No fatalities in crash of Aeroméxico Durango-CDMX flight shortly after takeoff

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July 31, 2018

What appears to be a cartel convoy lined up on a highway in Mexico.

Authorities in Jalisco are investigating a video circulating online that shows a convoy of stationary vehicles surrounded by uniformed and heavily armed men in what appears to be a cartel show of force.

In the video — which was initially shared on social media and via messaging services such as WhatsApp before appearing on news websites — two men, including the suspected cartel member who filmed the footage, make mention of the Jalisco cartel while others appear in shirts emblazoned with the criminal organization’s CJNG (Jalisco New Generation Cartel) initials.

“At the moment, we are verifying the authenticity [of the video] and also [determining] if it is in the state of Jalisco . . .” Interior Secretary Roberto López Lara said.

“The state has the security of all residents of Jalisco under control,” he added.

But the two-minute-long video paints a different picture.

The scores of suspected cartel members — many wearing balaclavas —appear jovial, relaxed and in full control of the highway where the video was filmed.

“We’re just here on patrol,” one masked man says on camera, while the man filming the video derscribes a group of five men “los guapos del cartel” (the handsome men of the cartel).

As the cameraman walks up the stretch of highway, music from two parked cars’ stereos can be heard.

The dissemination of the video yesterday came shortly after federal authorities announced that they had arrested a regional CJNG leader believed responsible for the disappearance of three Italian citizens in January, giving rise to speculation that it was a direct response to the arrest and intended to show off the cartel’s power.

The CJNG first made its presence known in 2009 during former president Felipe Calderón’s administration.

However, during the current administration under President Enrique Peña Nieto the cartel has become one of the most powerful and dangerous criminal organizations in Mexico and controls large swathes of national territory, especially mountainous regions.

This year, members of the cartel founded by Erick “El 85” Valencia and Nemesio “El Mencho” Oseguera Cervantes allegedly kidnapped, tortured and killed three Guadalajara film students and attacked state labor secretary Luis Carlos Nájera.

Beyond Jalisco, the CJNG is engaged in turf wars in several states and announced publicly last week that it is going after the “plaza” in the state of Morelos.

Source: Reforma (sp), Sin Embargo (sp)

López Obrador outlines million-hectare reforestation, jobs plan

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July 31, 2018

López Obrador, in white shirt, talks about his reforestation plans during a visit to the Lacandon jungle.

Mexico’s president-elect traveled on Saturday to the Lacandon jungle rainforest in Chiapas to plan an ambitious reforestation project covering at least 200,000 hectares.

Andrés Manuel López Obrador unveiled the plan — estimated to cost 6 billion pesos (US $322 million) — while on the campaign trail earlier this year.

The Lacandon reforestation is part of a larger project in which López Obrador wants to plant trees on one million hectares in Chiapas and Tabasco.

He intends to plant fruit and timber-yielding trees in a program that is not only about the environment, but jobs.

The project will give landowners financial incentives that will allow them to pay fair wages to farmworkers.

He said 80,000 “permanent, not temporary, jobs” could be created.

The people of Chiapas will be able to “put down roots, work and be happy in the place they were born . . . and those that want to leave can do so because they want to and not because they need to.”

There will be work in the villages and communities and in all the ejidos (communal landholdings) of Chiapas, he predicted.

Source: El Imparcial (sp)

The Narvarte Case: bogged down by a reluctance to investigate

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July 31, 2018

Posters placed on the window at the Mexico City Attorney General's office in protest against inaction on the homicide investigation.

Three years after five people were murdered in the Mexico City neighborhood of Narvarte, authorities remain reluctant to effectively investigate the case and are obstructing measures aimed at establishing the motive and finding out what really happened.

That was the contention put forward by lawyers, victims’ family members and activists yesterday at a press conference, where they also charged that the same authorities have failed to act on recommendations issued by the Mexico City Human Rights Commission (CDH).

Nor have they issued a public apology for their flawed investigation as ordered.

On July 31, 2015, four women — 31-year-old Colombian national Mile Virginia Martin, 18-year-old student and make-up artist Yessenia Quiroz Alfaro, 32-year-old human rights activist Nadia Dominique Vera Pérez and 40-year-old domestic worker Olivia Alejandra Negrete Avilés — and one man, 31-year-old photojournalist Rubén Espinosa Becerril, were killed execution style in an apartment in the middle-class neighborhood.

