trump's inauguration, we spent more than a month traveling the border with <a href="https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/04/14/fighting-fear-hundreds-join-border-caravan-for-migrant-rights/">The Caravan Against Fear</a>, organized by the SEIU, Global Exchange and others, to register the reaction of mostly Mexican-American border communities. We talked to Dreamers who had built careers and futures and were terrified that they would lose it all, to families who no longer went to the neighborhood park for fear of raids, to mothers who couldn't drive their kids to school anymore because the short drive could result in a one-way ticket to Mexico, to people whose towns were occupied by the border patrol, to common citizens who spent their weekends searching for bones or dying migrants in the desert.<br />
<br />
Things didn't get any better after that. Although deportations didn't soar immediately, the fear continued. One after another, a hail of executive orders, rule changes and obsolete laws came down, steadily constructing Stephen Miller's vision of a white America and cutting away at migrants' already limited rights, pushing them into self-deportation, detention or forced removal. Families that harbored dreams of living together in safety were shattered and the open racism of the "thieves and rapists" and "bad hombres" comments led to a spike in hate crimes against people of Mexican and other Latino origins. Racial profiling went from bad to worse.<br />
<br />
In Mexico, what happened stunned many of us who work in migrant rights. Lopez Obrador, the defender of Mexican sovereignty, bowed to Trump's every whim and Trump's whim was overtly anti-immigrant. Instead of rallying the international community to support Mexico when Trump used <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2019/06/07/mexico-tariffs-wont-reduce-immigration-might-help-trump-2020-column/1367725001/?fbclid=IwAR0aeVG70y2aOvNLxnlWszRTiDTrrh_daCOQ3gdI1jWcXv4zQ-Npyvv88jg">trade as a billy club </a>to get Mexico to block migrants and refugees traveling north, AMLO sent his foreign minister to negotiate around it. What he negotiated, or rather accepted, was a program that is unprecedented in a sovereign nation--to warehouse third-country asylum seekers awaiting hearings in the United States. After first hiding it, Trump literally waved the agreement to the press bragging 'Look what I got out of Mexico!'<br />
<br />
So this Washington meeting is, as a broad group of Mexican immigrant organizatons put it on <a href="https://www.americas.org/es/sr-presidente-quedese-en-casa/">a letter </a>also signed by teh Americas Program "a slap in the face to Mexican families in the U.S. who have sufferd 4 years of constant attacks from Trump's anti-immigrant administration."<br />
<br />
Going back to the Washington meeting... Amarela Varela, immigration export and arights activist, expressed what many of us on both sides of the border were feeling. Here's the translation: <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
[López Obrador] thanked him for the "respectful treatment of Mexico. Was he referring to the ICE detention of mothers and fathers of families with mixed immigration status outside their children's schools, the families who are torn apart? Or the 6,000 children in cages in teh 21st Century and separated from their families, forced to "declare" in courts alone? Or the squads of nativists who assassinate migrants in the desert? ...He said that the U.S. hasn't imposed anything on Mexico--does that mean that the 4T decided for itself to sign and put into practice the Remain in Mexico or MPP program that has left 65,000 asylum seekers surviving, exposed to the elements, on Mexico's northern border?</blockquote>
Over the past week, I've given reasons for why this meeting should never have happened:<br />
<br />
1) It wasn't necessary--the USMCA was already signed, ratified and in force and needed no ceremony, signing or statements. The ony purpose was to give Trump a stage to say he kept a campaign promise (to renegotiate NAFTA) and for Lopez Obrador to use the agreement to attract foreign companies, most of whom are already in Mexico because we have had essentially the same agreement for the past 26 years.<br />
<br />
2) It insults and endangers the 36 million Mexicans and their families who live in the United States. Although small groups came out to welcome AMLO, all the statements from major migrant organizations opposed the visit. Strengthening Trump, especially in the context of re-election, endangers their lives, their livelihoods and their famlies.<br />
<br />
3) It would be a direct endorsement of Trump's candidacy and a boon to his campaign. This was obvious. So obvious, that here in Mexico rumors that the AMLO government would actually prefer another Trump administration are rampant.<br />
<br />
4) The least said by an "anti-neoliberal" president about the USMCA, the better. One could understand it being seen as a necessary evil after two decades, but the over-the-top acclaim was cringeworthy among anyone who is committed to national sovereignty, fair trade and social justice. A <a href="https://www.bu.edu/gdp/2020/07/09/gdp-center-launches-new-report-on-trade-treaties-and-fiscal-stability-in-the-covid-19-era/">new study</a> from the Global Development Policy Center found that free trade treaties including the USMCA actually inhibit the ability of developing countries to respond to the crisis.<br />
<br />
5) A major increase in foreign investment is a non-starter as the central strategy to respond to the crisis. For one, it is unlikely to work, and more importantly, the ansolute reliance on export-oriented foreign investment is a major cause of Mexico's social and environmental crises today.<br />
<br />
6) It ignores the largest movement in the history of the United States, the Black Lives Matter movement for racial justice and equality. AMLO set aside his discourse on transformation and purposely fortified Trump who has repeaetedly attacked the movement and stands for everything this movement is against.<br />
<br />
If any readers can find anything new about these promises that we didn't hear in 1994 with the first NAFTA, please tell me in the comments section below. Here is the statement: <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/joint-declaration-united-states-mexico/">https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/joint-declaration-united-states-mexico/ </a><br />
<br />
Same with the speeches. Many defenders of the AMLO-Trump show have called the Mexican President's speech an historic occasion of the defense of national sovereignty. I have read it over and over and I have no idea what they are talking about. Readers can read it here to weigh in: <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-president-lopez-obrador-united-mexican-states-signing-joint-declaration/">https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-president-lopez-obrador-united-mexican-states-signing-joint-declaration/</a><br />
<br />
<b>LA NETA: </b>All that is important, but not the most important.<br />
<br />
The betrayal, the unfathomable part of it, is that Donald Trump is heinous. He not only has initiated open season on migrants in the United States and, with the full cooperation of Lopez Obrador, in Mexico, he also is a buffon who lies, cheats, bullies, denigrates and abuses women and leads the effort to roll back our rights, responds to demands for racial justice with repression and is confronting the largest and one of the most radical and hopeful movements in US history with hate. Days before the meeting, he tweeted a "White Power" video (and then removed it), and just two days before, on July 6, issued an order to revoke student visas for students attending schools where in-person classes have been suspended to protect lives during the pandemic.<br />
<br />
On the world stage, he has withdrawn the wealthiest nation in the world from the World Health Organization when more than half a million people have been killed by COVID-19 and his own country has more fatalities than any other in the world, He also withdrew from the climate change accords as the planet faces the real possibility of not being able to sustain the lives of our great-grandchildren.<br />
<br />
For Lopez Obrador to go out of his way to praise this man as a statesman in the middle of a re-election campaign is not even political pragmatism--it's simply immoral.<br />
<b></b><br />
<br />
<b>Success or failure? </b>The debate rages on. Time will tell, just as we discovered decades later that the pundits who predicted the success of NAFTA were wrong when they promised the agreement would reduce migration, close the wage gap, create more equal economies, cut poverty, develop Mexico and raise the standard of living for the majority. None of that happened.<br />
<br />
What's disturbing is that the AMLO administration, and especially Ebrard, seem to be banking on and actively apromoting what for most of the world is the worst-case scenario: another four years of Donald Trump.<br />
<br />
<b>FUTURE CHECKLIST:</b> Here's the list of claims by the presidents for the USMCA so we can go back in a few years to assess whether the trip benefited Mexico and if the ugly alliance was worth it:<br />
<br />
<b>Trump's claims:</b><br />
* "will bring countless jobs from overseas, back to North America, and our countries will be very big beneficiaries." AMLO reiterated this claim.<br />
* "will bring enormous prosperity to both American and Mexican workers and Canada" <br />
<b>AMLO's claims:</b><br />
* "reverse North American trade deficit with the rest of the world<br />
* "volumes of our country’s imports [to] the rest of the world may be
produced in North America at a lower transportation cost with reliable
suppliers" <br />
* attract investments from other places of the hemisphere, bringing those investments to our countries" <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br /></div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-39568514422876905082019-05-31T11:04:00.001-05:002019-05-31T11:04:43.899-05:00AMLO's letter to Donald Trump: "I am not a coward, I act on principles"<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Here is our translation of the letter sent by Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador to US President Donald Trump. While we have criticized the Mexican government's immigration policies and actions in recent months-- and will no doubt continue to do so-- this letter represents a welcome turning point in what has been a disappointingly conciliatory attitude on the part of the AMLO administration toward Trump's most aggregious anti-immigrant and anti-Mexico positions.<br />
<br />
Look for the full analysis on www.americas.org <br />
<br />
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">President Donald Trump,</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I am aware of your latest position related to
Mexico.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First, I want to express to you
that I do not want confrontation. The people and the nations that we represent
deserve that, when faced with any conflict in relations, however serious, we
rely on dialogue and act with prudence and responsibility.</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The best president of Mexico, Benito Juárez,
maintained excellent relations with the <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Republican
hero, Abraham Lincoln. Later, at the time of the oil expropriation, the Democratic
president, Franklin D. Roosevelt, understood the profound reasons that led the patriot
president Lazaro Cárdenas to act in favor of our sovereignty. By the way, President
Roosevelt was a titan of liberties. Before anyone else, he proclaimed the four
fundamental rights of man (sic): the right to freedom of speech, the right to
freedom to worship in one’s own way, the right to freedom from fear, and the
right to freedom from want.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">This is the basis of our policy on immigration.
