Mexico to present its highest honor to Trump advisor, son-in-law for work on trade deal

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November 28, 2018

Videgaray, left, and Kushner, praised for trade deal.

The federal government will bestow Mexico’s highest honor for foreigners on Jared Kushner, senior White House adviser and United States President Trump’s son-in-law, a decision that has triggered a backlash on social media.

A statement issued by the Secretariat of Foreign Affairs (SRE) said the government will admit Kushner to the Order of the Aztec Eagle because of “his significant contributions” to the process to negotiate an updated trade agreement between Mexico, the United States and Canada.

“Mr. Kushner played a fundamental role throughout the whole process, decisively supporting the development of trade talks between the two countries, thus achieving satisfactory results in a new economic agreement . . . .” the statement said.

Kushner’s participation in the negotiation process was also crucial to “avoiding a unilateral exit of the United States” from the three-way pact, it added.

President Peña Nieto is expected to formally present the award to Kushner tomorrow on the sidelines of the G20 Summit in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the newspaper Reforma reported yesterday, citing unidentified government sources.

Past Aztec Eagle honorees include former South African president Nelson Mandela, Colombian novelist Gabriel García Márquez, Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, American businessman and philanthropist Bill Gates and lead singer of the Irish band U2 and activist Bono.

Foreign Affairs Secretary Luis Videgaray, who reportedly cultivated a close personal friendship with Kushner, said today that the new North American trade agreement, to be known as the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), will be signed in Buenos Aires Friday morning.

Peña Nieto and his government leave office Saturday.

News that Kushner would be honored with the prestigious recognition quickly became a trending topic on Twitter, where several prominent Mexicans criticized the move.

“Kushner is the son-in-law of he who called Mexicans ‘murderers and rapists’. Giving him the Aztec Eagle reflects a supreme attitude of humiliation and cowardice,” historian Enrique Krauze wrote.

Actor Gael García Bernal said that the decision to grant Kushner the Aztec Eagle was “tremendously shameful” and devalued the worth of the award.

Well-known political analysts also took to Twitter to voice their outrage.

“The Aztec Eagle to Kushner? Really? This is the way that this unworthy government says goodbye. A perfect crown to its indecency,” Jesús Silva-Herzog wrote.

“The Aztec Eagle to the son-in-law of a president who says that the majority of Mexicans are rapists, who locks up migrant children in cages and has done nothing more than insult Mexico over and over again. The last kick [in the guts] from Peña Nieto before falling into eternal oblivion,” Esteban Illades said.

According to media reports, Kushner has been Foreign Secretary Videgaray’s go-to man in the White House and the pair have become close.

In August 2016 it was Videgaray, finance secretary at the time, who convinced Peña Nieto to invite Trump, then a candidate for president, to Mexico for a meeting at the National Palace.

At a joint press conference afterwards, Trump repeated a pledge to build a border wall while Peña Nieto remained silent.

The decision to invite Trump to the country was widely slammed by Mexicans and contributed to a further decline in the popularity of an already unpopular president.

Videgaray resigned from cabinet due to the backlash before returning as foreign secretary in January 2017.

Peña Nieto’s approval rating is just 24%, according to polling firm Consulta Mitofsky, as he prepares to leave office after a six-year term plagued by corruptions scandals and high levels of violence.

His successor, leftist political veteran Andrés Manuel López Obrador, will be sworn in as president Saturday, with Trump’s daughter and Kushner’s wife Ivanka expected to be in attendance alongside United States Vice-President Mike Pence and other world leaders.

Source: Reuters (en), Animal Político (sp), Milenio (sp)

Indigenous economic zone under consideration in Yucatán

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MND Staff

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November 28, 2018

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The indigenous economic would be centered on Valladolid.

Yucatán would become the first state in Mexico to boast a special indigenous economic zone (ZEEI) under a proposal promoted by two economists, a dozen mayors and the governor.

Jesús Bastarrachea Cabrera, one of two original proponents of the initiative, told the newspaper El Economista that the ZEEI would encompass 12 municipalities in the east of the state with Valladolid serving as the zone’s commercial center.

All 12 have high indigenous populations and six of them are among the 10 poorest in Yucatán, according to data from Coneval, a federal agency that measures poverty levels.

Bastarrachea acknowledged that one of the seven special economic zones (SEZs) created by decree by President Peña Nieto is located in Progreso, Yucatán, but contended that the east of the state was too far away to see any significant benefits from it.