Leopoldo Maldonado, a lawyer for the human rights organization Article 19, said yesterday the so-called Narvarte case is still “an open wound that continues to fester due to the lack of will of authorities to advance in [establishing] the truth, [serving] justice and [securing] the reparation of damage.”

Three people have been arrested in connection with the case but only one has been sentenced and all of them have alleged that they were tortured while detained.

The two men not yet sentenced have been granted injunctions ordering that the criminal process against them be restarted due to the human rights violations to which they were subjected, while lawyers for the victims said there are contradictions in the testimonies on which the charges against the arrested men were based.

Despite the arrests, news website Sin Embargo contended in a report that many of the questions asked at the start of the investigation remain unanswered: What really happened? How many assailants committed the crime? Why were they killed? Why did the Mexico City Attorney General’s office (PGJDF) put together an alternative version of events?

The CDH issued a report in June 2017 which concluded that the investigation into the case was deficient and poorly managed and that the right to the truth had been violated because the PGJDF did not fully exhaust all lines of investigation.

Upon release of the document, former CDH president Perla Gómez Gallardo criticized authorities for not considering that the motive for the crime could have been related to the particular characteristics of the victims such as “gender, nationality, the practice of journalism or human rights advocacy.”

Vera and Espinosa were both known critics of the now-imprisoned former Veracruz governor Javier Duarte and had separately fled that state to Mexico City after receiving threats and experiencing intimidation.

But Mexico City officials responsible for investigating the crime didn’t initially take those circumstances into account, the CDH said.

Instead, the PGJDF said the crime was related to drug trafficking in which it alleged Martín was involved.

However, the news website Animal Político reported today that there is “not a single element of solid proof that confirms that version” of events.

The CDH report recommended that within a period of three months the PGJDF should prepare a “comprehensive investigation plan” to rectify the omissions in its investigation conducted during the previous two years. The Mexico City government — led at the time by former mayor Miguel Ángel Mancera — almost immediately undertook to do it.

But more than a year later, Maldonado said, the investigation plan hasn’t been formulated and the PGJDF “stubbornly continues to not exhaust all lines of investigation.”

Karla Michele Salas, a lawyer for Vera’s family, said the indifference of authorities has reached the point where they are asking civil organizations representing the victims to “analyze the information and help to close the outstanding lines of investigation.”

One part of the PGJDF probe that she charged was “completely useless” was its investigation into a security company located near the Narvarte apartment. It is owned by Arturo Bermúdez, the Veracruz security chief during Duarte’s administration who is now imprisoned and facing charges related to the forced disappearance of 15 people.

According to the CDH report, the crime scene was also contaminated by the first investigator who entered the apartment because he left footprints and didn’t officially report his entry.

However, Salas said the footprints could also have been made by a fourth person involved in the crime and that possibility must also be considered.

Despite the irregularities and human rights violations detected by the CDH, no officials have been sanctioned for their actions and the same offenses continue to be committed, said human rights activist David Peña.

Instead, Peña said, officials who were directly involved in the investigation in its initial stage have been promoted to positions of greater responsibility.

One of those is the city’s Attorney General. Edmundo Garrido was the lead investigator on the case until his promotion last summer.

Peña charged that authorities are not interested in investigating what happened on July 31, 2015, adding that it appears they are betting on people growing tired of the case and that it will be forgotten.

But Indira Alfaro, Quiroz’s mother, vowed that she and the other victims’ relatives will not let that happen.

“The authorities did their job badly and have only told us to have faith that they did things well but there hasn’t been any progress . . . We’re left with the pain of that same day but we want to remind them [the authorities] and make society see that we’ve had enough of being silenced . . .”

Source: Sin Embargo (sp), Animal Político (sp)

Doctors in Nuevo León reattach arm of six-year-old

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July 31, 2018

Surgery took place at the IMSS hospital in Monterrey.

A six-year-old boy from Monterrey, Nuevo León, who lost an arm when he stuck it inside an operating washing machine on Sunday is recuperating after doctors reattached it.

Red Cross paramedics who were called to the boy’s home stabilized the youngster, retrieved the arm and put it on ice and rushed him to a nearby IMSS hospital.