Human beings do not abandon their homes because they want to, but rather out of
necessity. This is why from the beginning of my government, I proposed to
choose cooperation for development and aid to the Central American countries,
with productive investments to create jobs and resolve the root causes in this unfortunate
matter. </span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">You know that we are complying with our
responsibility to avoid, to the degree possible and without violating human
rights, transit through our county. It is pertinent to recall that, in a short
time, Mexicans will no longer need to turn to the United States and that
migration will be optional, not forced. This is because we are fighting corruption--the
main problem in Mexico-- as never before. And in this way, our country will
become a great power with a social dimension. Our countrymen and women will be
able to work and be happy where they were born, where their family, customs and
culture are. </span></i></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">President Trump: social problems are not solved
with taxes or coercive measures. How can it be that the country of brotherhood
for migrants of the world be converted, from one day to the next, into a
ghetto, an enclosed space that stigmatizes, mistreats, persecutes, expels and cancels
out the right to justice of those who seek, through their effort and work, to
live free of want? The statue of liberty is not an empty symbol.</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">With all respect, although you have the
sovereign right to express it, the slogan “America First”· is a fallacy because
until the end of time, even above national borders, universal justice and
fraternity will prevail.</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Specifically, Mr. President: I propose to you
that we deepen dialogue, search for alternatives that go to the root of the
migration problem, and please, remember that I do not lack courage, that I am
not a coward nor timid, but that I act on principles: I believe that politics,
among other things, was invented to avoid confrontation. I do not believe in
the Law of Talion, with its “tooth for a tooth” and “eye for an eye” because,
if that is where we take this, all of us will be toothless and blind. I believe
that statesmen and even more, nations’ leaders, are obliged to seek peaceful
solutions to controversies and to put them into practice, for example, the
beautiful idea of non-violence. </span></i></div>
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<br /></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Lastly, I propose that you instruct your
officials, if you find it appropriate, to sit down with the representatives of
our government, headed by Mexico’s Secretary of Foreign Relations who will
depart tomorrow to Washington to arrive at an agreement that benefits both our
two nations. </span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Nothing by force, everything by reason and law!</span></i></div>
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<br /></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Andrés Manuel López Obrador </span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">President of Mexico</span></i></div>
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Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-22376643945531522442018-06-01T07:17:00.003-05:002018-06-01T07:17:46.936-05:00Trump's 'Zero Tolerance' Bluff on the Border Will Hurt Security, Not Help <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i>The Washington Post published this op-ed today by former Border Patrol directors on the completely absurd and non-viable proposal of the Trump administration to prosecute all illegal border crossings. The article is mixed in its policy recommendations, favoring other measures that continue to criminalize migrants, and hailing Mexico's terrible southern border crackdown in Central American migrants, but it's worth a read. </i><br />
<br />
<i>This is a debate we must be having. If the Democrats don't stand up to the whole "border security" farce going on to enrich the few and make political hay for the racists, we will never get our of this vicious policy cycle. </i><br />
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<div class="pb-sig-line hasnt-headshot has-0-headshots hasnt-bio is-not-column">
<span class="pb-byline" itemprop="author" itemscope="" itemtype="http://schema.org/Person">By <span itemprop="name">Alan Bersin</span>, <span itemprop="name">Nate Bruggeman</span> and <span itemprop="name">Ben Rohrbaugh</span></span> <span class="pb-timestamp" content="2018-05-31T05:41-500" itemprop="datePublished">May 31 at 5:41 PM</span></div>
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<span class="pb-timestamp" content="2018-05-31T05:41-500" itemprop="datePublished"> </span> <span class="pb-bolt"></span> </div>
<div class="intro">
<i>Alan
Bersin, Nate Bruggeman and Ben Rohrbaugh worked together at U.S.
Customs and Border Protection, where Bersin served as commissioner. He
earlier was the U.S. attorney in San Diego. </i> <br />
</div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div id="U13008323736492aD">
<br /></div>
<div id="U13008323736492aD">
Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen recently announced a “<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trumps-zero-tolerance-at-the-border-is-causing-child-shelters-to-fill-up-fast/2018/05/29/7aab0ae4-636b-11e8-a69c-b944de66d9e7_story.html?utm_term=.d2770ff7af0c" shape="rect" title="www.washingtonpost.com">zero tolerance</a>”
policy on border security. Though its contours have not been described
in great detail, at its core, it is a commitment to criminally prosecute
every person who illegally crosses the border. </div>
<div id="U13008323736492aD">
<br /></div>
This strategy may provide sound bites, and harsh rhetoric may
generate some short-term deterrent effect, but it is impossible for this
policy to actually be implemented over any reasonable time period. By
announcing a threat that is effectively a bluff, the Trump
administration likely will harm border security rather than enhance it.<br />
<br />
The
federal criminal-justice system is not equipped to handle the flood of
cases that would result from referring every single illegal border
crosser for prosecution. There is a limited number of federal judges,
magistrate judges, federal prosecutors, public defenders and U.S.
marshals in the judicial districts along the border. Prosecuting more
than 300,000 people (<a href="https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/sw-border-migration" shape="rect">the number apprehended for illegally crossing</a>
our southwestern border in fiscal 2017) would overwhelm their
resources. And this is to say nothing of inadequate detention capacity;
each of the illegal crossers would have to be processed, housed, guarded
and fed before trial — and after, if convicted.<br />
<br />
The
core of effective border security is risk management — focusing
law-enforcement resources on the greatest threats. This is why the
Border Patrol developed the <a href="https://www.migrationpolicy.org/research/advances-us-mexico-border-enforcement-review-consequence-delivery-system" shape="rect">Consequence Delivery System</a>,
a program that matches different types of crossers to different
categories of processes or penalties. For example, a known human
smuggler receives harsher treatment than a first-time crosser. Referring
every illegal crosser for prosecution removes the ability of the Border
Patrol to manage risk effectively.<br />
<br />
The opportunity cost
associated with this prosecution strategy will be even more acutely felt
by the U.S. Attorney’s Offices along the border. Already handling a
massive workload, including drug- and human-trafficking cases, these
prosecutors focus their time and effort on cases that have the greatest
impact on public safety. The administration’s new “mission impossible”
will force prosecutors to misallocate resources to economic migrants;
but even then, there will not be enough resources to get the job done.
In the meantime, organized crime, drug smuggling and financial crimes
will receive short shrift.<br />
<br />
Meanwhile, the new policy is likely to
have little deterrent effect. We know this from experience. For
example, in San Diego during the 1980s and early 1990s, enormous numbers
of illegal crossers were subject to misdemeanor prosecution. That
effort consumed huge amounts of resources simply to create a revolving
door in area jails. It was only when the enforcement strategy changed to
focus on prevention and deterrence at the border — supported with
targeted felony prosecutions and strategically situated walls — did the
situation change.<br />
<br />
The
administration is looking for quick fixes to illegal immigration, but
action is instead needed on the difficult policy questions and
trade-offs that are inherent in this arena.<br />
<br />
For example, the
administration needs to strengthen its security partnership with Mexico.
Demonizing Mexico may score political points, but it is directly
contrary to our border-security interests. All irregular southwest
border crossers transit Mexico, and since 2015, Mexico has stopped more
than 500,000 Central Americans at its southern border with Guatemala. If
these efforts are halted, the effect on the southwestern U.S. border is
clear.<br />
<br />
One area of focus should be entering a “first
safe country” agreement — which the United States has with Canada —
providing that migrants from third countries claiming asylum here would
be returned to Mexico to pursue their claims. This arrangement would be a
powerful deterrent to economic migrants making false asylum claims,
while leaving open a refuge for those fleeing extreme violence directed
against them. The United States could provide assistance to Mexico to
help implement the system.<br />
<br />
Rather
than focusing on criminal prosecutions, the administration should be
reforming the overloaded immigration court system, where backlogged
cases wait years for final disposition. That means adding resources and
streamlining procedures so that asylum and other cases can be
adjudicated efficiently. This would yield the dividends the attorney
general’s recent token offer of 35 prosecutors and 18 immigration judges
cannot.<br />
<br />
“Zero tolerance” looks like an easy way to increase
deterrence, but there are no easy solutions or silver bullets for a
broken immigration system. While we wait for comprehensive immigration
reform and a strategy for tackling the drivers of Central American
migration, the administration needs to devise a deterrence scheme that
is effective and sustainable. Criminal prosecution will certainly be a
part of such a strategy, but if it is the only part, it will fail. <br />
<div id="U13008323736492aD">
<br /></div>
<br />
Read: <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trumps-zero-tolerance-bluff-on-the-border-will-hurt-security-not-help/2018/05/31/fafbe316-642a-11e8-99d2-0d678ec08c2f_story.html?utm_term=.d4856cec1b7c&wpisrc=nl_opinions&wpmm=1">https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trumps-zero-tolerance-bluff-on-the-border-will-hurt-security-not-help/2018/05/31/fafbe316-642a-11e8-99d2-0d678ec08c2f_story.html?utm_term=.d4856cec1b7c&wpisrc=nl_opinions&wpmm=1</a><br />
<br /></div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-59953270165401695332018-05-29T16:53:00.000-05:002018-05-29T16:53:00.080-05:00Mexico is siding with President Trump on migrants<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By James Fredrick - May 25<br /><br />MEXICO CITY — I heard a familiar story on a recent trip to the southern border.<br /><br />“There’s been harassment against my fellow Guatemalans, asking them if they’re citizens, demanding their papers, it’s an all-out persecution,” Hector Sipac, a Guatemalan consul, told me.<br /><br />But we weren’t in the United States. We were in Tapachula, on Mexico’s southern border, where Sipac is based. In the age of President Trump’s xenophobia, Mexico has quietly aligned itself with the American president against migrants.<div>
<br /></div>
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<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/global-opinions/wp/2018/05/25/mexico-is-quietly-siding-with-president-trump-on-migrants/?utm_term=.1145bfc5e70f">Read More. </a></div>
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Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-14459743886455551802018-05-17T09:38:00.000-05:002018-05-17T09:38:36.825-05:00EEUU: ¡Justicia, no impunidad! Agente de la Patrulla Fronteriza enfrentará nuevo juicio por el asesinato de José Antonio<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Revista Documentos El Derecho de Vivir en Paz - 16 mayo 2018</div>