“We’re talking about a distance of 200 kilometers, it’s another region, it’s the most marginalized area of the state of Yucatán, located exactly halfway on the highway between Mérida and Cancún . . .” he said.

Bastarrachea explained that the main cause of poverty in the 12 municipalities is a lack of employment opportunities, a situation he believes the ZEEI proposal can change.

“The idea is to attract large, international pharmaceutical research centers with tax incentives and the [local] flora . . . The objective is for scientific companies to set up and use the Cancún and Chichén Itzá airports to transport their products and personnel,” he said.

Bastarrachea added that a “complementary focus” of the region would be traditional Mayan herbal medicine.

“. . . The goal would be to supply [medicinal plants] to the west coast of the United States,” he said.

“The proposal has been well-received by [business] chambers . . . [including] the Business Coordinating Council [CCE], the National Chamber for Industrial Transformation [Canacintra] and the Mexican Employers Federation [Coparmex],” Bastarrachea added.

The economist said that members of the incoming federal government, including future finance secretary Carlos Urzúa, are also aware of the proposal but explained that in order for it to become reality, changes would have to be made to the Federal Law on Special Economic Zones.

The law as it stands states that only one SEZ can exist in any single state. In addition, it stipulates that states where any new SEZ is created must be among the 10 poorest in the country whereas Yucatán is now the 12th poorest of Mexico’s 32 entities.

“. . . The Secretariat of Finance and Public Credit [SHCP] would tell us that we don’t qualify,” Bastarrachea conceded before suggesting an alternative qualification route.

“We want the Valladolid region to join [the existing SEZs] but if we follow the process currently [established] by law we wouldn’t be included because we’re not in one of the poorest states anymore, we want a ranking at the municipal level, a regional level so that there is an opportunity . . . to be included.”

Next month, Bastarrachea said, a letter signed by the 12 mayors and Governor Mauricio Vila will be presented to the new government to formally propose the ZEEI idea.

The municipalities proposed for inclusion are Tixcacalcupul, Chichimilá, Uayma, Chikindzonot, Tekom, Chankom, Chemax, Kaua, Temozón, Cuncunul, Tinum and Valladolid.

Source: El Economista (sp)

Phones belonging to colleagues of slain journalist were targeted with spyware

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MND Staff

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November 27, 2018

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Messages received by Río Doce's Villareal that contained infection links.

Two colleagues of murdered Sinaloa journalist Javier Valdez were targeted by repeated attempts to infect their mobile telephones with spyware, a new report based on a forensic analysis has revealed.

The Canadian research organization Citizen Lab said in a report published today that two days after Valdez was killed on May 15, 2017, Andrés Villarreal, a journalist and director of information at the Culiacán newspaper Río Doce, began receiving suspicious messages on his phone.

The first was disguised as a news alert, stating that the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) was “responsible for the execution” of Valdez, who was a co-founder of Río Doce and a drug-trafficking reporter.

The message invited Villarreal to click a link to access the full story.

Had Villarreal clicked on the link, the Citizen Lab said, “his phone would have been turned into a digital spy in his pocket.”

The “news alert” was later determined to be a carefully crafted attempt to infect his phone with Pegasus spyware, which the federal Attorney General’s office (PGR) purchased in October 2014 for US $32 million.

The spyware infiltrates smartphones and monitors calls, texts, email and contacts and can use the device’s microphone and camera for surveillance.

Villarreal continued to receive attempts to compromise his phone for a week until the operator of the spyware selected a new target: Río Doce director Ismael Bojórquez.

Messages sent to both targets’ phones followed themes common to other cases of targeting, some of which had been publicly known for as long as eight months prior to Valdez’s death.

The messages were personalized and related to work and family issues. They included purportedly compromising romantic material, news alerts, and alarming billing notifications, the Citizen Lab said.

Both Villarreal and Bojórquez were aware of the reports about the abuse of Pegasus in Mexico and didn’t click any links contained in the suspicious messages they received.

According to the two men, officials from the Criminal Investigation Agency (AIC), a division of the PGR, had arrived in Culiacán immediately prior to the arrival of the messages as the agency had been given responsibility for the investigation into Valdez’s death.

One of the main suspects in the murder of the 50-year-old journalist was charged with homicide last week, the PGR said. One other man implicated in the crime has also been charged.

While research conducted by Citizen Lab has identified multiple current and previous Pegasus deployments in Mexico, the PGR is the only entity that has been publicly identified as a customer of NSO Group, an Israeli company that develops and sells the spyware.