Later, a team of physicians at the Hospital of Traumatology and Orthopedics No. 21, having decided that surgery was viable, reattached the amputated limb in a 10-hour procedure.

The patient is now being monitored constantly to ensure the limb is not rejected.

Source: IMSS (sp)

US man wanted on sex charges found 27 years later in Nayarit

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July 31, 2018

A man wanted in the United States on sex charges that date back nearly three decades was found living in a small town in Nayarit.

Earl Jay Slaton, 72, was arrested Saturday in San Juan de Abajo, located about 30 kilometers northeast of Puerto Vallarta.

He has been a fugitive since 1990 when he fled charges of sexual battery and aggravated child abuse in Lee County, southwest Florida.

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The Lee County Sheriff’s Office, working with the United States Marshals Service, discovered that Slaton was living with his new wife in the Nayarit town.

“With the assistance of the Mexican Federal Police and the U.S. marshals stationed in Mexico City, Slaton was located living near the small village of San Juan de Abajo,” the U.S. Marshals Service said.

Mexican police arrested Slaton on Saturday and he was deported the same day to Los Angeles due to his undocumented immigration status.

He is now being held at the Lee County jail. His arraignment is scheduled for August 26.

U.S. authorities believe Slaton had been living in Mexico for about 26 years.

Source: El Horizonte (sp), News-Press (en)

Through a non-profit, Tlaloc the rain god provides water in CDMX and beyond

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Susannah Rigg

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July 31, 2018

A Tlaloque rainwater capture system in San Gregorio Atlapulco, Xochimilco. Cate Cameron

An ingenious rainwater harvesting system developed by a Mexico City organization is helping the most marginalized communities of the city have access to clean water.

“Tlaloques were helpers of the rain god, Tlaloc,” Nabani Vera Tenorio told Mexico News Daily, explaining the name behind the system developed by Isla Urbana.

As the Mexica cosmology goes, Tlaloques were children that Tlaloc sent around the world with clay pots full of water. When Tlaloc gave the order, the Tlaloques would smash the pots together, creating thunder and letting water rain down upon the earth from above.

It is the perfect name for the system created by this highly skilled and dedicated organization to collect and filter rain. After all, these filters are helping Tlaloc to make the most of his abundant offering.

Anyone who has spent time in Mexico City will know that this bustling capital can see more rainfall in an hour than many places see in a week. The streets flood, there is traffic chaos and the storms can have an almost apocalyptic feel.

And with a rainy season that lasts for many months, it seems incongruous that a city with so much rain should suffer from constant water shortages. Residents in even the most connected areas sometimes go without water for days at a time and some 250,000 people have no access to piped water at all.

Perhaps the fact that around 21.5 million people live in this city built on a lake goes some way to explain the supply-demand issue. The population, including the greater city limits, has grown from around 13 million in 1980 to 21.5 million in 2018, putting an obvious strain on the water supply.

Seventy per cent of Mexico City’s water comes from underground aquifers but as they are being drained to meet the city’s water needs, Mexico’s capital is sinking. In the last 100 years alone the city has sunk some 10 meters.

In addition, Tenorio explained that an estimated 40% of the city’s water is lost due to leaks in the old, sputtering underground pipes. This means that for every liter of water used another 40 milliliters is lost.

Isla Urbana has been working to find solutions to Mexico’s water problems since 2009. It all started with a degree thesis and a woman called Clara.

Renata Fenton and Enrique Lomnitz were studying for degrees in industrial design when they came upon the idea of working on a project that would help their home city. For research they talked to the Señora Clara, who lived in Ajusco on the outskirts of Mexico City, to find out what her needs were.

Of the many problems she faced, the lack of access to water was the most pressing and the one that Fenton and Lomnitz decided to focus on. An idea that began with a single house has now made a big impact in the city and beyond: 7,500 rainwater harvesting units have been installed across the country, close to 54,000 people helped and some 333 million liters of water saved so far.

Tenorio explained that Mexico City is the perfect environment for the system. The flat roofs and the fast and heavy rainfall make conditions for collection perfect. “The first volume of water cleans the sky and the roof,” explained Tenorio, which allows for cleaner water to fill the cistern and as long as the system is maintained correctly, it provides water that is of drinking quality.