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En la mañana del 11 de mayo, fiscales federales de Tucsón anunciaron su decisión de volver a juzgar al agente de la Patrulla Fronteriza Lonnie Swartz por cargos de homicidio voluntario e involuntario por el asesinato, el 10 de octubre de 2012, de José Antonio Elena Rodríguez. Aunque el 23 de abril, un jurado en un tribunal federal en Arizona absolvió a Swartz de asesinato en segundo grado, la decisión de hacer un nuevo juicio le da a José Antonio, a su familia y a todas las víctimas de la Patrulla Fronteriza una oportunidad más para lograr justicia y detener la impunidad de la Patrulla Fronteriza. El nuevo juicio comenzará el 23 de octubre de 2018. <a href="http://www.derechoalapaz.com/?p=4272">Leer más.</a></div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-16353798126346863432018-05-15T09:29:00.005-05:002018-05-15T09:29:49.270-05:00Trump’s DHS is using an extremely dubious statistic to justify splitting up families at the border<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By Dara Linddara - May 8, 2018<div>
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<div>
<br />The government says its new policy reduced border crossings 64 percent. They actually increased 64 percent.</div>
<br />The separation of families who cross into the US from Mexico illegally is now official US government policy.<br /><br />On Monday, Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Thomas Homan announced that the Trump administration would adopt a zero-tolerance policy toward anyone caught crossing into the US by Border Patrol. All border crossers would be referred to the Department of Justice, and everyone referred would be prosecuted for the misdemeanor of illegal entry. <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/5/8/17327512/sessions-illegal-immigration-border-asylum-families">Read More.</a><div>
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Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-7321035343193275502018-05-08T12:54:00.003-05:002018-05-08T12:54:44.010-05:00Killings in Mexico: Collateral damage or the result of a failed security policy?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By Erika Guevara Rosas, Director for the Americas at the International Secretariat of Amnesty International - 19 April 2018<div>
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Early in the morning on 25 March, a young couple were driving with their three daughters and niece to the border town of Nuevo Laredo when a Mexican naval helicopter opened fire on them. Caught in the middle of the hail of bullets unleashed by personnel from the Mexican Secretariat of the Navy (SEMAR), the mother and two of her daughters were killed instantly.<br /><br />The authorities have deemed these deaths to be “collateral damage” resulting from a conflict that has coincided with more than 200,000 deaths in Mexico since the end of 2006. The connotation of this phrase is that there is logic to armed conflict and that frontal assault is acceptable. To mainstream the notion of collateral damage is to implicitly accept the standpoint that the armed forces play a role in public security. <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2018/04/las-muertes-en-mexico-danos-colaterales-o-el-producto-de-una-politica-de-seguridad-fallida/">Read More.</a></div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-54811199905790252342018-04-25T17:08:00.001-05:002018-04-25T17:08:24.054-05:00Colombia's Santos Latest to Cite Failure of War on Drugs Model, So Why Does the US Keep Pushing It?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
http://www.laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId=2455267&CategoryId=12393<br />
<br />
<br />
It couldn't be clearer. Latin America's staunchest drug warriors, the leaders of nations that have invested billions of dollars and thousands of lives into this, are calling for a new approach. <br />
<br />
This time it was Juan Manuel Santos, president of the country that pioneered the drug war in Latin America at the behest and with the support of a succession of US governments. Despite that it has been his nation's policy for decades, he didn't mince words when he spoke to the UN General Assembly on April 24:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
“The war that the world declared on drugs more than 40 years ago has not
been won. The strategy based exclusively on prohibition and repression
has only created more deaths, more prisoners, more dangerous criminal
organizations.”</blockquote>
He echoes something victims have known for years. In Mexico every grassroots victims' organization has called for an end to the war, calling it instead of the war on drugs, "the war on us".<br />
<br />
Yet the governments and their allied NGOs continue to support Calderon's drug war, now Peña's drug war, and the US component the Merida Initiative. They say it will win if we just give it more time. They say the "soft side" is really a new approach that will soon produce different results. They say if we´ll just be patient...<br />
<br />
Mexico, and especially Mexican youth, are in no mood to be patient. The latest brutal murder of three film students, who were first announced as disappeared and later identified as remains dissolved in vats of acid, has once again mobilized the outrage that is always latent in a nation where disappearances and executions by cartels and security forces are an every day occurrence.<br />
<br />
The soft side--police and judicial reform, "building resilient communites"-- is the way the State Department and others justify the drug war model these days, when faith in the model is waning. These bogus programs, ineffectual at best and profoundly interventionist at worst, keep the war on drugs alive when almost no one believes in it any more. The defense of the millions of dollars spent to enforce the model is justified by those who receive the juicy government contracts and the Pentagon, also a major player in its own right, that gets to operate freely in Mexico.<br />
<br />
Where are the millions of dollars alloted to build forensic capacity in Mexico as part of the Merida Initaitive over the past ten years? I know a mother who carries bone fragments carefully wrapped in a rag and asks anyone who will listen when, when? When will someone confirm that they are what's left of her son, or someone else's son.<br />
<br />
Mexico still sends fragments to Houston or Austria for testing. And that's an example that could be just the beginning of the list. Millions of dollars through the public policy pipeline: Why is the justice system not getting better? Why are police still corrupt and crimes not solved?<br />
<br />
The answer to these questions is obvious--the idea was never to solve crimes or find the disappeared. The problem is not technical and everyone knows it. It's political, it's a lack of political will. So the arrogant explanation of the U.S. government that they are training Mexicans to be better is not only racist but false.<br />
<br />
Before Santos' speech, it was Peña Nieto who declared the war a failure and the security policy basically a trainwreck. As if it weren't his fault.<br />
<br />
The campaigns are raising the debate. But the interests involved seem to assure that no matter how much consensus there is on its failure, the drug war will continue because it serves important interests. Politicians on both sides of the borders and their think tank and NGO echo chambers will say e too want a change in order to avoid a change.<br />
<br />
We're the ones who have to call them on it. We're the ones who will have to make the change, by doing exactly what the students are doing now: Standing up and saying ¡Ya Basta!</div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-72659846380986665082018-03-29T14:48:00.001-06:002018-03-29T15:12:15.856-06:00AP Story on New US-Mexico Drug War Cooperation at Sea Raises Questions<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
<i>This article describes the stubbron refusal of the govenments to recognize that the war on drugs is a total disaster. </i><br />
<br />
<i>The <a href="http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/public-safety/sd-me-sessions-visit-20170920-story.html">renewed focus on the drug war</a> is no surprise, given Trump's cozy relationship with the war industry. But it comes at a time when on the grassroots level, people are more sick of it than ever. The March for our Lives' call for controls on firearms is a strike to the heart of that industry. Reaction, including insulting kids whoses friends were just murdered, has come publicly from fanatical gun owners and rightwing ideologues, but not far behind them are the real forces behind the refusal to regulate lethal arms that kill students, the money-makers--the arms manufacturers and sellers and smugglers and hit men. </i><br />
<br />
<i>South of the border, the Colombian situation is characerized by a very complex effort to implement the historic peace accords. Calling for a return to drug war militarization and fumigation (like this unfortunate <a href="http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/09/18/the-united-states-is-losing-the-war-on-drugs-in-the-americas/">article </a>in Foreign Policy does) is the last thing they need now. Peace is a dirty word to the war industry and to the Pentagon with its $700 billion budget, which is why the rest of us have to fight for it so hard. </i><br />
<br />
<i>Mexico just had the most violent year on record thanks to the binational drug war. The leading presidential candidate's promise to change course partly explains his overwhelming popularity. Concerns over national sovereignty are legitimate--you can easily understand why if you turn the tables. Why instead of US forces coming into Mexico to stop production and transit, don't we have Mexican secuity forces fanning out to U.S. cities to stop retail sales, which is where the vast amount of profits come from that fuel the trade? Both are terribel ideas, of course. Mexico has every reason in the world to ask the United States to mind its own bisness, literally, working on the part of transnational crime that takes place within its own borders. Less intervention and more domestic problem-solving is what "America First" should mean.</i><br />
<br />
<i>I've had several debates with Jorge Chabat and find the quote at the end of this article especially disturbing because they imply that there is no other way to confront the cartels than the war model that has killed more than 160,000 since it was implemented. We can be more creative--and more empathetic--than that. Shirk's comment that the wall impedes drug trafficking, forcing it into the sea, is utterly absurd. Even the DEA, which is heavily invested in continuing the drug war, admits that the vast majority is smuggled over the border in vehicles that cross international bridges and sail right by US Customs agents. LC</i><br />
<br />
SAN DIEGO (AP) — The U.S. and Mexican governments are sparring over
immigration and trade, but the two countries are joining forces on the
high seas like never before to go after drug smugglers.<br />
The United States, Mexico and Colombia will target drug smugglers off
South America’s Pacific coast in an operation that is scheduled to
begin Sunday and last for the foreseeable future, Coast Guard officials
told The Associated Press.<br />
<br />
U.S. Coast Guard Adm. Paul F. Zukunft teased the idea during a recent
defense conference in San Diego, saying the United States “can’t do it
alone.”<br />
<br />
“It’s no secret we are besieged with the flow of drugs from Latin America to the United States,” he said.<br />
<br />
U.S. and Mexican forces have routinely worked together at sea, but
the latest effort “marks a significant step in terms of information
sharing, collaboration and cooperation between the United States, Mexico
and other partner nations,” according to the Coast Guard.<br />
<br />
The Americans and Mexicans will exchange intelligence more freely
than in the past, which could mean sharing information on well-traveled
routes for drug smugglers or preferred paths for specific smuggling
organizations, Coast Guard spokeswoman Alana Miller said.<br />
<br />
They will also board the other country’s vessels to view operations
and gain expertise, Miller said. In 2015, three members of the Mexican
navy boarded a Coast Guard vessel during a port call in Huatulco,
Mexico, but this operation calls for more frequent exchanges, and they
will be at sea.<br />
The operation will last “for the foreseeable future as long as it’s
working for everyone,” Miller said. “It’s sort of open-ended.”<br />
<br />
Traffickers over the years have increasingly turned to the sea to
move their illegal goods, traversing an area off South America that is
so big, the continental United States could be dropped inside. Smugglers
routinely move cocaine out of countries like Colombia to Central
America and Mexico via fishing boats, skiffs, commercial cargo ships —
even homemade submarines.<br />
<br />
The operation comes after five years of record seizures by the Coast
Guard. But U.S. officials say because of limited resources, the U.S.
