Last week, 19 bodies were discovered in 11 hidden graves on private land in the crime-plagued municipality of Tecomán, Colima.
Yesterday, the state attorney general’s office (FGE) announced that 50 more bodies had been found in another 38 hidden graves on an adjacent plot, bringing the body count to 69.
The FGE said the second discovery was made after state police carried out an operation in Tecomán that resulted in the arrest of two men and the liberation of two people they had kidnapped.
An investigation of the property where the victims had been held revealed 38 more clandestine burial sites. The bodies were transferred to the coroner’s office for autopsies and DNA testing to discover the identities of the victims.
Authorities said they had met with family members of missing persons to collect DNA samples to be compared with the biological data obtained from the victims.
The FGE specified that of the bodies unearthed in the most recent find, all were adults and some showed signs of having been dead for at least five years.
The attorney general’s office said it would not rule out the possibility of finding more hidden graves and that it would continue the investigation to identify the culprits and their motive for the murders.
The Pacific coast state of Colima has been one of Mexico’s most violent for several consecutive years. Authorities have said that one reason is that drug gangs, principally the Jalisco New Generation Cartel and the Sinaloa Cartel, are fighting over the port of Manzanillo.
According to the National Human Rights Commission, in the last 11 years 1,300 hidden graves have been discovered throughout Mexico, at least 200 of them in the states of Chihuahua, Durango and Veracruz.
Cold front No. 36 and a low-pressure system struck parts of the Yucatán peninsula with intense rainfall yesterday, conditions that were not expected to improve much today.
Rain started to fall yesterday around noon, causing flooding in parts of Cancún, triggering the deployment of emergency services. There was also flooding in Playa del Carmen.
Emergency responders in both cities helped motorists stranded by flash flooding during the course of the nine-hour storm.
Government employees were also kept busy clearing storm drains.
The conditions were caused by a low-pressure system extending between the peninsula and the island of Cuba, whose effects continued to be felt in Quintana Roo and Yucatán overnight.
'Chapo, give me a child,' reads a sign in Sinaloa after Guzmán was captured in 2014.
News of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán’s conviction yesterday on drug trafficking charges traveled quickly to his home state of Sinaloa, where some residents lamented the downfall of the man who has been likened to Robin Hood.
The former leader of the notorious Sinaloa Cartel was found guilty in a New York federal court of smuggling tonnes of drugs into the United States during a decades-long career that was based on intimidation of rivals and bloody turf wars.
Even though 56 witnesses and hundreds of pieces of evidence were presented by the prosecution to demonstrate that the former drug lord was guilty of smuggling drugs, bribing officials, laundering money and murdering rivals, many Sinaloa locals continued to describe Guzmán as a modern-day Robin Hood.
“As a Sinaloa native, the truth is this hurts,” a gray-haired man told the news agency Reuters in the state capital, Culiacán.
The man, who declined to give his name but said he was a native of Guzmán’s home town of Badiraguato, added: “We know that near Badiraguato, he’s helped a lot of people, building roads, schools, churches. People here will suffer now due to lack of support.”
Guzmán fans in Sinaloa in a file photo.
Other sinaloenses, such as Gildardo Velázquez, said that little will change in the state despite Guzmán’s conviction and the probability that he will spend the rest of his life in prison.
“Trafficking drugs will continue,” he said. “Nobody can stop it. Even now that they’ll give him the life sentence they think he deserves, it’s not going to change anything here.”
Yet more local residents expressed fear that Guzmán’s conviction would trigger more violence across the country as cartel members fight for control of territory he once dominated, although authorities in Sinaloa said that homicide numbers in the state had fallen by 30% during his three-month trial.
“I think it might be counterproductive,” said a young man identified only as Carlos. “There’s more people that want everything that El Chapo controlled.”
Although news of the 61-year-old’s conviction spread quickly, the security team for Guzmán’s mother, María Consuelo Loera Pérez, didn’t immediately notify her about her son’s fate, media group Univision reported.
However, Alejandrina Guzmán, eldest daughter of El Chapo, said in San Diego that her stomach was in knots and her legs shook when she heard the jury’s verdict. She later went to a church to pray for her father.
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Beyond Sinaloa, the reaction to Guzmán’s conviction was more muted, and his trial didn’t attract great interest.
“The reaction, of rather lack of it, is just a clear reflection of who we are as a country,” Jacobo Dayán, a human rights specialist and professor at Mexico City’s Iberoamerican University, told The New York Times.
