The lack of water management legislation is creating a crisis in Mexico, says IMCO. (Cristian Hernández/Cuartoscuro)
Mexico needs to update legislation surrounding access and distribution of water in the country, said the Mexican Institute for Competitiveness (IMCO).
In a press release to celebrate World Water Day, the group called on the federal government to ensure that access to clean water and sanitation is enshrined in law.
INEGI statistics showed that many states do not have adequate access to drinking water. (INEGI)
The United Nations recognizes access to water as a basic human right.
Twelve million Mexicans currently do not have access to clean drinking water. According to government statistics, a survey of national water infrastructure revealed that four states have no drinking water treatment facilities at all. A further six had fewer than three.
The National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI) revealed that 58% of the country does not have wastewater treatment — although these statistics were originally published in 2020.
Despite a 2012 resolution to implement a new general water law, no new legislation has been passed since 1992. The Supreme Court has denounced this failure to issue new legislation, calling it a “legislative omission.”
This large logistics center was listed as a small ranch in Tepozotlán, México state, allowing it to exploit poor water management controls. (contralacorrupcion.mx)
A major issue identified by IMCO was the misuse of water extraction rights. Extraction titles last between five and 30 years but have no transparent transfer process — meaning that there is little oversight of how much water is being used and who is using it.
There have been reports that in some regions of the country, water rights have been provided to farmers free of charge but have later been discovered to have been diverted to industrial parks, which use significantly more water. Without proper measurement and government oversight, IMCO estimates that up to 15% of clean drinking water in Mexico has been misappropriated in this manner.
This misappropriation is particularly critical, as droughts have intensified over the last decade, and the overexploitation of aquifers has increased by 15%, placing more stress on an already precarious system.
Amongst the problems facing Mexico are poor management of public resources and an inability to track water levels and basins at a national level. This has made water management a geopolitical issue, rather than a geophysical one, and has limited the ability of the Federal Water Commission to monitor supply and demand.
There is still insufficient wastewater management throughout the country. This graph shows the number of treatment facilities by state. (INEGI)
A lack of monitoring in piping systems also means that authorities are unable to identify leaks in real-time, leading to significant wastage and supply disruption.
To address these problems, the federal Water Resources Commission (Conagua) has proposed a new national fund for water infrastructure, designed to meet the needs of the country by 2030. If approved, IMCO estimates this will cost 600 billion pesos.
Both the current government and opposition have agreed that passing a new law should take priority, but no action has yet been taken to do so.
“A more modern legal and regulatory framework will not solve the challenges of water management by itself,” warns IMCO, “but it is an essential condition to guide the country toward more efficient water systems that guarantee access to water for all Mexicans.”
The Bank of Well-Being was founded to help rural Mexicans to access modern banking services. (@bbienestarmx/Twitter)
The Bank of Well-Being (Banco del Bienestar) no longer receives remittances from other banks and institutions and plans to focus entirely on the diffusion of the government’s social welfare programs.
The public financial institution founded by President López Obrador in 2019 released a statement saying that since Feb. 28, it has stopped receiving remittances from other banks and remittance institutions abroad.
The bank will now focus exclusively on providing banking services to the beneficiaries of social programs and paying out benefits. (@bbienestarmx/Twitter)
A new government entity, Finance for Well-Being (Financiera para el Bienestar), has taken over receiving remittances. Director General of Finance for Well-Being Rocío Mejía Flores told El Economista that remittances are now the institution’s priority.
In its statement, the Bank of Well-Being cites the 2019 Federal Republican Austerity Law that forbids duplication of functions between public entities.
“After reviewing the bank’s status and based on the Federal Republican Austerity Law, which in its Article 13 expressly forbids the duplication of functions in the units that make up the Federal Public Administration (APF), the Bank of Well-Being has taken the decision to leave the remittances market.”
The public institution also denied allegations that U.S. bank Wells Fargo decided to stop providing its remittance services through the Bank of Well-Being over money laundering concerns, and that it was instead the Mexican bank that exited the market. The bank said it informed all remittance institutions it worked with in December of its decision.