military’s smallest service still catches only about 25 percent of
illegal shipments in the Pacific.<br />
<br />
Even so, the Coast Guard annually seizes three times the amount of
cocaine confiscated at the U.S.-Mexico border. <br />
<br />
Yet ocean smuggling has
not grabbed lawmakers’ attention like the flow of drugs across the
nearly 2,000-mile-long (3,200-kilometer-long) land border, where the
Trump administration wants to spend billions to build a continuous wall.<br />
<br />
<span style="background-color: white;">As much as 20 percent of the cocaine moving through South America
ends up in the United States, </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">and most of it lands first in Mexico from
seafaring smugglers. The hope is </span>boats will be stopped before their
shipments are loaded onto Mexican trucks that fan out on various routes
bound for the U.S. border, authorities said. Large boats can cart 20
tons (18 metric tons) of cocaine or more.<br />
<br />
Mexico has historically been among the Latin American countries that
are most reluctant to join operations with the U.S., which can be traced
back to the Mexican-American War that was fought 170 years ago. The
United States cannot open military bases in Mexico, and U.S. officials,
for instance, cannot venture into Mexican waters without prior
permission, even if they are chasing drug vessels.<br />
<br />
The Coast Guard now stops its pursuit and alerts Mexican authorities if suspicious boats cross into their territorial waters.<br />
<br />
It’s unclear whether this new cooperation will affect those restrictions.<br />
<br />
Treaties with nations such as Colombia have allowed U.S. authorities
more latitude, such as permitting Coast Guard officers to board
Colombian-flagged ships. U.S. officials have touted Colombia’s joint
anti-drug efforts as a model for the region.<br />
<br />
The U.S. and Mexican military relationship has strengthened since the
two nations signed the 2008 Merida Initiative to work together in the
drug war. There have been more cross-border trainings, especially with
the Mexican Navy, which is considered less corrupt than the Mexican Army
and has raised its profile with the captures and killings of drug
bosses.<br />
<br />
The combined operation was planned in a series of meetings over the
past year. The maritime services signed letters of intent to work
together to fight organized crime while respecting each country’s
sovereignty and territorial waters.<br />
<br />
David Shirk, associate professor of political science at the
University of San Diego, said the operation falls in line with Trump’s
vow to go after the “bad hombres,” while President Enrique Pena Nieto
has recognized organized crime is so severe that Mexico needs help.<br />
<br />
“With more walled-off sections of the border, we’ve seen drug
trafficking organizations literally go underground or offshore,” he
said.<br />
<br />
Last year, the Coast Guard seized more than 455,000 pounds (206,000
kilograms) of cocaine worth more than $6 billion and brought more than
600 suspected traffickers back to the United States for prosecution. The
Coast Guard has been criticized for holding suspects on ships where
they cannot easily access lawyers. Shirk said joint operations could
lead “to serious violations of suspects’ rights at sea and possible
human rights violations in the process.”<br />
<br />
Coast Guard officials say they respect suspects’ rights. Where
suspects will be sent with the three countries participating in the
operation will be decided on a case-by-case basis.<br />
U.S. military officials have been reluctant to openly discuss details
of the cooperation with their Mexican counterparts, sensitive to the
Mexican public’s historical view and recent barbs between the two
presidents.<br />
<br />
Jorge Chabat, a political scientist at the Center for Economic
Research and Teaching in Mexico City, said he doubts the combined
operation will get much negative reaction from a Mexican public tired of
drug violence.<br />
<br />
“The more insecurity we have, the less nationalism we have in Mexico,” he said.<br />
Ultimately, he doubts the joint operation will make much difference.<br />
<br />
“This is something they have to do to maintain drug trafficking at
the same level, and not allow it to grow,” he said. “That’s the most you
can do. You can’t just surrender.”<br />
<br />
https://wtop.com/national/2018/03/ap-exclusive-us-mexico-open-new-maritime-front-in-drug-war/slide/1/<br />
<br /></div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-11557015741972177682018-03-27T14:32:00.000-06:002018-03-27T17:48:40.070-06:00Secretive Kushner and Nielsen Visits to Mexico Bode Ill for Binational Relations<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
As President Enrique Peña Nieto meets with US Homeland Security chief Kristjen Nielsen today, there has been a flurry of opinions and information regarding the US-Mexico relation. Much of it has been centered on Trump's Mexico envoy and son-in-law, Jared Kushner<b> </b>and the future of the binational relationship--at a time when it is at an all-time low. <br />
<b></b><br />
Fllowing Kushner's surprise visit to Mexico to meet with Peña Nieto on March 7 and now Nielsen's visit there has been a great deal of speculation as to whatis going on behind the scenes. questions. <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/jared-kushner-leading-us-mexico-ties-diplomatic-problems-2018-3">Business Insider reports</a> that prior to her visit, the two governments signed several bilateral agreements, although details on the content is scanty.<b> </b><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
US Homeland Security Secretary Kristjen Nielsen and Mexican
Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray signed several agreements this
week — one aimed at promoting cooperation to stop illegal
merchandise from crossing the border, one to implement joint
inspection programs along the frontier, and one to promote
agricultural trade. Nielsen <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-mexico-us-sign-accords-on-customs-border-cooperation-2018-3" rel="noopener" target="_blank">said</a> around 20 more were being
worked on, and White House officials <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/24/us/politics/jared-kushner-mexico.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur" rel="noopener" target="_blank">told The Times</a> that several US
federal agencies would announce agreements in the coming weeks. </blockquote>
Nielsen met with the Secretary of Foreign Affairs Luis Videgaray and her counterpart the Secretary of the Interior Alfonso Navarette yesterday, and the president today. The Homeland Security <a href="https://www.dhs.gov/news/2018/03/27/readout-secretary-kirstjen-m-nielsen-s-meeting-mexican-president-enrique-pe-nieto">press release states</a> that the two discussed "their efforts to
improve border security through close collaboration", and "facilitate more secure trade and travel between the two
countries". <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Secretary Nielsen emphasized the Department of Homeland
Security’s (DHS) commitment to working with Mexican counterparts to
combat transnational crime affecting both the United States and Mexico.
She also stressed the importance of the partnership between the United
States and Mexico - particularly via intelligence sharing - and thanked
the Mexican President for helping to foster a close partnership with the
Department during his administration. </blockquote>
The press release actually thanks Peña Nieto twice for his service. It states: <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Both sides expressed concerns with migration flows including those
caused by the collapse of the Venezuelan economy and its impact in the
region. The partners shared their mutual desire to confront
transnational criminal organizations and money laundering. Lastly, both
sides reiterated their long held respect for the human rights of
migrants. </blockquote>
The specific reference to Venezuela is not unexpected in the context of the Trump administration's use of Mexico to denounce and isolate the Maduro govenment--and the number of Venezuelans coming to Mexico has risen sharply in the past year--but it stands out since the vast majority of migratory flows in Mexico and requests for asylum come from Central America.<br />
<br />
Most migrants from the Northern Triangle (Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala) report fleeing life-threatening violence and hunger in the region in the context of the US-backed war on drugs and failed economic policies. The flows have been exacerbated recently by the electoral fraud <a href="https://www.elsoldehidalgo.com.mx/republica/migrantes-realizan-viacrucis-por-mexico-piden-respeto-y-asilo">in Honduras</a>-- a crisis confirmed by this year's Easter pilgrimage of Central American migrants from Mexico's southern to northern borders called the Via Crucis.<br />
<br />
The United Nations High Commissioner on Refugees just <a href="https://www.elsoldemexico.com.mx/mexico/crece-580-migracion-a-mexico-1534027.html">released data </a>showing that requests for refugee status in Mexico have increased 580% since 2014. The High Commisssioner<a href="http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/nacion/sociedad/peticiones-de-refugio-presionan-mexico"> stated</a> that anti-immigrant policies in the U.S. under Trump and enforced by Nielsen's Homeland Security are another factor that leads them to predict that these numbers the two governments claimed to be concerned about will continue to grow. <br />
<br />
The Mexican government statement on the meeting with Homeland Security emphasized the areas most criticized in the relationship with the United States--protection of Mexican migrants' rights in the United States, national sovereignty and the potential of the shared border where Trump contines to insist on building a sea-to-sea wall. However, it provided no information on any advances in these areas. <br />
<br />
<b>The Inconvenient Son-in-Law </b><br />
<br />
Days before the visit, the New York Times published an article entitled "<a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?hl=en&q=http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v%3D2%26c%3Dq4dTzWdAgeBMux1pHtbfXfWVfCRP%252FZQI&source=gmail&ust=1522249999051000&usg=AFQjCNF9tEIrgEK1VEglQqJeWDU_rRPsPg" href="http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=q4dTzWdAgeBMux1pHtbfXfWVfCRP%2FZQI" name="m_8021360967751839116_m8" target="_blank">As Ties With Mexico Fray, Kushner Works Quietly to Mend Them</a>". Considering that the article has no new information in it, it is difficult to discern the reason behind the publication. Speculation increases since the <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/jared-kushner-leading-us-mexico-ties-diplomatic-problems-2018-3">Business Insider</a> published an almost identical article under the title "Jared Kushner is still in the driver's seat on US-Mexico relations, but a deeper problem persists".<br />
<br />
The NYT piece is a political fluff piece on Kushner, seemingly designed to bolster his role as he falls deeper and deeper into problems. Not only was he stripped of his security celarance in the White House, but his delusions of grandeur have been further curtailed by reality checks and tainted by a slurry of bad press related to his business failings, the Mueller investigation reportedly on his heels for <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/mueller-team-asking-if-kushner-foreign-business-ties-influenced-trump-n852681">financial deals </a>and <a href="https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2018/02/robert-mueller-is-taking-a-closer-look-at-jared-kushner">security risks</a>, and his failure to actually accomplish anything. <br />
<br />
Why would Peña Nieto, a president of the 11th largest economy in the world, break protocol to meet with an advisor who doesn't hold a cabinet position or even high-level security clearance? This isn't the first time Peña has set aside national pride and personal face-saving to seek deals with the Trump administration.<br />
<br />
One possibility is that the Peña administration believes that Kushner is its only hope of saving NAFTA before the elections. Kushner is Trump's point person on Mexico and oversees NAFTA negotiations.<br />
<br />
Peña is also likely looking to legacy, especially to lock in much-criticized aspects of his structural reforms, given the probable election of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador in part as a mandate to rescind or modify the broadly unpopular reforms in energy and education in particular. He clearly wants to make sure that his policies favoring the small political elite he forms part of remain in place and one way of doing that is by quickly creating a series of bilateral agreements that nail down cooperation on those policies. <br />