“Where we have more capacity for outrage is when it comes to corruption, but not so much left for violence.”
A fashion designer and member of Mexico’s ruling party who has no scientific background is the new chief of the federal government’s GM biosecurity unit, raising questions about her appointment to the role.
Edith Arrieta Meza, a fashion design graduate of the Jannette Klein University in Mexico City, became head of CIBIOGEM – a federal government agency that develops policies for the safe use of genetically modified organisms – on December 10.
The role also makes Arrieta a deputy director at the National Council of Science and Technology (Conacyt), of which CONABIO is part.
According to her public declaration on the government transparency platform declaraNet, Arrieta’s only previous work experience is as head of “Department B” between 2015 and 2018 in the Tlalpan government that was led by current Mexico City Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum.
The newspaper El Universal said that Arrieta has been a member of the Morena party since at least 2014 and became the general secretary of its executive committee in the southern Mexico City borough of Milpa Alta, which borders Tlalpan.
In 2015, she ran as a candidate for Morena in the federal election and during her campaign appeared alongside now-President López Obrador and Martí Batres, the party’s leader in the Senate.
In photos posted to her Facebook account, Arrieta also appears with current Secretary of Public Administration Irma Sandoval and Morena Senator Citlalli Hernández, among other government figures.
Asked about the appointment, López Obrador said this morning he had been advised the information published was incorrect. If true, Arrieta will not remain in the post, he said, explaining that the head of Conacyt is looking into the matter.
Arrieta’s designation at the helm of CONABIO is not the only Conacyt appointment that has raised eyebrows.
Another new deputy director of the organization is David Alexir Ledesma, who was named head of communication and strategic information although he is only in the third semester of an undergraduate communication degree.
His appointment and 44,000-peso (US $2,300) monthly salary triggered a backlash on social media, with one Twitter user charging that it was proof of the new government’s lack of professionalism.
Another said that it a was a “shame” that people who have completed communication degrees and have ample experience in the field “have to give up opportunities like this” to people who are less qualified.
Montgomery Knott's film, Leyenda de mi Sobrina, from inside the cube.
Step into the 27-foot multimedia cube at Colegio Dante Alighieri Catholic school in Mexico City for a sensory experience unlike anything else – a five-course custom culinary creation from one of Mexico’s most beloved chefs, Jaír Téllez of MeroToro and AMAYA, and a two-hour program of film and performance from the legendary experimental cinema project, Monkey Town.
Comfy benches line the gymnasium at the school, located in Colonia Escandón, each situated under one of the four projection screens. Diners sit at small tables for two, literally surrounded by cinema, featuring works by 18 filmmakers and artists from Mexico, Latin America, Europe, Russia, and the United States.
The subject matter runs from straightforward narrative to contemplative visual poetry and sharp political commentary.
The vastly different films become bound together by the experience that’s like watching from inside the film, inducing a sort of mild psychedelia that’s only intensified by the warm belly glow of wine and tequila. The four screens and multi-speaker surround sound hold the viewer, as if in a closed chamber, while from above:
A post-apocalyptic neon wolfman speeds along on a glowing motor scooter, smoking mechanical amphetamine, out to settle a score.
The view from outside the Monkey Town cube.
A stampede of rolling mangos leaps from tin roof to tin roof, echoing like an off-kilter drum corps, building in speed and sound.
A woman searches for enlightenment on a web browser and enters a dream world of New Age product placement spirituality.
Cruise ship passengers are injured by games of leisure. A snorkeler is sucked into ocean oblivion, and a single golf ball prevails.
This marks the 16th year and eighth edition of Monkey Town, which originally began in New York City and has run in Denver, Barcelona, Austin and Los Angeles.
Monkey Town founder and director Montgomery Knott first conceived of the program after seeing a four-channel Christian Marklay video work and sketched a crude drawing of the idea on a cocktail napkin. Eight months later Monkey Town was born and other artists soon began making works for the program.
Of the Mexico City version Knott explains, “About half of the artists made or adapted pieces specifically for the cube. I normally try to have a mix where we switch between single, two-channel and four-channel pieces. I asked friends, curators and artists from Mexico City. And they asked two friends and they asked two friends and so on and so on. Mostly a game of phone, linking up with people and trying to curate a diverse program, with a variety of aesthetics. It’s a survey of contemporary video art, without trying to be thematic or zeitgeisty.”