According to reporting in Reforma newspaper, in September 2021, the head of the consumer protection agency (Profeco) had encouraged Mexican workers living abroad to use the Bank of Well-Being for sending remittances home. But a year later, López Obrador dismissed a question from the press about alleged bank fraud involving a migrant, saying that the Bank of Well-Being was not “receiving or distributing remittances”.
The bank has stated that it will now focus on the government’s two main objectives: to provide banking services to the beneficiaries of social programs and the creation of the largest branch network in the country. Its goal is to reach 25 million Mexicans and to provide “every one of them” with a Bank of Well-Being card to easily access financial support.
In February, López Obrador boasted that the bank would distribute 600 billion pesos (US $32 billion) in social programs throughout 2023 without charging a commission. The bank currently has 1,500 branches in operation, out of the 2,700 initially promised.
Despite leading a troubled life, Antonieta Rivas Mercado was a prolific author, editor and deep-pocketed cultural patron who founded or led several Mexican arts and cultural institutions. (Public Domain)
María Antonieta Rivas Mercado, who killed herself in Paris’ Notre Dame a few weeks before her 31st birthday, may be best remembered by the world for her immortalization in Diego Rivera’s Mexico City mural, “El que Quiera Comer que Trabaje” (“He Who Wants to Eat Must Work”), but in Mexico, she’s known as one of the most influential figures on Mexico’s cultural institutions during Mexico’s postrevolutionary era.
Born on April 28, 1900, Rivas Mercado, the second daughter of renowned architect Antonio Rivas Mercado — creator of Mexico City’s iconic monument, the Ángel de la Independencia — grew up in what is now the Casa Rivas Mercado museum in downtown Mexico City. She had a romantic childhood surrounded by arts and culture.
Rivas Mercado, left, with her sisters on the steps to her family’s home, built by her father, renowned Mexican architect Antonio Rivas Mercado. (Casa Rivas Mercado)
An avid reader and fluent in French and English, she had access to an education that few women did at the time, learning piano and history from private governesses. At 3 years old, she wrote a love poem to her father.
Antonio was a central figure in his daughter’s life, since Antonieta’s mother, Matilde, who had European blood and features, often ignored her due to the girl’s indigenous appearance. In a story told in the best-selling book “In the Shadow of the Angel“ — written by Kathryn Blair (the wife of Antonieta’s only child, Donaldo) — Matilde asks Antonio soon after their daughter is born: “Don’t you think she’s too brown?”
Matilde had German and indigenous heritage, but she, as did the rest of her children, had European features.
But Antonio admired and cultivated the girl’s bright and curious mind. In 1909, she and her older sister Alicia traveled with him to Paris to supervise the ornamental details for the Ángel de la Independencia, which was to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Mexico’s independence.
Rivas Mercado’s father, Antonio Rivas Mercado, was a prestigious architect who designed the Angel of Independence.
While in Paris, Antonio took Alicia and Antonieta on weekly visits to the Louvre, where Antonieta learned the value of art.
“The primal function of art is to create beauty,” Antonio would tell his daughters.
He also took them to the theater and to the Paris Opera, where they once watched a ballet performance. Young Antonieta fell in love with the art and was later admitted to the ballet school of Monsieur Soria, where she was considered a gifted young dancer. However, after a year, Antonio took her daughters back to Mexico despite Antonieta’s wishes.
On September 16, 1910, the Ángel de la Independencia on Paseo de la Reforma was inaugurated in a magnificent event, but a revolution was brewing both in Antonieta’s home and throughout the country: Rivas’ mother decided to leave her family, and the Mexican Revolution began.
Rivas Mercado with Minister of Education Jose Vasconcelos. (Federico Garcia Lorca Foundations/Casa Rivas Mercado)
The Revolution (1910—1917) marked Rivas’ life: She witnessed violence, death, hunger and the abuse of power. In February 1913, Mexico City was violently occupied for 10 days as Álvaro Obregón’s forces attempted to oust President Ignacio I. Madero.
During this time, she was a prisoner in her own house along with her father and siblings. In her book, Kathryn Blair describes how the Rivas Mercado family suffered food shortages just like any other peasant in the country.