<br />
Another side of it has to do with Peña and Kushner's personal agendas. Mexican government insiders say that Videgaray has already taken over the reins in the run-up to the July 1st elections. In this context, Kushner's reception could be a sign that Peña has virtually abandoned the vestments of office and is seeking personal gain and protection. There's a phrase for the PRI tradition of emptying the coffers on your
way out of office: "Año de Hidalgo, pendejo el que deje algo" (The year
of Hidalgo, only a fool leaves anything behind". <br />
<br />
We don't know what Kushner and Peña Nieto discussed in the reportedly three
hours they spent in Los Pinos on March 8, but Peña Nieto is as desperate as
Kushner to save his hide. Peña's problem is not internal investigations or bad financial
deals (he has enough raw power to put a lid on those), but the presidential election in July. His candidate, JoseAntonio Meade, is almost certain to
lose, opening up the possibility that the traditional immunity former
Mexican presidents have enjoyed could be stripped away. <br />
<br />
Kushner, as mentioned above, has a number of weak flanks. The Washington Post reported that the former National Security Advisor,
Gen. H.R. McMaster was concerned about Kushner's foreign contacts and
diplomats <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/kushners-overseas-contacts-raise-concerns-as-foreign-officials-seek-leverage/2018/02/27/16bbc052-18c3-11e8-942d-16a950029788_story.html?utm_term=.c49b59e50dca">worry openly</a>
that foreign governments, including Mexico, could manipulate the famous
son-in-law, green in foreign affairs and vulnerable due to his
shaky financial standing and erratic father in-law. With Kushner reportedly <a href="http://www.newsweek.com/jared-kushners-debt-soared-millions-entering-white-house-ivanka-trump-807055">holding debt </a>in
the range of 100 million dollars, he seems desperate for a lifeline to
emerge from his privileged role as pseudo-diplomat, which opens up a
dangerous and ethically dubious personal agenda in his international dealings.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">_____________________________________________________</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Within this morass of complex interests that omit the only one that <i>should</i> be present in international diplomacy--the public good of the nations represented--it's utterly absurd to present Jared Kushner as the White Knight who rides in to save US-Mexico relations. </span><br />
<br />
________________________________________________________________________________<br />
<br />
His visit to Mexico went down badly in Mexican press. Maybe not quite as badly as his father-in-law's August 2017 visit, which got Videgaray fired and then reincarnated as Secretary of Foreign Relations, but it was seen generally as another instance of Videgaray and Peña pandering for Trump's attention.<br />
<br />
Mexican magazine, Eje Central, <a href="http://www.ejecentral.com.mx/kushner-llego-cuando-trump-mas-lejos-lo-quiere/">wrote </a>on the eve of his visit:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Jared Kushner, today more than ever, is a burden on President Donald Trump and nothing good can come out of a meeting with President Peña Nieto, with decorated Army Generals above him, and the weight of accusations of business favors as a member of the White House. As a message and as an event, this act confirms Trump's disdain for Mexico and the traps that the Mexican government continues to fall into. </blockquote>
The free daily, Publimetro, referring to upcoming presidential elections in Mexico and the ongoing NAFTA negotiations, <a href="https://www.publimetro.com.mx/mx/noticias/2018/03/07/esta-sera-la-agenda-del-yerno-trump-visita-mexico.html">concluded</a>: <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The
visit of the political advisor [Kushner] and envoy of President Donald
Trump is neither opportune nor convenient in these times of economic
instability and political uncertainty. </blockquote>
Surprisingly, Lopez Obrador <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jared-kushner-in-mexico-on-diplomatic-visit-2018-3">was quoted</a> as supporting the visit, although he demanded that <a href="https://www.sdpnoticias.com/nacional/2018/03/07/jared-kushner-a-que-vino-a-mexico">any agreements be made public</a>.<br />
<br />
The Mexican government issued a vague <a href="https://www.gob.mx/sre/prensa/recibe-el-presidente-enrique-pena-nieto-a-jared-kushner-enviado-del-presidente-donald-j-trump">press statement</a> on the meeting: <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The Mexican and U.S. officials discussed issues of common interest, including the fight against transnational criminal organizations, drug trafficking and the flow of arms and cash between both countries. Also, they discussed issues of border security; orderly and safe migration, including a potential project for a circular program for the mobility of agricultural workers; development in Central America; and fomenting job creation and shared prosperity through fair and reciprocal trade, as well as the continuaton of NAFTA negotiations in an expedite manner. </blockquote>
There continues to be a lot of suspicion regarding the real reasons for Kushner's visit. One web comment <a href="https://www.sdpnoticias.com/nacional/2018/03/07/jared-kushner-a-que-vino-a-mexico">stated</a>:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span class="_5mdd">Obviously [Kushner] didn't come to Mexico just to say hi to Peña and Videgaray because he likes them so much. He came to see what that pair of corrupt scoundrels would offer him in excehage for support from the gringos in the presidential elections...</span></blockquote>
From what we know so far, there are no real breakthroughs for the beleaguered bilateral relationship in the Kushner and Nielsen agreements. Many are simply the result of the kind of normal neighborhood governance that takes place all the time, and others could be part of an attempt on the part of both governments to cement policies and practices before or in case the center-left candidate comes to power.<br />
<br />
Either way, they do not improve the relationship. If the Trump administration is seen to be conspiring to tie the hands of a new democratically elected president, they could cause a further political backlash against Peña and the PRI.<br />
<br />
In this context, citizens on both sides of the border must demand that the substance of the talks and the agreements be made fully public. <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
</blockquote>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
analysts said, could lead Mr. Trump to revive the disparaging
language about Mexico that first necessitated Mr. Kushner’s diplomatic
rescue mission.</div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-36539729801799944372018-02-09T10:17:00.000-06:002018-02-09T10:17:22.309-06:00Signs of Progress in Nafta Talks but Countries Remain Deeply Divided<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By ANA SWANSON - JAN. 29, 2018<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
MONTREAL — Discussions to revamp the North American Free Trade Agreement moved from stalemate to actual negotiation during the sixth round of talks that concluded on Monday, but a deal was still far from guaranteed as Mexico, Canada and the United States continue to squabble over how to reshape the 24-year-old pact.<br /><br />Government officials and trade analysts described the mood around the talks as “cautiously optimistic” as Canada, in particular, joined Mexico in offering counterproposals to America’s requests for drastic changes, an outcome that seemed likely to dissuade the United States from imminent withdrawal.<br /><br />Yet more than six months into the talks, a conclusion still appeared elusive. And tensions between the countries grew as the United States criticized Canada’s suggested changes to the pact on areas including automobile manufacturing and investment.<br /><br /><br />Robert Lighthizer, the United States trade representative, suggested that Canada had been responsible for the stalled talks. He said discussions were now progressing as the nation recognized the need to protect its trading relationships, though he added that talks were not moving fast enough.<br /><br />“The reality is some of the participants weren’t willing to talk about anything,” Mr. Lighthizer said in remarks to the media. “Now, they’re starting to realize that we have to begin to talk. I think that’s a reason for guarded optimism. But you know, I’m never really very optimistic,” he added.<br /><br />Officials from Canada and Mexico sounded more positive about the prospects for a deal. Ildefonso Guajardo Villarreal, the Mexican economic secretary, said that the three countries were at “a better moment in this negotiation process,” and that progress made so far had put the countries “on the right track to create landing zones to conclude the negotiation soon.”<div>
<br />Chrystia Freeland, the Canadian foreign minister, said that Canada had come to the table “with creative ideas we believed could move us forward.” She also emphasized the benefits of trade with Canada for the United States.<br /><br />The Nafta pact, negotiated by President George H.W. Bush and signed into law by President Bill Clinton, spurred trade between the three countries by reducing Mexico’s high tariffs on goods from Canada and the United States. But, as President Trump has often highlighted, it also incentivized companies to shift labor-intensive manufacturing to Mexico.<br /><br />Mr. Trump has repeatedly threatened to walk away from the trade pact if it cannot be renegotiated in the United States’ favor, a position that has put him at odds with many in the business community and Congress, who see trade with Mexico and Canada as integral to industries as varied as manufacturing, agriculture and energy. The auto industry, in particular, has arranged its North American <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/12/02/business/economy/globalties-exports-imports.html">supply chains around the deal’s terms</a>.<br /><br />With talks now reaching into their seventh month, negotiators are about to butt up against several political events that could make an agreement even more difficult, including the Mexican general election on July 1.<br /><br />The election could usher in a leftist political party that may be less willing to make concessions. The front-runner, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, has advocated a more combative approach to the Trump administration.<br /><br />“Doing this before the Mexican election is critical, because you don’t know who is going to be leading afterward,” said Representative Will Hurd, a Texas Republican who attended the talks.<br /><br />The negotiations have faced a series of collapsing deadlines. Last year, officials insisted that the deal must be largely concluded by the end of 2017. Then in October, they <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/17/us/politics/nafta-negotiators-extend-talks-delaying-its-expected-demise.html?rref=collection%2Fbyline%2Fana-swanson&action=click&contentCollection=undefined&region=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=16&pgtype=collection">decided to extend the talks</a> into the first quarter of 2018, with March widely cited as a deadline.<br /><br />Negotiators did not specify a new target for concluding the talks. In remarks on Monday, Ms. Freeland said that Canada looked forward to continuing its work at the next round in Mexico City in late February, and in Washington in April.<br /><br />Officials from all three countries say they would rather have a good deal than a rushed one. But the delay is not without risks — some trade analysts fear that an extended process could cause Mr. Trump to lose patience, and spur an American withdrawal.<br /><br />Midterm elections in the United States on Nov. 6 could also complicate the deal. The administration will need a simple majority in both the House and Senate to approve their revised trade agreement, which could prove difficult if Democrats win control of either chamber.<br /><br />Mr. Lighthizer reiterated in his remarks on Monday that he hoped to win the support of some Democratic lawmakers. That may hinge on the administration’s efforts to improve labor standards. Last Tuesday, more than 180 Democrats and one Republican lawmaker sent <a href="http://democrats-edworkforce.house.gov/imo/media/doc/2018-01-23%20Letter%20to%20USTR%20on%20NAFTA.pdf">a letter to Mr. Lighthizer</a> urging the administration to propose stronger measures to improve Mexican labor conditions.