Monkey Town diners watch Greta Alfaro’s film, In ictu oculi.
On the food side of the program, the menu is quintessential Chef Téllez – classic Mexican ingredients with masterful French training and Mediterranean aesthetics: sea scallop with parsnip, xoconostle cactus fruit and lime; fresh corn tamal with roasted hen broth and quail egg; and grilled sea bass in escabeche with salt-cured nopales.
The minimal service allows for little distraction from food and film. Talking is certainly allowed but appreciated in hushed tones – the dining experience heightened as ingredients obscure and then materialize into view under the shimmer and glow of projected movement.
Both Chef Téllez’s restaurants MeroToro and Laja have appeared on Latin America’s best 50 restaurants list. His third restaurant, AMAYA, has become a Mexico City institution in recent years for its world-class, fresh and rustic, Baja-Mediterranean plates and one of the best natural wine lists in the country.
Téllez admits that he’d never heard of Monkey Town before his introduction to Knott but immediately liked the idea, and says, “it was quite easy to decide and collaborate with him.” While envisioning a menu for Monkey Town, Téllez says he sought to create “food that is expressive and delicious, yet a meal that flows with the experience and doesn’t protagonize.”
Knott continues, “We were talking to a few chefs, but once we met with Chef Téllez we knew we’d found our compatriot. His cuisine manages to be both exquisite and unpretentious. There’s so much thought behind each dish, but it’s not trying to be showy. I think there’s an affinity with our program in this process and effect.”
In addition to the film schedule, which will be consistent throughout the four-month run, each night will feature a changing catalog of live performers, including dance, opera, chamber music and a variety of experimental music and performance art.
The Monkey Town cube.
A recent performance from multi-instrumentalist Paz Lenchantin of The Pixies, accompanied by Tennessee Thomas on drums, had the two performers “on stage” surrounded by the screens, as Lenchantin’s film The Spider Lady – a black and white, stop motion ode to 40s-era horror and avant-garde – danced images across them.
Lenchantin’s live-looped droning tones and Thomas’s slow gallop of drums induced a trance, echoing throughout the concrete and formica gymnasium, as the spider woman stalked her prey, the theremin’s hypnotic wail providing the perfect creepy backdrop to the film.
Monkey Town runs Mondays through Saturdays until May 31 at Cda. La Paz 15, Colonia Escandón. Purchase tickets in advance from Monkey Town’s website: 800-1,200 pesos for four to five-course meals, with two nightly seatings.
The beach umbrellas are ready for more growth in tourism.
A record 41.4 million international tourists came to Mexico last year, 5.5% more than in 2017, and they spent more while they were in the country.
The Secretariat of Tourism (Sectur) said in a statement that 41,447,000 foreign tourists visited Mexico in 2018 compared to 39.3 million the year before.
The tourists spent just over US $20.3 billion while here, 6% more than in 2017. Each international tourist spent on average US $490 in the country.
The top 10 source countries for tourists who arrived by air were the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Colombia, Argentina, Brazil, Spain, Germany, France and Peru.
Once daytrippers from the three countries with which Mexico shares a border are added, a total of just under 96.8 million foreign visitors entered the country last year.
That figure represents a 2.6% decline on total visitor numbers in 2017, according to data from the National Institute of Statistics and Geography (Inegi).
The 55.3 million daytrippers spent just under US $2.2 billion or an average of $39 each, taking total tourism expenditure to just over $22.5 billion, 5.5% more than 2017.
For this year, Sectur predicts that international numbers could hit 43.6 million, which would represent a 5.2% increase on last year’s figures. Total tourism expenditure is forecast to reach jut under US $23.7 billion, which would also be 5.2% higher than in 2018.
Tourism Secretary Miguel Torruco Marqués described the outlook in both areas as positive.
Earlier this month, Torruco said that the government is aiming to increase expenditure by tourists in Mexico by focusing more on attracting big spenders.
Among the nationalities that spend the most while visiting Mexico, the Japanese were in first place, spending an average of $2,008, not including airfare.
However, in terms of visitor numbers, Japan was only in 17th place with 140,363 visitors.
Sailboats at Zihuatanejo for this year's Sailfest.
Once a sleepy fishing village, Zihuatanejo is nestled in a sheltered bay off the coast of Guerrero, a few hours north of Acapulco, and home to what has become one of the premier fundraising events of the sailing world.