After the Revolution’s end, Rivas, now aged 18, married Albert Blair, a British man who had fought in the Mexican Revolution. The pair had only one son, Donald Antonio Blair.
However, the relationship was not meant to last: her husband felt that Rivas’ reading material fed her brain with strange ideas and romantic illusions. He forbade Rivas to speak to their son in French and burned all her favorite books from authors like Nietzsche, Verlaine, Baudelaire and Proust.
She eventually became one of the first women in Mexico City’s elite to ask her husband for a divorce. Furious, Albert threatened to deprive her of custody of Donald, resulting in a long court battle.
But she ultimately regained her independence and moved back to her childhood home, where she devoted herself again to her interests. When her father died in 1927, she used the fortune she inherited to finance many cultural projects in Mexico, many that changed its cultural history forever.
The house Rivas Mercado grew up in is today a museum open to the public. (Casa Rivas Mercado)
Through her close friendship with painter Manuel Rodríguez Lozano, she met Los Contemporáneos (The Modernists), a group of young Mexican intellectuals who recognized the emergence of an unprecedented universality of cultural expression in which they sought to contribute. Sharing their vision, Rivas not only became their patron but also a member.
She also financed and helped create the experimental Ulises Theater with Los Contemporáneos. Although it only lasted for a few months, it influenced modern Mexican theater fundamentally.
During this time, she was also an editor of notable books in Mexico by authors such as Xavier Villaurrutia, Gilberto Owen and Andrés Henestrosa. She was also the first person to translate to a foreign language (English) the works of Spanish poet Federico García Lorca and scripted the first theatrical adaptation of the novel “Los de Abajo”(Those From Below”) by Mariano Azuela.
She also founded the Mexican Symphony Orchestra in 1928. Together with Mexican composer Carlos Chávez, they created the most important musical ensemble the country had seen to date.
Her concern for women’s rights led her to write several feminist essays. One of those was published in 1928 in the Spanish newspaper El Sol de Madrid.
In “The Mexican Woman,” Rivas said that culture was the only means for women’s salvation and stressed the importance of education to “cultivate women’s minds and teach them to think.”
In Paris, Rivas Mercado, center, had a wide social circle.
She also founded the first department of indigenous affairs in the Ministry of Education and later became actively involved in politics by financially supporting the presidential campaign of former Minister of Education José Vasconcelos. They later became romantically involved, a development that was to have a profound impact on her life.
When Vasconcelos lost the presidential race in 1929, Rivas had to leave the country after many vasconcelistas (Vasconcelos supporters) were being chased out by the new government.
Rivas sought refuge in New York with her son, whom she took illegally out of the country; her court case to maintain custody was still ongoing. In New York, she met author Federico García Lorca before moving to Paris, where she spent her remaining days.
Rivas Mercado’s suicide at Notre Dame was recorded in the major newspapers of the day, mainly because of its shock value: she shot herself inside a confessional at the cathedral.
Although she maintained a natural poise and elegance given by her education and lineage, Rivas and her son were forced to live in precarious conditions; most of her fortune had gone to her cultural pursuits and patronages.
On her last full day of life, she met up with Vasconcelos, after not having seen him in months. The following day, after what she herself termed a troubled life, she shot herself in the heart in Notre Dame Cathedral with a gun she had taken from Vasconcelos’ suitcase the previous night.
In one of her final letters, Rivas wrote to her sister, “Life for me has been suffering and work, the latter my fun and relief. I have never been able to carry a light soul; something has always weighed on me, and in truth, I wish no one such a fate.”
The president responded on Tuesday to a U.S. State Department report on human rights in Mexico. (Gob MX)
President López Obrador on Tuesday rejected a United States government report that denounced “significant human rights issues” in Mexico.
Published by the U.S. Department of State on Monday, the report said those issues included “credible reports” of a wide range of abuses, among which were:
Unlawful or arbitrary killings by police, military and other governmental officials
Forced disappearance by government agents
Harsh and life-threatening prison conditions
Arbitrary arrest or detention
Restrictions on free expression and media, including violence against journalists
Serious acts of government corruption
Insufficient investigation of and accountability for gender-based violence, including domestic or intimate partner violence
The State Department also said that “impunity and extremely low rates of prosecution remained a problem for all crimes, including human rights abuses and corruption.”