<br /><br />Representative Sander Levin, a Michigan Democrat and one of the signatories, said the Trump administration’s current labor proposals just “mask maintaining the status quo.” Mr. Levin said “the traditional view of these issues is that they’ll work out in the wash, but workers have been taking a bath.”<br /><br />Negotiators said they reached agreement on a Nafta chapter focusing on anti-corruption, and were nearing completion on several other sections. But the ideas Canada brought forward to counter the Trump administration’s proposals were proving a source of contention.<br /><br />The United States has proposed <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/22/trump-team-readies-for-nafta-fight-over-making-goods-in-america.html">significantly raising the so-called rules of origin</a>, which govern how much of a car needs to be manufactured within the free-trade area to be exempt from tariffs.<br /><br />The Canadians last week discussed changing the way the figures were calculated to include design, investment and parts of an automobile like high-tech software and sensors that are common in cars today but not measured under Nafta.<br /><br />The change is likely to raise the proportion of a car’s value produced by the United States, because many high-tech industries are centered there. But it also appeared unlikely to address Mr. Trump’s primary reason for renegotiating Nafta: strengthening American manufacturing.<br /><br />Mr. Lighthizer criticized the idea, saying that it “may actually lead to less regional content than we have now” and said “this is the opposite of what we’re trying to do.”<br /><br />Mr. Lighthizer also used his remarks to criticize <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/10/us/politics/canada-us-tariffs-wto.html?rref=collection%2Fbyline%2Fana-swanson&action=click&contentCollection=undefined&region=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=7&pgtype=collection">a recent case Canada brought to the World Trade Organization</a>, in which it claimed that the United States system for policing dumping and subsidies was unfair. “It is imprudent, and my suspicion is, spiteful,” he told reporters.</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/29/us/politics/nafta-talks-conclude-in-montreal-with-signs-of-progress-and-risk.html </div>
</div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-42304122132761704272018-02-03T02:08:00.001-06:002018-02-05T20:10:43.806-06:00Tillerson in Latin America<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson touched down on Mexican soil Thursday and many Mexicans were not happy about it. Tillerson is heading out into the land of "rapists and thieves", etc. to talk about the central themes of Trump policy in the region: the war on drugs, now referred to in government circles as "transnational crime" since the U.S. public's enthusiasm for a drug war has decisively waned in recent years, and, of course, immigration.<br />
<br />
Tillerson plans to do a grand sweep of Mexico, Argentina, Peru, Colombia and Jamaica with a focus on a country he won't visit--Venezuela. The general purpose of the tour seems to be to convey two messages -- 1) no, the Trump government is not just a bad joke, and 2) yes, I am still Secretary of State.<br />
<br />
The representative of the most unpopular U.S. government in decades, if not ever, Tillerson brings his baggage of general opprobrium, plus a carry-on of indignation generated by <a href="http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/371874-tillerson-cautions-against-chinese-influence-in-latin-america">his remarks</a> just the day before setting off in which he warned the region of Chinese and Russian influence.<br />
<br />
In a <a href="https://www.state.gov/secretary/remarks/2018/02/277840.htm">speech at the University of Texas</a>, née Sonora, Tillerson said:<br />
<br />
"Latin America does not need new imperial powers that seek only to benefit their own people." Not surprisingly given the history of the region, Latin Americans understood that as 'Just shut up and be happy with the old one'. You now, the one that goes around the world spouting the "America First" agenda (and doesn't mean "America" as a continent).<br />
<br />
His statement was so inadvertently revealing that it provoked irate responses in the Latin American
press. The Mexican daily <a href="http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2018/02/02/edito">La Jornada wrote</a> (translation mine):<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The
affirmations cited are an unmistakable show of cynicism and
ignorance--characteristics of the Trump administration--given that if
any superpower has been characterized by its predatory trade and
economic practices and its military support of dictatorial Latin American
governments, it's the United States..." </blockquote>
He went on to say,<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Russia’s growing presence in the region is alarming as well, as it
continues to sell arms and military equipment to unfriendly regimes who
do not share or respect democratic values. Our region must be diligent to guard against faraway powers who do not reflect the fundamental values shared in this region. The United States stands in vivid contrast. </blockquote>
Here in Mexico nothing could be more tone-deaf than this image of the United States suddenly being a moral ally against other countries "who don't share our values." Apart from the long history of intervention, Mexicans have watched with growing outrage as the Trump administration proclaimed them the "other" that threatened U.S. values. <br />
<br />
<b>The Agenda</b><br />
<br />
Tillerson has been the Secretary of State in abstentia for the Western Hemisphere until this trip. He stood alongside the real architect of the new Trump Era policy in the region, John Kelly, in several previous visits, but had little to do with the remapping of policy here and appeared more as a figurehead. Occasionally we've gotten a glimpse behind the public diplomatic protocols of his dealings as an empowered oil executive. But except for the oil-rich U.S. nemesis, Venezuela, he hasn't shown a lot of interest in the region.<br />
<br />
General Kelly however, does have a vision for the Americas. He sees a web of military bases and proxy forces that guarantee the United States can shield international investment and pre-empt threats to elites. As former head of Southern Command he has a militarist preference for confronting problematic drug by battling traffickers in the streets and fields (of foreign countries) with arms, rather than in the schools and courts with arguments.<br />
<br />
The Kelly agenda is also all about borders. Who is kept in and who is kept out is the core of his foreign policy and what has defined Trump policy in the region. His stint at Homeland Security really never ended when he left for the White House as he continues to coordinate both Homeland Security and foreign policy in this region. Current Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen's total loyalty to her old boss and his boss (to the point of making herself ridiculous in the <a href="https://qz.com/1180864/kristen-nielsen-trumps-department-of-homeland-security-chief-on-shithole-countries/">defense of Trump's "shithole countries"</a> comment) proves the point.<br />
<br />
In Texas, trying to sound like a statesman, Tillerson laid out three pillars for Latin American policy. (Washington likes the image of pillars--we have four of vastly differnt sizes in the Merida Initiative and every time policy appears to be crumbling we get more pillars, or one pillar is changed for another. As any architect knows, the problem with this kind of pillar construction is that if the foundation is rotten no number of pillars can hold up the structure.) <br />
<br />
Anyway, the new pillars he presented are "economic growth, security and democratic governance"-- the same pillars we've had for years. Pillar One-economic growth- says nothing about who reaps the benefits, what happens to unrenewable resources or sustainability and environment. Tillerson focused first on NAFTA. Taking a different position from his boss, he tried to assuage the Texans and the Mexicans that Washington just wants to update the agreement:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
I’m a Texan, former energy executive, and I’m also a rancher. I
understand how important NAFTA is for our economy and that of the
continent. But it should come as no surprise that an agreement put into
place 30 years ago, before the advent of the digital age and the digital
economy, before China’s rise as the world’s second-largest economy –
that NAFTA would need to be modernized.
</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Our aim is simple: to strengthen our economy and that of all of North
America, to remain the most competitive, economically vibrant region in
the world. </blockquote>
So Tillerson views NAFTA from the point of view of a U.S. "Texan, former energy executive and rancher." Then there's Peña Nieto who sees it from the point of view of a rapacious politician and representative of the Mexican transnational elite.<br />
<br />
Tillerson, former head of ExxonMobil, adds:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
We see a future where energy connectivity from Canada to Chile can
build out and seize upon energy integration throughout the Americas,
delivering greater energy security to the hemisphere and stability to
growing economies. South America is blessed with abundant energy resources. Colombia,
Peru, Brazil, Guyana, and Argentina all have significant undeveloped oil
and natural gas. The United States is eager to help our partners
develop their own resources safely, responsibly, as energy demand
continues to grow.
</blockquote>
His phrase "seize upon energy" jumps out at Mexicans who have zealously guarded their oil reserves from U.S. interests up until Peña Nieto finally privatized them. Mexico auctioned off the largest block of offshore drilling contracts
to date the day Tillerson arrived.<br />
<br />
Building a post fossil-fuel economy and energy plant is clearly not a language Exxon's Tillerson speaks. As John Saxe Fernandez <a href="http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2018/02/01/opinion/024a1eco">notes</a>, Tillerson's oil interests are reflected in his Latin American itinerary focused on isolating Venezuela and opening up the Hemisphere to U.S. companies like his under the Maximum Extraction Principle and the Mexican government is lockstepping alongside. Saxe Fernandez warns: <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
..this energy <i>entreguismo</i> (a Spanish word for surrendering resources to a foreign power) creates extremely high-risk climate and war for our region in relation to the United States. </blockquote>
The Secretary of State talked about more than his oil-hegemony goal. He slammed Cuba and Venezuela as the blight on an otherwise democratic continent (nothing on Honduras' stolen elections, Mexican authoritarianism or Brazil's court maneuvers to bar the presidential frontrunner) and hinted ominously at support for a military coup in the latter. singled out for praise Argentine president Mauricio Macri and his "market-basd economic reforms". But sympathetic words from the hegemon to the north may be counterproductive for the conservative leader, who has <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/12/15/buenos-aires-protests-police-fire-tear-gas-violence-breaks-protest/">faced mass protests </a>in the streets and slipped to an approval <a href="https://www.hispantv.com/noticias/argentina/366550/macri-baja-popularidad-reforma-previsional">rating of 39%</a> in January following his latest move to slash the nation's safety net.<br />
<br />
On security Tillerson turned to the "transnational criminal organizations", again using the U.S.'s undeniable responsibility for cartel violence as a justification for further intervention and militarization. "Shared responsibility" has been the catchword for intervention since the Obama administration launched George Bush's joint drug war in Mexico and Central America. By citing U.S. demand, the Pentagon and US arms manufacturers have reaped millions in tax dollars to train and equip Mexican and Central American police and armed forces. According to Tillerson, this failed, interventionist model will continue to be U.S. policy:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
We acknowledge our role as the major market for illicit drug
consumption and the need for shared approaches to address these
challenges. The opioid epidemic we are facing in this country is a
clear, tragic representation of how interconnected our hemisphere truly
is. Violence and drugs do not stop at our southern border. That is why we continue to employ a coordinated, multilateral approach
to diminish the influence of these groups. It is time we rid our
hemisphere of the violence and devastation that they promote.