Sailfest began in 2002, the result of a chance meeting between longtime expats Richard and Gloria Bellack and a sailboat named Latitude 38 (of sailing magazine fame).
The Bellacks, who were already involved with a local indigenous school called Escuela Primaria Netzahualcoyotl, were more than happy to accept the boatload of supplies the sailors had brought with them.
Word soon spread, and a few dozen other cruisers decided to join in a weekend of boat races, raffles and fun to raise money for indigenous children. The makeshift fundraiser with the help of other expats and locals raised US $1,500 in its inaugural year, which was then matched by the Bellack Foundation.
Fast forward 17 years and Sailfest has expanded to a week-long festival through the combined efforts of sailors, expats, locals and various organizations such as Rotary, Niños Adelante, Por Los Niños and the city of Zihuatanejo itself.
Sailfest’s meet and greet party.
In 2017, the organization raised over 1 million pesos through a variety of events, including silent and live auctions, raffles, chili cook-offs, concerts and donations from local merchants, restaurants and hotels.
The festivities include an opportunity to “crew” on a participating sailboat for a donation, with all proceeds going to the charity. Local musicians donate their time and perform while guests sail in and around the bay of Zihuatanejo and to Ixtapa.
Cruisers come from as far away as England, France, Canada and the U.S. for this annual event. In its best year, 2005, Zihuatanejo had an estimated 90 boats in its harbour. Although that number has reduced some (perhaps in part due to the economy) to around 35 in 2017, enthusiasm for the event has not.
The slack in sailor participation has in fact been picked up through the efforts of the many expats in the community who call Zihuatanejo home during the winter months, and the locals themselves.
Most welcome and new to Sailfest this year is the involvement of new Mayor Jorge Sánchez Allec and city officials. For the first time in the history of Sailfest, the city has shown tremendous support by providing people, money and pageantry in the form of local talent and donated food, and by buying tickets to attend events themselves.
It is believed by many to be an excellent way to encourage locals to participate in the many fun events held each year.
Festival co-founders Gloria and Richard Bellack.
Over the years, monies raised have helped thousands of children in Zihuatanejo with scholarships and tuition, uniforms, school supplies, shoes and nourishment (more than 35,000 meals a year) through a program called Carols’ Rice.
Sailfest donations are responsible for building 110 classrooms and Zihuatanejo’s first high school in over 20 years. Last year was considered a banner year with 2 million pesos raised but Carol Romain, chairman of the Sailfest committee and administrator of Por Los Niños, reports that 2019 beat that figure with 2.1 million.
Like many other expats and tourists, I have personally sponsored a child through the Por Los Niños program almost from its inception in 2005. Aldrich, who is now 22 and graduating this year, has held a grade point overage of over eight out of 10, a prerequisite for children in the program who wish to be sponsored from grade school through to university.
How to get involved?
• Sail your boat to beautiful Zihuatanejo and become part of an exciting festival each February. If you can’t do that, fly down and join in the fun and support a great cause at the same time.
A Guerrero mining group is forecasting that its operations and the new investment it attracts will generate a 2-billion-peso spillover for the state’s economy this year, a 300% increase on its first year of operations in 2017.
Alfredo Phillips, president of the Clúster Minero de Guerrero (CMG) – a group made up of eight companies – said that the predicted 2-billion-peso (US $103.6-million) injection into businesses in the state will represent growth of 66% on last year’s figures.
Despite security concerns and uncertainty surrounding possible changes to the federal Mining Law, Phillips said that several companies are interested in collaborating with the CMG on a range of new projects in Guerrero.
One set to be undertaken by Energéticos Nieto is the construction of a facility in Iguala with the capacity to store more than 15 million liters of diesel.
Phillips said that Canadian company Leagold Mining sees potential for a new project in the state while Media Luna, a subsidiary of Canada’s Torex Gold Resources, will invest US $600 million on a second Guerrero project.
Torreón-based Minera Capela is starting a project in the municipality of Teloloapan and the Campo Morado project in Arcelia, operated by Canada’s Telson Mining Corporation, continues to forge ahead, he added.
Meanwhile Canadian company Alio Gold is waiting for the right market conditions in order to enter the state.
“Insecurity will always be an issue, you find these situations everywhere, not just in Mexico, but I believe that the environment has improved because, with the collaboration of state and municipal governments as well as federal authorities, we’ve managed to . . . improve conditions,” Phillips said.
