Homicides surge in Mexico City: worst four-month period in 20 years

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May 31, 2018

Mexico City homicides, first four-month period of each year since 1998.

Mexico City has recorded its most violent first four-month period of any year of the past two decades with 382 intentional homicides between January 1 and the end of April.

The figure is 14% higher than the 335 recorded in the same period last year and 24% higher than the murder rate registered in the first four months of 1998, when there were 309 homicides.

There have not been more than 300 murders in Mexico City in the January-April period of any other year in the past 20.

Based on National Public Security System (SNSP) statistics, the average daily homicide rate in the capital to April 30 was 3.1.

The SNSP data, which compiles statistics provided by the Mexico City Attorney General’s office (PGJ), shows that the number of murders has increased in the first four months of every year since 2015.

Compared to 2014 — when homicides fell to 241 in the first four-month period from 256 the previous year — the crime has increased by 58%.

In the past 20 years, the lowest number of homicides recorded in a first four-month period was in 2006, with 207.

According to Mexico City authorities, most of the murders committed this year were not linked to organized crime and are not indicative of an outbreak of violence on the streets of the capital.

PGJ statistics reveal that eight out of every 10 homicides were the result of personal fights or attacks in revenge, in which alcohol consumption and/or firearms were involved.

However, a report published today in the newspaper Milenio said that homicides have increased since authorities began security operations against criminal organizations dedicated to narcomenudeo, or retail drug dealing.

Milenio cited the Tláhuac Cartel in the southern borough of the same name, Los Rodolfos in Xochimilco and La Unión de Tepito and La Fuerza Anti-Unión in the central borough of Cuauhtémoc among the organizations authorities have targeted.

The marines, backed up by police, carried out an operation in July last year that resulted in the death of the boss of the Tláhuac Cartel, known by the alias “El Ojos.”

Narco-blockades made an unprecedented appearance in Mexico City following the death of the gang leader and seven of his sicarios, or hitmen.

Mexico City Mayor José Ramón Amieva admitted yesterday that criminal gangs with “links all over the country” use locations in the capital to store and sell drugs but rejected any suggestion that drugs are grown or processed the city.

A joint 2017 report by the city’s Public Security Secretariat and the PGJ identified 20,000 places where drugs were being bought and sold at the start of last year.

Another report by the National and Mexico City Citizens’ Observatories published last month showed that retail drug trafficking soared by 113% in the first quarter of 2018.

Source: Milenio (sp)

Students’ smartphone application provides basic Spanish-Mixtec translation

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César Hernández

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May 31, 2018

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The IPN students and their smartphone app.

Anyone at a loss for a word in the Mixtec language can now turn to a smartphone app for help.

MixtecApp caters to an estimated 660,000 Mexicans who speak Mixtec, which sits in fourth place among the most widely used indigenous languages, behind Náhuatl, Mayan and Zapotec.

Two computer engineering students at the National Polytechnic Institute (IPN) in Mexico City created the simple smartphone application that teaches the user a basic vocabulary of Mixtec words.

The intention of Ernesto Hernández Bernal and Leo Zuriel Hernández Castillo was to contribute to the conservation of the Mixtec language. The former grew up on a ranch near Tlaxiaco, Oaxaca, where it was the first language of his parents’ generation.

But few people of his age can speak it fluently.

It took the duo over a year to fully research the Tlaxiaco variant of the language. Once a complete vocabulary was compiled, the development stage of the app took another six months.

In its current version, MixtecApp offers the user a basic vocabulary divided into four categories: animals and insects; fruits, vegetables and seeds; numbers; and colors.

Upon accessing a category, the phone displays a picture of the word in question, as well as its spelling in Spanish and Mixtec. After pressing a play button, the correct Mixtec pronunciation can be heard.

The students plan to further develop their Android-based mobile app, which doesn’t need an internet connection to function, by offering a true translation option, in which the user will be able to type a word in Spanish and obtain its Mixtec translation and pronunciation.

Mixtec is one of 68 native languages spoken in Mexico. Fourteen of those are considered at risk of being lost due to declining numbers of speakers.