</blockquote>
Not one expert has pointed to evidence that this strategy has worked. The opioid epidemic is demonstrably demand-driven, not supply driven, and is overwhelmingly dominated by prescription drugs produced and distributed in the United States rather than foreign heroin. Mexican heroin can pose a serious health risk for Mexicans in growing and trafficking areas and for U.S. consumers, but the roots of the problem are in U.S. communities and pharmacies, and in the contradictory prohibition and enforcement regime. If dealt with there, the size and power and violence of Mexican groups will wither.<br />
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Tillerson believes that the current course is just fine, however. Ten years and 150,000 Mexicans killed and 33,000 disappeared in drug war-related violence--many of them by security forces--with no reduction in the availability of prohibited drugs appears to be insufficient reason to change course. Human consequences don't enter into the equation at all -- he talks about the Merida Initiative as if it were a (very expensive) package of good intentions, rather than a policy that has already racked up a decade of bloodshed and failure:<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Through the Merida Initiative – a partnership between the United States
and Mexico focused on improving security and the rule of law – the
United States is providing assistance to build the capacity of Mexican
law enforcement and judicial institutions. By providing inspection
equipment, canine units, and training, we equip law enforcement officers
with tools to eradicate opium poppy production, tighten border
security, and disrupt trafficking activities – not just in drugs but in
trafficking of humans. By improving cross-border communications, we make
both sides of the border safer.
</blockquote>
It's spin-off, the Alliance for Prosperity in Central America, gets the same treatment. He refers to the Kelly-sponsored meeting at SouthCom last June where:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
the State Department and the Department of Homeland
Security, along with our Mexican counterparts, cohosted the Conference
on Prosperity and Security in Central America. Through many productive
conversations with public and private sector leaders across the region,
opportunities were identified to help Central American countries grow
their economies, strengthen their institutions, and better protect their
people. More opportunities for Central Americans will weaken the hold
of transnational criminal organizations, address the underlying causes
of legal and illegal immigration, and result in less violence. </blockquote>
This sounds reasonable, but the same policy, which has been going on for years, has actually played a major role in expelling people through megaprojects and land grabs and increased inequality, increasing violence through militarization of public safety and decreased rule of law by propping up repressive and corrupt governments in the name of battling organized crime, to which they are often tied.<br />
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At Friday's <a href="https://www.state.gov/secretary/remarks/2018/02/277876.htm">press conference</a> in Mexico City, Mexico's Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray rambled obsequiously, Canada's Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland mentioned the importance of "advancing democracy, especially in Venezuela" without saying a word about Honduras's recent election that the OAS deemed too dirty to call. Tillerson came back to his favorite theme of the need "to promote market-based energy development". He also said they discussed following up on the Central America conference last June on the Northern Triangle countries, stating, "Success there will better protect all of our countries and provide opportunities for the citizens of Central America." This statement in the context of the fraudulent election is meant to put a nail in the coffin of Honduran democracy.<br />
<br />
In response to questions, Videgaray said that they did not discuss DACA but said if they come back "it will be a win situation for Mexico and a lose situation for the United States". he said Mexico would not support any decision on Venezuela that involved violence. Tillerson basically said the US would prefer a peaceful solution, but that depends on Maduro. <br />
<br />
Tillerson went into a drawn-out attempt to justify Trump's anti-immigrant policies. He also revealed that they had a working dinner with the Mexican armed forces on disrupting transcriminal (sic) organizations, meaning the drug war will continue, more miltarized than ever since Mexico passed the Internal Security Law and Donald Trump took office. </div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-35993365734301496702018-01-15T09:18:00.001-06:002018-01-15T09:20:01.601-06:00Mexico: Cloaked by silence of Christmas, Police unleash spate of at least 5 enforced disappearances in Guerrero<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By Amnesty International<br />
11 January 2018, 16:22 UTC<br />
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While families were celebrating Christmas holidays at home, police in the city of Chilpancingo forcibly disappeared 5 young men, using chilling tactics that mirror those used by organized crime, said Amnesty International. <br />
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“Tragically, the enforced disappearance of these young men is the latest of a long line of horrors have befallen Guerrero state. The warning signs of corruption and terrible human rights violations have been there for all to see, and those officials that negligently ignored them are themselves complicit,” said Erika Guevara-Rosas, Americas Director at Amnesty International.<br />
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<a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2018/01/mexico-cloaked-by-silence-of-christmas-police-unleash-spate-of-at-least-5-enforced-disappearances-in-guerrero/">Read More</a></div>
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Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-27093510899279012222018-01-15T09:16:00.004-06:002018-01-15T09:16:32.298-06:00Mexico Takes to Twitter to Slam Trump on Wall Funding Claims<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By Rita Devlin and Nacha Cattan<br />January 11, 2018, 9:19 PM CST<br /><br />Mexico has long said it wouldn’t be paying for a border wall with the U.S. On Thursday, officials used some cheeky language on President Donald Trump’s favorite medium to reiterate their message.<br /><br />Both Mexico’s Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo and the country’s chief Nafta negotiator Kenneth Smith rebuked Trump’s suggestion that gains from a new trade deal may be used to pay for a border wall with Mexico. That would mean the U.S.’s southern neighbor would indirectly be paying for part of the wall, Trump said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-12/mexico-takes-to-twitter-to-slam-trump-on-wall-funding-claims">Read More.</a></div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-83477143099894042822018-01-08T10:23:00.002-06:002018-01-08T10:23:44.911-06:00‘We’re Competing Against Everybody Just Like You’: Voices on Manufacturing in Mexico<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/by/farah-stockman">FARAH STOCKMAN</a> and MICHEL VEGADEC. 27, 2017<br /><br /><br />At a time of uncertainty over the fate of the North American Free Trade Agreement, what does it feel like to work in a manufacturing plant in Mexico, where a surge of American companies have taken advantage of low labor costs?<br /><br />This year, we <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/14/us/union-jobs-mexico-rexnord.html">followed a group of steelworkers in Indianapolis</a> whose jobs were moving to Monterrey, Mexico, as discontent simmered in the American Rust Belt over the loss of blue-collar jobs.<br /><br />In the wake of the article’s publication, and as tensions rose over <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/21/us/politics/nafta-talks.html">attempts to renegotiate Nafta</a>, we sought out perspectives on globalization from readers who had worked in the manufacturing industry in Mexico. We asked them what they would tell American workers if they could.<br /><br />When Nafta was passed nearly 24 years ago, the trade deal marked a major milestone for globalization. It greatly expanded the number of assembly plants in Mexico known as maquiladoras, which import parts duty-free and send finished products back across the border. Today, Mexico’s maquiladora industry is far more sophisticated and global than when Nafta began.<br /><br />In response to our queries, we received over 200 responses from readers. They ranged from expressions of solidarity — “We are not your enemy, but your brother in arms,” one wrote — to anger at being demonized for merely trying to make a living.<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/27/us/mexico-manufacturing.html#story-continues-2">Continue reading the main stor</a><br /><br />Many of the respondents echoed a common theme: Fear of the looming threat of automation, and of losing jobs to China. In follow-up interviews, respondents shared more about their experiences and their views on globalization.<br /><br />These interviews have been lightly edited and condensed, and one was translated from Spanish.<br />‘Americans should be seeking “first world” jobs’<br /><br />Luis Arturo Torres Romero, 37, has worked for 19 years in factories in Tlajomulco de Zúñiga, a city in the Mexican state of Jalisco.<br /><br />The son of an artist and a nurse who has struggled to make ends meet, Mr. Torres Romero put himself through college by working the night shift as an assembly operator at a factory that made consumer electronics. Now, he’s a development engineer for automotive electronics. <br /><br />I would have never been able to finish college if there weren’t those kinds of jobs in a maquiladora. Now I have a good life, I can afford certain luxuries. I no longer live worried about money. I no longer wonder what am I going to eat tomorrow.<br /><br />That kind of activity can’t fulfill you as a human being: doing something over and over like a machine. The staff turnover is very high. A lot of us didn’t even have a contract. We were outsourced by employment agencies. If there was a production spike, they would hire people, but if it lowered you would get fired.<br /><br />Those jobs no longer have a future. Machines will make them cheaper. Those jobs are being automated. Americans should be seeking first-world jobs. They should focus on making education accessible to more people to focus on higher-ranking positions.<br />‘We’re competing against everybody just like you’<br /><br />Raquel Gerardo, 22, grew up in Tijuana in a family that depended on the maquiladora industry for its livelihood.<br /><br />Ms. Gerardo’s parents met while working together in a factory. Her father started off sweeping floors as a teenager. He rose through the ranks, becoming a technician, an engineer and finally a plant manager at an electronics factory in Tijuana.<br /><br />Ms. Gerardo attended high school in Tijuana, where students were taught quality control, marketing and other skills necessary for the maquiladora industry. She went to college in Idaho, but returned to Tijuana for an internship at a factory. Today, she lives in Tijuana and works for an American software company that markets to Latin American customers.<br /><br />We are privileged. Not everyone has a chance to learn English and get an education to that level. I remember as a kid, my father would take me to the factory. Now that I’m an adult, I realize that people’s education levels are very mixed. If you are under, you are under. If you are the boss, all the respect is for you. <br /><br />Even if you earn a little above minimum wage, it’s not a livable wage. You can’t just do one shift and survive. Everybody in the family has to be working two or even three shifts.<br /><br />We’re competing against everybody just like you. China — it’s almost impossible to compete with them. My dad was the plant manager for this company and his bosses would call him every day and say, “If you don’t reduce the costs by this much, we’re going to move.” We didn’t celebrate my 12th birthday because of the stress.<br /><br />_____<br />Work from the United States has been ‘a boon for Mexico’<br /><br />Douglas Naudin, 75, of Laredo, Texas, worked as a human resources manager in the maquiladora industry from 1983 to 2007.<br /><br />Mr. Naudin was born in Mexico, but grew up in El Paso after his father earned an engineering degree from the University of Missouri. A dual citizen of the United States and Mexico, Mr. Naudin always felt drawn to the Mexican side of the border.<br /><br />He was thrilled when an American company based in Carrollton, Tex., hired him in the 1980s to work in a newly built electronics factory in Juárez, Mexico. Mr. Naudin became head of human resources at that plant, which made LED bulbs for automobile dashboards.<br /><br />The Americans liked the idea of me going over there, because they could communicate with me. At the time, they had a Mexican H.R. manager who couldn’t speak English. People in Carrollton struggled with “Why are people leaving? What’s the head count?”