While there are a few variables, it is possible that a family of four that has a good size roof and saves water can have enough for the whole year, Tenorio said. That means one entire family is not draining the average 920 liters of water per day from the aquifer.

The system not only saves water but also drastically changes the quality of life of the recipients, who no longer have to rely on water delivery trucks or walk each day to collect water for their homes.

Isla Urbana is focusing its efforts on the areas of the city that have no access to municipal water. Remote parts of Tlalpan, Milpa Alta and Xochimilco are of particular focus.

But a system cannot be installed and left. It requires work and maintenance on the part of the homeowners. Residents who are interested in capturing their rainwater have to attend a mandatory workshop to understand their role in the upkeep of the Tlaloque.

In some cases, they are also asked to pay a small amount for the systems, a well-researched and proven way of creating more engaged recipients. It is important that the systems are being used properly and effectively for the benefit of the residents and the city as a whole, so the Isla Urbana team provides yearly maintenance and is always on hand for questions and queries.

What about standing water and mosquitoes? The systems are mosquito-proof, tightly sealed and protected with mosquito netting to avoid the possibility of the spread of disease.

As well as supplying the rainwater capturing systems, Isla Urbana sees it as its duty to educate citizens about water usage. With a project called La Carpa Azul or The Blue Tent, the plan is to make Mexican citizens active rather than passive water users.

To do this they work with communities and with schools, offering theater productions and art projects related to water.

Tenorio described how positive acts like coming together as a community and painting a gray wall with a mural of an “axolotl watering the houses and seeing them bloom, for example” creates a more open and enjoyable space from which to talk about and think about water.

Isla Urbana’s work is proven to create resilience too. Last year’s September 19 earthquake left a large number of people struggling without water for weeks. In San Gregorio Atlapulco, a remote part of Xochimilco where Isla Urbana works, the houses with the Tlaloque rainwater systems continued to have water after the earthquake while everyone else did not.

“They were the only ones who had water and they started to share it with their neighbors,” Tenorio explained. The earthquake also motivated the team to create an emergency drinking water system to be prepared for any future emergency.

As well as providing the Tlaloques free of charge or at a very small fee to marginalized communities, the organization also runs a business entity that sells the systems to anyone looking to live a more sustainable life.

The small profit made from selling the products is used to help fund the operations of the social side of the business.

While the kits cannot be installed in buildings higher than about three floors (because the water collected would simply not be enough to serve all the apartments) Isla Urbana does sell household kits that can be easily installed and help residents use up to 50% less water.

Despite the many challenges the city faces with regard to water, Isla Urbana feels positive about the future. The new government is already indicating it wants to collaborate with the organization to solve those problems, calling on Isla Urbana’s expertise and its new, alternatives ways of dealing with the city’s water shortages.

By the end of the year, Isla Urbana’s goal is to have 10,000 water-harvesting systems installed and Tlaloc’s little helpers will continue to provide water for those who need it most.

To find out more about the work that Isla Urbana is doing across Mexico City and beyond, check out their website.

Susannah Rigg is a freelance writer and Mexico specialist based in Mexico City. Her work has been published by BBC Travel, Condé Nast Traveler, CNN Travel and The Independent UK among others. Find out more about Susannah on her website.

Book finds new generation of ‘caciques’ among today’s governors

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July 30, 2018

Paxman and his new book about effect of democratization. — Paxman and his new book about the effect of democratization.

The editor and contributing author of a new book that compares and contrasts six modern-day political leaders with their counterparts from the past has charged that democratization in Mexico has given rise to a new generation of caciques, or regional strongmen (and women).

Andrew Paxman, an English historian and journalist based in Mexico, told the newspaper El Universal that state governors today could equally be described as “the new viceroys” because of the autonomy they enjoy — and power they exercise — while in government.

The book Los Gobernadores: Caciques del pasado y del presente (The Governors: Caciques of the past and present) examines the recent governorships of five states as well as the administration of president-elect Andrés Manuel López Obrador when he was mayor of Mexico City and the political reigns in days gone by of leaders in the same six entities.

The modern-day politicians included in the book were mostly chosen because at some stage in the past they showed interest in pursuing the presidency, Paxman said.