Mixtec is spoken mostly in the states of Oaxaca and Guerrero, where linguists have counted more than 40 regional variations of the language.

Source: El Financiero (sp)

Mexico strikes back after US announces tariffs on steel, aluminum

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MND Staff

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May 31, 2018

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The US announced steel and aluminum tariffs this morning.

Mexico struck back swiftly after the United States announced today that it would impose tariffs on Mexican metal imports.

The government said it would “impose equivalent measures” in response to the announcement by United States Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross that duties of 25% on Mexican steel and 10% on aluminum would take effect at midnight tonight.

The metal tariffs will also apply to Canada and the European Union.

The government said that Mexico’s reciprocal tariffs would apply to steel flats, light bulbs, pork legs and shoulders, cold meats and prepared foods, apples, grapes, blueberries and a range of cheeses, among other products.

The duties could be as high as those imposed on Mexico and will remain in place while the United States protectionist measures continue, the Secretariat of Economy (SE) said in a statement.

“Mexico deeply regrets and condemns the decision of the United States to impose these tariffs on steel and aluminum imports . . . under the criterion of national security,” the government said.

The statement added that Mexico has repeatedly indicated that these types of measures taken on national security grounds “are not appropriate or justified” and underscored that it is the biggest importer of United States aluminum and the second biggest purchaser of U.S. steel.

The two metals are “inputs that contribute to the competitiveness of several strategic sectors that are highly integrated in North America, such as automotive, aerospace, electrical and electronics,” the government said.

The statement reiterated Mexico’s openness to constructive dialogue with the United States, its support of international trade and its disapproval of unilateral protectionist measures.

The United States’ tariff announcement ends a two-month exemption for its southern neighbor and comes amid continued uncertainty about the future of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

Before the exemption was granted in March, U.S. President Donald Trump said that Mexico and Canada could be spared from the measure “if a new and fair NAFTA agreement is signed.”

In the intervening period, Trump has been hot and cold on the future of the trilateral agreement, saying last month that a deal could be reached “fairly soon” while at times threatening to terminate the 24-year-old treaty. This month he called it a “horrible” disaster for the U.S. economy.”

In addition to using his metal tariffs as a NAFTA negotiation ploy, he has also threatened to make a new agreement conditional on immigration policy but Mexico quickly rebuffed the idea.

The United States’ launch of a tariff probe into vehicle imports last week was also seen as a move designed to pressure its NAFTA partners in negotiations that have been contentious on issues including rules of origin and wages as they apply to the automotive sector.

Before receiving today’s unwelcome news, the top international trade official for Mexico’s influential Business Coordinating Council (CCE) said that the organization had asked the Mexican government to respond to tariffs from the United States “with the same force” by imposing tariffs of its own on U.S. products.

Speaking during a television interview, Moises Kalach also said that Economy Secretary Ildefonso Guajardo has managed to pass a motion in the Senate stipulating that any unilateral protectionist measures imposed would be met with proportionate, reciprocal measures from Mexico.

The trade official said that the tariff issue brought additional “noise” to NAFTA negotiations but added that it was significant that Mexico isn’t alone in facing increased protectionism from its northern neighbor.

Source: El Economista (sp), Noticieros Televisa (sp), La Silla Rota (sp)

One dead in Chihuahua train crash; human error blamed

By

César Hernández

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May 31, 2018

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Human error caused a head-on collision by two trains in Chihuahua yesterday that killed a conductor and injured five other crew members, Ferromex officials said.

The trains collided about 1:30am on a stretch of track between the cities of Chihuahua and Ciudad Juárez. The conductor of the northbound train died, while five crew members from both trains were injured.

The collision sparked a fire that could be seen for several kilometers.

Investigations by the rail consortium indicated that the conductor of the southbound train erred by exceeding the authorized indicated speed limit and was running ahead of time.

Ferromex, with its subsidiary Ferrosur, is a private rail consortium that operates the largest railway network in Mexico with combined length of 12,070 kilometers.

Source: El Financiero (sp)