He added that communities in the state now have a better understanding of the benefits that the mining sector can bring them.
“The Clúster Minero de Guerrero started two years ago . . . and in the first year we had an economic spillover in the state . . . of 550 million pesos. Last year, [it was] 1.2 billion pesos . . . and this the goal is to have a spillover of at least 2 billion pesos on mining value chains in the state,” Phillips said.
Guerrero is Mexico’s third largest gold producer behind Sonora and Chihuahua, while mining in the state generates 8,000 direct jobs and 40,000 indirect ones.
Pipeline under construction: some have been halted by local opposition.
Private energy companies yesterday rejected President López Obrador’s claim that contracts they were awarded by the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) to build gas pipelines were one-sided and unfair.
A total of six contracts were awarded to IEnova, TransCanada and Grupo Carso during previous governments for the construction of seven gas pipelines for which the CFE is to pay the companies 16 billion pesos (US $831.2 million) this year even though the projects are incomplete.
Speaking at his morning press conference, López Obrador charged that “juicy business has been done under the protection of public power, unfair contracts favoring private companies have been signed.”
He also took aim at the Energy Regulatory Commission (CRE), asserting that it played a role in awarding contracts to private companies and thus contributed to the “privatization” of the national energy sector.
The CRE later rejected the claim, stating that while it approved the CFE’s tendering processes, it didn’t participate in them in any way.
Work on the pipelines has been delayed for between two and five years due to opposition from several communities through which they are to run.
The CFE has already paid the companies more than 60 billion pesos (US $3.1 billion at today’s exchange rate) for the construction of the pipelines, which are intended to supply natural gas to electrical generation plants.
CFE chief Manuel Bartlett said that if the government is forced to continue paying out billions of pesos under the terms of the current agreements, the state-owned electric utility will go bankrupt.
He also threatened to sue the companies if they refused to show flexibility in agreeing to new terms.
Later in the day, the three companies all said separately that the contracts they signed are both legal and transparent and that social conflicts and/or legal challenges are responsible for the delays.
TransCanada said it cannot complete pipelines it was contracted to build in Hidalgo because communities are opposed to the work while Grupo Carso, owned by Mexico’s richest man, Carlos Slim, cited the same reason for delays to its projects in the north of the country.
IEnova said in a statement to the Mexican Stock Exchange that one of its pipelines began operations in 2017 but “sabotage” interrupted supply to the CFE.
Shares in all three companies fell following the remarks made by López Obrador and Bartlett, with IEnova suffering a 4.72% loss while TransCanada and Grupo Carso stock dropped 1.03% and 0.46% respectively.
Amín Vera, director of economic analysis at investment consultancy Black Wall Street Capital, said that “confidence in Mexico is being systematically degraded” by the government.
At yesterday’s press conference, Bartlett also named nine former public officials, including ex-president Felipe Calderón, who he said awarded energy contracts to private companies at which they would later work.
Yesterday's ceremony marking the beginning of construction of a new pier in Zihuatanejo.
A new pier will grace the shore of Zihuatanejo, the popular beach destination in the state of Guerrero.
Governor Héctor Astudillo Flores presided over a groundbreaking ceremony yesterday to begin work on the project, announcing that the state government will support the construction through an investment of 100 million pesos (US $5 million).
Measuring 80 meters long by nine meters wide the new pier will be built on 162 pilings and will include seven docking slips for ships and five for smaller boats and solar-powered lighting.
A provisional pier will be prepared for use until the project is completed.
The governor said all of the state’s tourist destinations were a priority for his administration. He said that the state hopes the new pier would allow Zihuatanejo to become an important stop for cruise ships, as well as provide a boost for marine activity and the tourist economy.
Astudillo also pledged an additional 20 million pesos for the completion of the Paseo del Pescador, a seaside promenade featuring outdoor eateries and stores.
Speaking before an audience that included fishermen, tourism representatives, business people and residents, the governor said he expected that project to be completed by April in time for the 2019 edition of the Tianguis Turístico tourism fair in Acapulco.
Zihuatanejo Mayor Jorge Sánchez Allec thanked the governor for his support and emphasized the importance of the project.
“It is significant that we are starting the year off with the beginning of the pier’s construction, given its importance and the development opportunity that it will represent for those in the tourism and fishing industries . . . . Once completed, I know that we will once again have cruise ships in Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo.”