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken at the North American Leaders’ Summit in January. (@SecBlinken/Twitter)
Asked about the report at his regular press conference, López Obrador accused the United States government of lying.
“[The report] isn’t true; they’re lying, with all respect, it’s nothing but politicking,” said the president, who frequently asserts that his administration doesn’t tolerate the kind of human rights abuses that routinely occurred during previous governments.
“It’s their nature,” Lopez Obrador said of the U.S. government, “they don’t want to abandon the Monroe Doctrine and … the so-called Manifest Destiny [belief]. They don’t want to change; they think they’re the government of the world.
“It’s not worth getting angry about,” the president said. “That’s just the way they are.”
He also suggested that Mexico could write a damning report about the human rights record of the U.S. government, questioning why it imprisoned Wikileaks founder Julian Assange — who is in fact in jail in the United Kingdom as he fights extradition to the U.S. — and why criminal organizations that distribute fentanyl are “allowed” to operate in the U.S.
“What are you doing for young people so that they don’t use fentanyl?” López Obrador asked before going on to claim that the hush-money investigation against former U.S. president Donald Trump is politically motivated.
AMLO, as the president is best known, has vigorously defended Mexico in the face of criticism emanating from north of the border, declaring that the country is both safer and more democratic than the United States.
The latter assertion came after the federal government’s commitment to combating Mexico’s notorious drug cartels was being questioned by some Republican Party lawmakers in the wake of the murder of two United States citizens in Matamoros, Tamaulipas.
The claim that Mexico is more democratic than the United States followed the Feb. 27 publication of a State Department statement that indirectly criticized the government’s recently-approved electoral reform laws.
A U.S. congressional delegation led by Senator John Cornyn returned to the U.S. on Monday after meeting with President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and Mexican officials in Mexico City to discuss security and development cooperation, among other topics. (Twitter / @lopezobrador_)
President López Obrador said Monday that migration, development cooperation and security were among the topics discussed at his meeting with 12 United States lawmakers in Mexico City on Sunday.
“The meeting was very good, very respectful, and we reached agreements to continue working together with respect for our sovereignties,” he told reporters at his regular morning news conference.
The U.S. delegation’s visit comes at a moment of increased tension between Mexico and the United States on issues such as Mexican energy policy an stemming the northward flow of drugs. (Twitter / @USAmbMex)
The U.S. delegation was led by Republican Senator John Cornyn and included Democratic Senator Chris Coons, Democratic Representative Veronica Escobar and Republican Representative María Elvira Salazar, among other legislators. U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Ken Salazar and other embassy officials were also in attendance.
López Obrador was accompanied by several of his cabinet ministers and other officials, including Pemex CEO Octavio Romero and National Water Commission chief Germán Martínez Santoyo.
According to a statement issued by the president’s office, López Obrador and the Republican and Democratic lawmakers held “an open and constructive dialogue to deal with common challenges that both countries face.”
The meeting came after some Republican lawmakers proposed the deployment of the United States military in Mexico to combat Mexican cartels and the flow of drugs, especially fentanyl, into the U.S. López Obrador has addressed these statements himself, calling them an offense to the Mexican people.
“Through respectful, frank, and open dialogue with President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and officials of the Mexican government, we affirmed our shared commitment to broadening our joint efforts facing the common challenges of illegal traffic in fentanyl and its precursors, irregular migration, and traffic in arms and persons,” read a statement published by the U.S. Embassy in Mexico on the visit. (Twitter / @USAmbMex)
However, López Obrador said Monday that that proposal was not considered at Sunday’s meeting in the National Palace.
“It was an initiative of some legislators who think they can get votes in the United States with this, by blaming Mexico for what’s unfortunately happening in the United States,” he said.
“A lot of young people are dying due to the consumption of drugs, especially fentanyl. That’s something we regret, but it’s been explained to them that fentanyl isn’t produced in Mexico, this is a chemical that is brought in from Asia, that arrives in Mexico to be transported to the United States, but which also arrives directly to the United States,” López Obrador said, despite evidence that the synthetic opioid is indeed manufactured in Mexico.