<br /><br />We were putting together little teeny tiny bulbs. They are soldered with little teeny gold string, wire. And it was done through microscopes. It was tough work. We used to manufacture a kajillion of them. The workers were coming from some of the farms nearby.<br /><br />By the 1990s, American companies started sending more technical work, higher-grade equipment, laboratories. As time went on, all these other tasks started going to Mexico. Engineers. Machinists. Mechanics. You had a lot of the second and third generation who are professionals at the plants, where their parents had been operators. It has been a boon for Mexico.<br /><br />_____<br />‘Mexico, the U.S. and Canada should be working together’<br /><br />David Treviño, 56, worked for 12 years as a production manager at a plant in Mexico City that made electrical bundles.<br /><br />Mr. Treviño has traveled to China more than 100 times in the last 27 years, first as the representative of an international wire assemblies company that was establishing factories in China in the 1990s, and with an electronics distributor in Mexico City he founded that imports products from China to Mexico and the United States.<br /><br />In 1989, I was working for a Mexican company that was making wiring assemblies, those bundles of wires that connect to all the buttons in the back — for example, in a washing machine. I called it “working in the salt mines,” because it was hard. I was one of the few guys to speak English. I got promoted.<br /><br />At that time, China was totally underdeveloped. There were almost no hotels. You had to stay in the factory. The salary in China was $1 per day. More and more companies were coming, to the point that in the early 2000s, you had to have a factory in China, or you were wrong. Americans transferred huge investments and know-how to China for free. They did it for corporate profits, to keep shareholders happy. But you see the results.<br /><br />Chinese people started their own factories, becoming a rich country and now a U.S. rival. My youngest son just graduated a year ago from a very good college in Mexico. He did an exchange in China. Given the situation, I told him, “You might want to learn Chinese because it’s the language of the future.”<br /><br />Americans should have made better political and economic decisions years ago. Punishing Mexico is not the solution. Eliminating Nafta or building walls is not the solution. Mexico, the U.S. and Canada should be working together to face the big challenges the rest of the world is posing. If the U.S., Mexico and Canada do not find ways to work together, we will see many U.S. manufacturing companies closing due to the brutal competition from Asia, and China in particular.<div>
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https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/27/us/mexico-manufacturing.html </div>
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Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-76945343677331054192017-12-20T09:19:00.004-06:002017-12-20T09:19:49.894-06:00Exclusive: Anti-Money Laundering Group Blasts Mexico in Draft Report<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By Michael O'Boyle - DECEMBER 19, 2017<br /><br />Mexican prosecutors are failing to systematically punish money launderers and tax authorities are too lax with potential drug money fronts such as real estate and luxury goods firms, according to a draft report on Mexico’s efforts to fight illicit finance.<br /><br />The report by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), an international organization that sets global standards for fighting illicit finance, highlights the tiny dents made by Mexican prosecutors in the financial networks of drug gangs and corrupt officials.<div>
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<a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mexico-corruption-exclusive/exclusive-anti-money-laundering-group-blasts-mexico-in-draft-report-idUSKBN1ED2AB">Read More</a></div>
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Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-29870301325014657082017-12-13T11:42:00.002-06:002017-12-13T11:42:08.563-06:00A Nasty, Nafta-Related Surprise: Mexico’s Soaring Obesity<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By ANDREW JACOBS and MATT RICHTEL DEC. 11, 2017<br /><br />William Ruiz Sánchez spends his days grilling burgers and slathering fried hot dogs with pepperoni and cheese at his family’s restaurant. Refrigerators and fire-engine red tables provided by Coca-Cola feature the company’s logo in exchange for exclusive sale of its drinks.<br /><br />Though members of the Ruiz family sometimes eat here, they more often grab dinner at Domino’s or McDonald’s. For midday snacks, they buy Doritos or Cheetos at Oxxo, a convenience store chain so ubiquitous here that nutritionists and health care advocates mockingly refer to the city as San Cristóbal de las Oxxos.<div>
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<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/11/health/obesity-mexico-nafta.html?emc=edit_ta_20171211&nl=top-stories&nlid=73978454&ref=cta&_r=0">Read More</a></div>
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Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-30677773873827009102017-10-09T14:38:00.002-05:002017-10-09T14:38:42.785-05:00Another Journalist Slain in Mexico<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
A photo-journalist employed by an online newspaper in the central Mexican state of San Luis Potosi was found murdered on Friday, the media outlet said.<br /><br />“We regret to inform you that the dead body of reporter Edgar Daniel Esqueda Castro was discovered,” Vox Populi San Luis Potosi said in a message published on social media. “We are with his family, with his 1-year-old daughter Daniela.”<div>
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<a href="http://www.laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId=2444354&CategoryId=14091&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+laht%2Fmailer+%28Latin+American+Herald+Tribune%29">Read More.</a></div>
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Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-64720200942750692532017-10-09T14:37:00.002-05:002017-10-09T14:37:33.847-05:00Mayor Murdered in Western Mexico<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; text-align: justify;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; text-align: justify;">The mayor of a Purepecha Indian town in western Mexico was fatally shot on Friday, authorities in Michoacan state said.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; text-align: justify;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; text-align: justify;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; text-align: justify;">Stalin Sanchez Gonzalez was killed by five men armed with assault rifles who ambushed him outside his home in Paracho, the state Attorney General’s Office said.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; text-align: justify;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; text-align: justify;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; text-align: justify;">The assailants fled the scene in a Ford Ranger pick-up truck, witnesses told police.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; text-align: justify;"><a href="http://www.laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId=2444351&CategoryId=14091&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+laht%2Fmailer+%28Latin+American+Herald+Tribune%29">Read More.</a></span></div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-90780440933508812892017-10-09T14:36:00.000-05:002017-10-09T14:36:12.048-05:003 things Trump’s proposed border wall with Mexico wouldn’t accomplish<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By Vanda Felbab-Brown - Tuesday, September 26, 2017<br /><br />President Trump’s proposed border wall with Mexico would be costly and counterproductive in a number of ways, as I explained in more detail in my recent Brookings Essay. No matter how tall, deep, or thick a wall will be, illicit flows will cross, with undocumented workers and drugs finding their way into the United States regardless. Nor will the physical wall enhance U.S. security.<br /><br />Here are 3 things that the proposed border wall will not accomplish, in spite of what the president and his supporters claim.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2017/09/26/3-things-trumps-proposed-border-wall-with-mexico-wouldnt-accomplish/?utm_campaign=Brookings%20Brief&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=57114460">Read More.</a></div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-38500687391113084532017-10-09T14:33:00.003-05:002017-10-09T14:33:30.587-05:00Mexico’s Former 1st Lady Launches Independent Presidential Bid<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Former first lady Margarita Zavala announced on Friday that she resigned from the conservative National Action Party (PAN) to run as an independent in Mexico’s 2018 presidential election.<br /><br />“I formally present my resignation to the PAN. I am leaving without rancor,” Zavala said in a video posted on Twitter.<div>
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<a href="http://www.laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId=2444360&CategoryId=14091&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+laht%2Fmailer+%28Latin+American+Herald+Tribune%29">Read More.</a></div>
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Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-55510841778781863302017-10-02T21:31:00.001-05:002017-10-02T21:31:35.247-05:00Mexican Government Censored Reports on Earthquake, NGO Claims<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
The NGO Article 19, based in London, which defends freedom of expression and the right to information, accused the Mexican government on Friday of concealment and censorship in its reports on the earthquake of Sept. 19.<br /><br />In an extensive analysis, Article 19 concluded that the state “customarily deploys a policy of concealment and censorship,” and that in the case of the magnitude-7.1 earthquake was neither proactive nor efficient.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId=2444073&CategoryId=14091&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+laht%2Fmailer+%28Latin+American+Herald+Tribune%29">Read More.</a></div>
Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-73815309375030604602017-09-15T07:01:00.001-05:002017-09-15T07:01:10.733-05:00The end of DACA would be 'a big win for Mexico,' foreign secretary says<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By Ann M. Simmons - september 14, 2017<br /><br /><br />Relations between the United States and Mexico have been strained since the inauguration of <a href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/politics-government/donald-trump-PEBSL000163-topic.html">President Trump</a>, who has threatened to dismantle the <a href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/business/economy/north-american-free-trade-agreement-EVGAP00023-topic.html">North American Free Trade Agreement</a>, vowed to make Mexico pay for a border wall and — during his campaign — called Mexican immigrants rapists.<br /><br />But Mexico has not given up hope that relations can improve, said its foreign secretary, Luis Videgaray.<br /><br />“For us this is the most important relationship in the world,” he said in an interview with The Times’ editorial board and reporters. “We believe also for America, Mexico is a very important relationship as well, and it's in the best interest of both sides to work it out in a constructive way.”<br /><br /><a href="http://www.latimes.com/world/mexico-americas/la-fg-global-mexico-foreign-secy-qa-20170909-story.htmlhttp://www.latimes.com/world/mexico-americas/la-fg-global-mexico-foreign-secy-qa-20170909-story.html">Read More</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #ff5443; font-family: Georgia, 'Droid Serif', serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold;"><br /></span>
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Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8058611092223984448.post-8962158466929173972017-09-04T12:53:00.000-05:002017-09-04T12:53:07.693-05:00When Mexicans Crossed Our Border to Feed Americans in Need<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By Stephen R. Kelly August 28, 2015<br /><br /><br />Stephen R. Kelly, a former U.S. diplomat who served in Mexico from 2004 to 2006, teaches at the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University.<br /><br />In a scene that would have given Donald Trump heart palpitations, 200 flag-waving Mexican troops breached the U.S. border outside Laredo, Tex., 10 years ago and advanced unopposed up Interstate 35 to San Antonio. <br /><br />It was the first time a Mexican army had marched on San Antonio since 1836 when Gen. Santa Ana massacred besieged Texas independence fighters at the Alamo.<div>
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<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/when-mexicans-crossed-our-border-to-feed-our-hungry/2015/08/28/347342e4-4cee-11e5-84df-923b3ef1a64b_story.html?tid=ss_fb-amp&utm_term=.47027251caf7">Read More.</a></div>
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Laura Carlsenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09104803970928403045noreply@blogger.com0