“I believe they wanted to search our conversations and messages for clues to the murder of Javier, but we are absolutely against this,” Bojórquez told The New York Times.

“Nothing obtained illegally should be used in an investigation, and especially not from those who are involved professionally and emotionally to the victim.”

The current federal government bought the Pegasus spyware on the condition that it only be used to target terrorists and criminals.

But Citizen Lab, working with Mexican collaborators, has now identified a total of 24 individuals who are known to have been abusively targeted by the spyware in Mexico.

Other targets include journalist Carmen Aristegui and her young son, National Action Party (PAN) politicians, anti-corruption activists, lawyers working on a controversial multi-homicide case in Mexico City and some of those representing the families of 43 students who disappeared in Guerrero in 2014.

Citizen Lab said the targeting has another disturbing implication: “Pegasus spyware might have been used by officials covertly trying to ascertain just how much victims’ families, lawyers, and investigators knew about who was responsible for the crimes.”

After The New York Times published an exposé in June 2017 on the use of Pegasus against critics of the Mexican government, federal authorities denounced the surveillance and initiated an investigation into abuse of the spyware.

But the investigation has gone nowhere, The Times reported today. “Not a single individual has been punished for abusing the system.”

Source: The Citizen Lab (en), The New York Times (en)

Pemex triples estimate of Veracruz oil field’s reserves

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Tony Richards

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November 27, 2018

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Pemex has nearly tripled its estimate of the reserves in a recently discovered onshore oil field in Veracruz, making it the biggest discovery in 25 years, a Pemex official said.

The Ixachi field, located 72 kilometers south of the city of Veracruz, was discovered in November last year, when its 3P reserves (proved, probable and possible) were estimated at 366 million boe (barrels of oil equivalent).

But the state oil company said at the time of its discovery that reserves could be larger. Today it revised the figure to more than one billion boe after drilling two new wells.

Source: Milenio (sp)

Funding shortfalls, residents’ opposition leave CDMX megaprojects unfinished

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MND Staff

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November 27, 2018

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Extending Line 12 of the Metro is one of the unfinished projects.

The Mexico City government will leave five large infrastructure projects unfinished when its six-year term ends next week.

The Secretariat of Public Works and Services (Sobse) cited a shortfall in federal funding and opposition from residents as the main reasons for the failure to complete the projects, in which a total investment of 29.5 billion pesos (US $1.4 billion) was anticipated.

The incomplete works, which will be inherited by incoming mayor Claudia Sheinbaum, are extensions to line 12 of the subway system and line 5 of the Metrobús network, construction of section III of the Mexico City-Toluca passenger train, a new hospital in the western borough of Cuajimalpa and a children’s museum in the eastern borough of Iztapalapa.

According to Sobse data, the projected cost of extending line 12 of the Metro so that it links to Line 1 at the Observatorio station was just under 9.5 billion pesos (US $462.9 million) with full funding supposed to come from the federal government.

However, city authorities have so far only received just over 5.5 billion pesos.

In addition to the lack of funding, Public Works Secretary Gerardo Báez told the newspaper El Universal that the project had been held up because authorities in Álvaro Obregón refused to grant permission for a tunnel to run beneath their borough headquarters.

Nevertheless, almost 2,000 meters of the 3,000 meters of tunnel required to connect the two subway lines has been built, he explained.

“Why didn’t we make more progress? Firstly, [a lack of] resources from the federal government and another factor was the release of the right of way. There are 54 buildings that have to be purchased but there are no resources . . . obviously that doesn’t allow us to advance,” Báez said.

He added that the project was also delayed due to the time and money spent on repairing an existing section of the so-called golden line which was found to have construction problems and consequently closed soon after opening in late 2012.

“. . . If that 1.1 billion pesos [US $53.6 million] and the time the redevelopment took had been allocated to the extension, [the project] wouldn’t have stopped,” Báez said.

With regard to section III of the Mexico City-Toluca train project, whose terminus in the capital will also link with the Observatorio subway station, the Sobse chief said that constant changes to the railroad’s route was one of the main reasons why it hadn’t met the scheduled timeframe.

Landowners in Cuajimalpa obtained court orders that prevented the seizure of 1,111 square meters of land on which the elevated line was intended to run while protests against the logging of trees in the same borough also forced a modification to the route.

Federal funding for section III has fallen almost 4 billion pesos short of the 16.8 billion pesos the Mexico City government was expecting.