At the meeting with the U.S. lawmakers, Mexican Security Minister Rosa Icela Rodríguez reported that 2,263 kilograms of fentanyl were seized in Mexico last year.
Despite tensions in recent weeks, AMLO praised U.S. President Biden on new migration measures, while Senator John Cornyn, the delegation’s leader, expressed hope that the delegation’s conversations with the Mexican president would “lead to collaborative solutions that make both countries safer and more prosperous.” (Twitter / @PedroCasas)
The statement by the president’s office also noted that Rodríguez highlighted that 6,115 kilograms of the drug have been confiscated since the current government took office. The figure has been mentioned frequently by federal officials in recent times as they seek to demonstrate that Mexico is serious about stopping the flow of the powerful narcotic to its northern neighbor.
Among the high-ranking Mexican officials at Sunday’s meeting was Navy Minister José Rafael Ojeda Durán, who “offered details on thestrategy to strengthen customs and the maritime and ports protection that is being carried out in the country,” according to the president’s office.
The current government put Mexico’s ports and customs stations under the control of the military as part of efforts to stamp out corruption.
The statement added that López Obrador acknowledged U.S. President Joe Biden’s work on migration issues at Sunday’s meeting.
López Obrador praised his counterpart for opening upnew legal pathways for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans to enter the United States and “reaffirmed that Mexico will continue promoting development in Central America and the Caribbean with programs like Sembrando Vida [Sowing Life] and Jóvenes Construyendo el Futuro [Youths Building the Future].”
The former is a reforestation and employment program, while the latter is an apprenticeship program. Mexico has expanded both initiatives to northern countries in Central America.
López Obrador also highlighted the government’s investment in Mexico’s south and southeast through projects such as the Maya Train railroad, the new Pemex refinery on the Tabasco coast, and the Isthmus of Tehuantepec trade corridor.
He also spoke about “various projects of United States companies in the region, including energy ones,” according to the statement, which made no mention of theongoing dispute between Mexico and the U.S. over the Mexican government’s energy policies, which the U.S. alleges violate the USMCA trade agreement by favoring state-owned energy companies.
According toa statement posted to Senator Cornyn’s website, the U.S. delegation “received briefings from U.S. intelligence officials, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, and U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Ken Salazar on the United States’ security posture with regards to Mexico,recent killings of Americans in the country, efforts to stop drug trafficking, and illegal immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border.”
“The delegation shared their concerns with Mexico’s handling of these issues with President López Obrador and members of his administration,” the statement added.
Given that the United States and Mexico share a border, Cornyn said, the two countries “should have a shared interest in working together to address the security challenges that put American and Mexican lives at risk, including drugs, murderous cartels, and unchecked migration.”
“Our delegation made clear to President López Obrador that his administration must do more to address these issues so that we can maintain our historically strong economic and cultural partnership, and I am hopeful that our candid conversations will lead to collaborative solutions that make both countries safer and more prosperous,” the senator said.
López Obrador said Monday that “there is a framework of understanding in which there is cooperation on the issue of security” with the United States.
He stressed, however, that the bilateral security arrangement is “regulated so that agents of United States government agencies” — such as the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Federal Bureau of Investigation — cannot enter Mexico “without the knowledge of the Mexican government, … as previously happened.”
Abeja Negra SOS is dedicated to protecting and promoting honey bees in Mexico City. (Abeja Negra SOS/Facebook)
A group of beekeepers and veterinarians is on a mission to rescue and relocate the wild bees of Mexico City.
Abeja Negra SOS (Black Bee SOS) was founded in 2018 to help educate local people about the benefits that bees bring to the human environment.
Many rescues are carried out at night to prevent alarming residents and endangering the hives. (Abeja Negra SOS/Facebook)
“These bees are at risk only because people do not have the culture [of caring for bees] or believe they are a danger,” said Adriana Véliz, one of the veterinarians in charge of Abeja Negra SOS.