They include former governor of Hidalgo and ex-interior secretary Miguel Ángel Osorio Chong, former México state governor Eruviel Ávila, ex-governor of Puebla Rafael Moreno Valle, the now-imprisoned former governor of Veracruz Javier Duarte and the ex-governor of Yucatán, Ivonne Ortega Pacheco.

“We didn’t consider the most prominent leaders but rather those who were possible presidential candidates 15 months ago when the [book] project started. Five of the six — all except Javier Duarte — had expressed an interest in competing for the presidency and that’s interesting because it’s a sign of their growing power,” Paxman said.

“Features [of their administrations] to control the state such as selectively using violence, sometimes killing inconvenient people and a tendency to stick their hand in the money chest, to get rich from their position, were tendencies that these people admitted to.”

Paxman, a professor and researcher at the Center for Research and Teaching in Economics (CIDE) in Mexico City, said “this new caciquismo is the result of federal level democratization and the decentralization of power and treasury resources.”

He also said the governorship of a state was previously the “peak of power” to which a state-based politician would aspire but explained, “that’s not the case anymore, governors are aspiring to be president.”

Paxman stressed that not all the modern-day leaders profiled in the book were as cacique-like as each other in their conduct while in power, adding that López Obrador was included because of allegations that he had acted authoritatively while in office from 2000 to 2005.

However, he explained that a close examination of his administration revealed that his governance style was notably democratic.

“. . . He delegated a lot and didn’t often enforce [his views]. He didn’t try to coerce the press and refused opportunities to cultivate a corporatist power base,” Paxman said.

“Despite all the accusations and all the contradictions he [creates] himself in terms of his statements and vague proposals, the precedents we saw in his five years of government are encouraging. It appears that he will govern much more democratically than his critics say,” he added.

Among the challenges López Obrador will face as president, Paxman said, will be to promote a more democratic culture at the state level and to ensure that governors are held accountable for their actions.

He also said the president-elect will have to “implement mechanisms” to help him fight corruption, charging that he has put too much faith in the belief that he can hold himself up as an example of virtue and expect others to follow.

Source: El Universal (sp)

12-year-old Mateo has all it takes to become ‘a great musician’

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July 30, 2018

Mateo González Tamariz is just 12 years old but already well on his way to a successful career as a pianist, with pieces by Beethoven and Debussy in his enviable repertoire.

The Veracruz native performed a concert at the National Palace in Mexico City Saturday, playing his favorite sonata by the former composer and Children’s Corner by the latter.

“Mateo has a talent that covers everything needed to be a great musician,” Luisa González Parda, the youngster’s teacher and an acclaimed pianist herself, told the newspaper Milenio.

“We’re talking about a virtuosity in terms of energy, strength and speed [combined] with sweetness, communication and art,” she added.

Mateo, one of the standout students of the “Las Notas de Guido” music program and the Veracruz State Institute of Music, told Milenio that when he is on stage he tries to block everything out and focus solely on the music.

“Sometimes I don’t hear the audience, I put myself inside the music and in my mind, I start to think of stories that relate to what I’m playing. And suddenly everyone claps and it’s comforting. In the last pieces, it feels like the piano belongs to you,” he said.

Mateo has been honing his musical talent for almost half of his short life.

His mother, Elisa Tamariz Domínguez, explained that at the age of seven Mateo started playing around on the same piano that she had played as a child.

It wasn’t long before he was making up his own ditties, she said, adding “in six months he advanced as much as I did in five years.”

Now, Mateo describes music as a “way of life” and his passion for his instrument is obvious for all to see and hear.

“The sound of the piano is very beautiful, it’s spectacular. You can make sounds [ranging from] the very faint to the very loud,” he said.

The prodigy has been rewarded for his dedication and passion by receiving first and second places in two national music contests while he has also performed at the Universidad Veracruzana, the Museum of Anthropology in Xalapa and the International Piano Festival at the National Autonomous University (UNAM) in Mexico City.

Despite his growing experience, Mateo admits that he still gets nervous before he plays and also said he is worried about whether he will become as successful as he hopes to in the future.

But judging by his performance at Saturday’s recital as part of the National Institute of Fine Arts’ “Young people in music” program, his teacher’s acclaim and his love for his instrument, a glittering career probably awaits.

Source: Milenio (sp)

Manzanillo tunnel opened; work on port to begin in September

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July 30, 2018