A 20-kilometer extension to line 5 of the Metrobús system was delayed, Báez said, because state-owned petroleum pipelines had to be rerouted on a three-kilometer stretch of the extended line and residents in the borough of Coyoacán have opposed the route.

Despite the delays, the new government will be in a position to open the line extension, which includes 35 new stations and was funded by the World Bank, within its first 100 days in office, the outgoing secretary said.

The fourth project facing delays is the Cuajimalpa Hospital.

After a gas explosion at the Cuajimalpa Maternity Hospital in January 2015, which killed five people and left at least 72 injured, the city government announced that a new general hospital would be built at the site with an expected opening date of mid-2017.

However, the project has been opposed by community groups who have filed six amparos, or injunctions, against it, the most recent of which resulted in an indefinite suspension of work.

“We don’t know the reason why there is amparo after amparo,” Báez said. “It’s illogical, it’s a hospital that [already] existed. From my point of view, there are vested interests.”

Finally, the secretary said that the Iztapalapa Interactive Children’s Museum is around 40% complete and is expected to be finished by the end of next year. Construction delays were related to problems with the museum’s design, Báez said.

Sheinbaum, who will be sworn in as mayor on December 5, has committed to investing 10.2 billion pesos (US $498.3 million) next year to improve and expand public transportation in the capital.

Source: El Universal (sp)

Growers will have 466,000 natural Christmas trees available

By

César Hernández

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November 27, 2018

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Looking for a natural Christmas tree? Growers who are part of a federal forestry program will have more than 466,000 available this season.

The National Forestry Commission (Conafor) said in a statement that the top producing states are México and Mexico City, which will see a yield this season of 200,000 and 160,884 trees respectively.

There are 431 producers in 19 states who receive federal support to grow the trees on a total of 5,172 hectares.

The federal program promotes the use of non-forest land and land that has not been used for agricultural purposes. It also intended to help discourage the poaching of wild trees.

The production of the pine trees is a sustainable activity: the number of trees planted every season equals the number harvested. It also offers year-round employment.

Conafor said the trees are harvested at five to eight years, and plantations have a yield of 2,000 to 4,000 trees per hectare.

Source: Informador (sp)

Judge okays release of ex-governor on bail of 140 million pesos

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César Hernández

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November 27, 2018

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Sonora ex-governor Guillermo Padrés Elías could soon be released from prison after spending two years awaiting trial on corruption charges.

A federal judge ruled in Padrés’s favor yesterday after he requested a revision of the preventive imprisonment ordered after his arrest in November 2016.

Bail was ordered at 140 million pesos (US $6.8 million).

Upon release Padrés’ whereabouts will be tracked with an electronic bracelet, and he will have to report to the court every 15 days. He is also forbidden to leave the country.

The ex-governor faces federal charges of money laundering and state charges of torture, abuse of power and influence peddling among others.

Padrés was governor from 2009 until 2015.

Source: Infobae (sp)

Supreme Court to examine obligatory benefits for domestic workers

By

MND Staff

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November 27, 2018

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Benefits for domestic workers eyed by Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court (SCJN) will examine a proposal next week that would make it mandatory to pay social security benefits to domestic workers.

Justice Alberto Pérez Dayán has recommended that the second chamber of the court rule against an article in the federal Social Security Law that states that paying benefits to housekeepers is voluntary.

The law as it stands has resulted in most domestic workers not receiving benefits that other employees are legally entitled to.

Pérez’s proposal argues that there is no constitutional justification to exclude the mostly female workers, commonly known as muchachas or maids, from the social security system.

“[It’s not just] a discriminatory action that perpetuates and reinforces the social marginalization of women who work in homes but also a violation [of their rights] that cannot be overcome simply because said workers can access the voluntary regime,” the proposal states.

The initiative recommends that the government and the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS) introduce a pilot program over a period of 18 months that is easy for employers to implement and that Congress make the necessary legislative reforms to ensure that domestic workers’ right to access benefits is enshrined in the law.

The newspaper Reforma said today that it is unclear if a majority of judges will support the proposal because some have shown that they are not inclined to support court rulings that include recommendations or suggestions to other authorities.

The December 5 session will be the last time the second chamber of the SCJN sits in 2018, meaning that if the proposal is rejected, an examination of an amended version would not happen before the middle of January.

According to a 2016 employment poll conducted by the National Statistics Agency, 95% of domestic workers are women and only 4% of those workers are employed under the terms of a contract in which their rights and obligations are clearly stated.