Bees play a vital role in our ecosystem, helping to pollinate plants and crops. However, bee populations have collapsed in the early part of the 21st century due to multiple stressors, including overuse of pesticides, habitat loss and invasive parasites.
In Mexico, bees are under threat from deforestation and urbanization, as their natural habitats are destroyed by expanding human activity.
In an urban environment like Mexico City, there is always the risk that scared humans will lash out. For this reason, Abeja Negra SOS works to rescue hives in the dead of night, to prevent alarm. A recent rescue in Xochimilco saw the team contend with a hive that was already defensive towards humans.
Abeja Negra SOS distribute many of their rescued bees to local beekeepers and start-up companies, helping not only to sustain wild pollination but also to make a difference in their local community. “These bees can continue with their normal life without being a risk to humans with us,” explains Veléz.
The group also sells honey and other bee-related products to help fund their work.
If you are in Mexico City and would like to report a colony in need of rescue, Abeja Negra SOS can be reached via WhatsApp (55 12 97 49 78).
The "Melody", which is alleged to have caused damage to a protected coral reef near Puerto Morelos. (@gchristy65/Twitter)
A ship carrying ballast destined for the Maya Train project has damaged a coral reef in the Mexican Caribbean, claimed diver and underwater videographer Alberto Friscione.
The tanker “Melody” was anchoring near Puerto Morelos, loaded with 20,000 tons of porphyrite stone from Cuba when the incident happened.
The Maya Train has caused concern from environmental advocates throughout its construction. (@Avispa_Midia/Twitter)
“When [Melody] dropped the anchor, it fell on top of many [coral],” Friscione told EFE. “They pulled the whole chain for several meters and as the ship drifted, the chain moved and began to break the few or many corals that were there.”
He explained the area is home to many corals protected by Mexican law.
He said he had seen damage to several coral species in the area and was in the process of filing environmental damage complaints with the relevant authorities.
“If any of us were seen touching one of these coral reefs, they would just about put you in jail,” he said. “It should not be possible for them to arrive and just voluntarily or involuntarily drop the anchor and cause the destruction we saw just now.”
Following Fiscione’s complaint, the tanker was moved to an area near the island of Cozumel, where there is a larger sand bank and fewer coral species.
“Melody” has been shipping porphyrite to the port in Puerto Morelos since March 1. The stone is brought to shore in barges and then transported in trucks to a location on the Route of the Cenotes, where it is crushed into ballast to stabilize the Maya Train tracks. The operation is expected to take at least two months.
Environmentalists opposed to the Maya Train – one of the López Obrador administration’s signature projects – have been warning since late 2022 that unloading the ballast in Puerto Morelos could pose risks to the reef.
When “Melody” first arrived at Puerto Morelos in early March, Pepe Tiburón, from the activist group Sélvame del Tren, wrote on social media: “Without any kind of environmental authorization, the first Cuban ballast boat arrived. Reef, mangrove and people at the mercy of political alienation. Anyone who does not join the defense of the environment is complicit in this suicide.”
The newspaper Reforma reported on Tuesday that Section 1 of the railroad is severely delayed due to a lack of ballast. Only 31% of the tracks are completed, despite construction companies having committed to delivering them by August 2022. By that date, only 11% of the necessary ballast had been received, according to leaked internal Defense Ministry reports.
Javier May, director of the National Fund for Tourism (Fonatur), confirmed that lack of ballast was a major factor in the delays. He said Mexico still only had 42% of the necessary ballast to complete the entire railroad.
The intimate exhibition about one of Mexico's greatest cultural icons has opened at the University of Guadalajara. (@udg_oficial/Twitter)
Images of Frida Kahlo taken during her recovery from gangrene are being exhibited for the first time in Mexico at the Museo de las Artes (MUSA) in Guadalajara, Jalisco.
Running until Aug. 6, “Kahlo Without Borders” honors the human behind the artist and a lesser-known side of Frida Kahlo’s life in a period near her death.
The exhibition also displays a number of personal items, letters and gifts from her time in hospital with gangrene. (@udg_oficial/Twitter)
“This exhibition shows Frida Kahlo as a person of flesh and blood,” Kahlo’s great-niece Cristina Kahlo, who co-curated the show, told the news agency EFE.