Source: Reforma (sp)

Mexico asks US for investigation into using tear gas against migrants

By

MND Staff

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November 27, 2018

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Migrants in Tijuana are in for a long wait.

The Mexican government has made a formal request to United States authorities to conduct a full investigation into the use of tear gas on Sunday against Central American migrants at the border between Tijuana and San Diego.

The Secretariat of Foreign Affairs (SRE) presented a diplomatic note to the United States embassy in Mexico to request the probe into what it described as non-lethal weapons.

In a statement, the SRE said that Mexico also “reiterated its commitment to continue protecting the human rights and safety of migrants at all times.”

Around 500 migrants rushed the border Sunday morning after bypassing a Federal Police blockade and crossing the dried-up Tijuana River.

United States authorities said that tear gas was only used after the group began throwing rocks at border agents.

Women and children were among those affected by the tear gas. British aid organization Oxfam described its use as shameful.

“Images of barefoot children choking on tear gas thrown by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol should shock us to our core,” said Vicki Gass, Oxfam America senior policy advisor for Central America.

The U.S. shut the border at San Ysidro, the busiest crossing in the world, for several hours following the incident.

The Mexican government said in a statement that it would “immediately deport” those who “in a violent manner tried to cross Mexico’s border with the United States.” The National Immigration Institute (INM) said yesterday that 98 people had been arrested and deported.

The INM said that more deportations will follow if investigations identify more migrants who participated in the attempted border breach.

United States Customs and Border Protection commissioner Kevin McAleenan said that 69 migrants were arrested on the California side of the border after crossing illegally.

He also said that the border patrol’s use of force policy allows the use of tear gas and that there were no serious injuries, but added that the incident would be reviewed.

“As the events unfolded yesterday, quick, decisive, and effective action to close San Ysidro and – on the Mexican side, El Chaparral [border bridge] – prevented an extremely dangerous situation of hundreds and potentially over a thousand migrants seeking to rush the border through vehicle lanes,” McAleenan said.

On Twitter yesterday, United States President Trump urged Mexican authorities to deport “the flag waving migrants, many of whom are stone-cold criminals,” adding that the border could be closed permanently “if need be.”

Later yesterday, Trump defended the actions of border agents, describing the tear gas used as “very safe” and “a minor form” and declaring: “Here’s the bottom line. Nobody’s coming into our country unless they come in legally.”

More than 7,000 mainly Honduran migrants fleeing violence and poverty are currently in Tijuana or other parts of Baja California, according to Mexican authorities, and thousands more are farther south in the country.

They could face waits of several months or more to lodge asylum requests with U.S. authorities due to an existing backlog of claimants.

The migrants, most of whom are staying in a Tijuana sports complex, have overwhelmed local authorities, prompting Mayor Juan Gastélum to declare a humanitarian crisis last week.

Source: El Universal (sp)

Vuhl, the luxury sports car that’s made in Mexico

By

MND Staff

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November 26, 2018

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In the market for a high-performance, luxury sports car? There’s no reason to look beyond Mexico.

Vuhl, a company created by the brothers Iker and Guillermo Echeverría, is designing and making ultra-light sports cars at a plant in Querétaro.

“Vuhl is a Mexican company formed by Mexican partners with Mexican capital and we make very high-performance cars,” Guillermo told broadcaster CNN.

The design of each car is personalized with an average weight of just 600 kilograms and a top speed of 245-255 kilometers per hour.

“The speed is achieved [by using] very light materials, carbon fiber, titanium, aluminum and high alloy steel with a highly optimized structural design,” Guillermo explained.

Although some parts are imported from Europe, Vuhl cars are made completely in Mexico by a 100% Mexican workforce.

“They’re not assemblers, these are people with a much higher level [of knowledge], even a different level of enthusiasm. The people at Vuhl are trained for years,” Guillermo said.

Currently, the company is making just one or two cars a month although it has the capacity to make around 60 vehicles annually.

However, Guillermo said that there were no plans to significantly increase production of the vehicles, which sell for between 1.6 and 2.2 million pesos (US $77,000 – $105,000).

Vuhl has sold vehicles in the United Kingdom and the Middle East but the Echevarría brothers hope to find new customers closer to home in Mexico and the United States.

In 2016, the company opened its own boutique dealership in Mexico City and the same year its Vuhl 05 model featured in the Goodwood Festival of Speed in West Sussex, England.

Source: El Financiero (sp)