The photos date from the amputation of the artist’s right leg in 1953, shortly before her death the following year.
Images taken by the Mexican photographer Graciela Iturbide show Frida’s new prosthesis, as well as the corsets she wore after her accident in 1926. They are on display alongside pictures of the hospital gowns she wore that were stained with paint as she worked from her bed.
Other photos document her convalescence in Mexico City.
The intimacy of the images shows Frida as someone “who had all these operations […] and who continued as a creative artist even when she was in a hospital room,” Cristina Kahlo said. “For her, art was a healing issue.”
The images reveal a vulnerable and depressed Frida, strikingly different from the figure in the collective imagination — a woman with a perpetually strong stare and pride in her clothing, Cristina added.
Kahlo spent much of her life in chronic pain after a vehicle accident when she was only 17.
In addition to the photographs, there are a number of personal letters on display that provide a look into the life of the troubled artist, obsessed with questions surrounding her treatment, the behavior of her husband Diego Rivera and the socialist struggle — aspects of her life that have become secondary to her modern mythos.
The exhibition also showcases clinical material — such as doctor’s notes — from those who attended the artist during her various convalescences, including the amputation of her leg at the American British Cowdray Hospital (ABC) in Mexico City.
Mónica Ramírez-Montagut, director of the MSU Broad Museum in East Lansing, Michigan, where the exhibition was first shown last year, said that Cristina Kahlo spent more than four years trying to recover her great-aunt’s medical records from the hospital.
“The records detail what she ate and drank in the morning, cardiograms of her surgeries or post-op notes,” she said.
As for the letters and images of Frida, many come from the family’s personal archive, since Cristina’s father, Antonio Kahlo, took some of the most intimate photos of the convalescing artist.
After Guadalajara, the exhibition will move on to the Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo House Study Museum in Mexico City.
The port complex in Michoacán will receive significant infrastructure upgrades to cope with nearshoring demand. (APM Terminals)
The Mexican government will invest over $6 billion pesos (approximately US $322 million) in the Lázaro Cárdenas port in Michoacán, the port’s administration has said.
In a meeting with the Mexican Association of Shipping Agents (Amanac), Asipona head Jorge Luis Cruz Ballado said that improvement works started in 2020, with upgrades scheduled to be completed by 2026.
Links with rail and road networks are also due to be improved as part of the upgrade works. (APM Terminals)
Ongoing projects include the construction of a goods yard with a static capacity for 7,560 automotive units.
Cruz Ballado said that the new funds will be allocated to projects including the construction of the control tower, the renovation of the Lázaro Cárdenas airport terminal and the optimization of handling of cabotage cargo and customs services.
The port will also build nine fluid storage tanks with a capacity of 401,280 barrels.
To discuss ways to improve efficiency for the transit of rail cargo, Director General of Lázaro Cárdenas port, Norma Becerra Pocoroba invited representatives of Kansas City Southern railroads, APM Terminals and Hutchison Ports to take part in the meeting.
During discussions, Amanac reinforced that Lázaro Cárdenas is key to the development of the Mexican economy owing to its strategic geographical position within the Eastern, Western, Northern and Southern maritime routes. The site also boasts more than 820 hectares available for new business.
With drafts of up to 19 meters in its access channel, Cruz Ballado said that Lázaro Cárdenas can accommodate ships of up to 165,000 tons as well as seventh-generation container ships.
In 2022, the total cargo movement from Lázaro Cárdenas was 2,460,374 tons. This was predominantly mineral bulk (44%), followed by containerized cargo (35%) and oil products (5%).
Despite automotive units amounting to only 3% of the port’s total cargo, imports hit a record figure of 646,578 units, placing Lázaro Cárdenas as the nation’s second in automotive cargo statistics thanks to strong import quantities from Asian manufacturers.
Forbes Mexico reported that the Chinese automakers Zhong Tong Bus, Ankai, Skywel, Karry, Chirey Brilliance, Yutong and Dongfeng, increased by 40%. In January 2023 alone, the port reported a movement of 56,983 units from Chinese automakers and brands like Toyota, Mazda, Suzuki, General Motors, Hyundai and BMW, among others.
This high number of automobiles has led to port congestion.
Japan were jubilant as they advanced to play the United States in Tuesday's final. (@MLB/Twitter)
Mexico’s exhilarating run in the World Baseball Classic came to an end in a thrilling Monday night semifinal, when No. 1-ranked Japan won 6–5 by scoring two runs in the bottom of the ninth inning.
Japan will play the United States in the championship game Tuesday at LoanDepot Park in Miami.
Mexico had defied the odds and overcome highly-rated Puerto Rico to reach the semifinal against Japan. (@MLB/Twitter)
A crowd of 35,933 packed the ballpark on Monday, many of them wearing sombreros, chanting “¡Sí se puede!” (yes we can!) and otherwise boisterously supporting a Mexican squad that had strung together four consecutive wins after opening the 20-nation WBC with an extra-inning loss to Colombia.
Mexico’s triumphs included an 11-5 thumping of the United States in round-robin play in Phoenix and a rousing, 5–4 comeback over favored Puerto Rico in the Miami quarterfinals, a huge improvement over showings in previous years, when Mexico was knocked out in the second round of the first two WBCs in 2006 and 2009, then failed to advance past the first round of the next two, in 2013 and 2017.
Despite entering this year’s semifinals as underdogs, Mexico held a 3–0 lead over two-time champion Japan after six innings, thanks to a home run by Luis Urías in the fourth inning and the strong pitching of starter Patrick Sandoval of the Los Angeles Angels.
Urías, who plays for the Milwaukee Brewers, launched his homer with two runners on base and two outs, scoring it off 21-year-old Japanese phenom Roki Sasaki, who threw one perfect game (and nearly two in a row) in Japan last season. Twenty-six of his 64 pitches on Monday eclipsed 100 mph.
Despite defeat, Mexico Coach Benji Gil told a reporter, “The world of baseball won tonight.” (@TalkinBaseball/Twitter)
Holding a 3–0 lead and needing only seven more outs to clinch a spot in the final, Mexico suddenly found itself in a 3–3 tie after Japanese slugger Masataka Yoshida belted a three-run homer with two outs in the bottom of the seventh.
Mexico rebounded by scoring twice in the top of the eighth to take a 5–3 lead, but a single run by Japan in the bottom of the eighth and two more runs in the ninth scored off relief pitcher Giovanny Gallegos sent Mexico to defeat.
Minutes later, “Amo el Béisbol,” a Mexican baseball page on Facebook that has 728,000 followers, posted “THANK YOU MEXICO! Thank you for making us dream! Thank you for making history! Thank you for being a team together! Thanks for everything! We will always carry [you] in our hearts.”
In less than 15 minutes, the post had 2,500 likes and 71 shares.
Japan, meanwhile, won the first two and lost in the semifinals in the other two. “Samurai Japan,” as the country’s national team is known, entered the semifinals having outscored its five opponents 47–11. Oddsmakers had predicted Japan to beat Mexico by two runs.
Both squads are comprised of players who either play in Major League Baseball or for professional teams in their home countries.
Japan’s winning rally began with a double by superstar Shohei Ohtani, an outstanding pitcher and hitter for the Los Angeles Angels, and ended on a walk-off double to the gap by Munetaka Murakami that plated two runs — and left deflated Mexican players hanging over their dugout railing.
“We lost a baseball game but we won many things,” said outfielder Randy Arozarena of Mexico. “Mexican baseball continues to grow. This is the first step.”
Arozarena — who defected from Cuba in 2015, escaping on a small boat bound for Quintana Roo — has proved a huge factor in Mexico’s success.
The Cuba native hit .450 with six doubles, one home run and nine RBIs in the tournament. He also made two highlight-reel catches, including a leaping grab Monday at the 8½-foot wall in left field that saved a home run and preserved Mexico’s 3–0 lead and sparked Mexico’s go-ahead rally in the eighth with a leadoff double.
“Randy was incredible today,” Mexico manager Benji Gil said. “He gave us the opportunity to come back … We fought. We retook the lead. They are warriors.”
A young star in Cuba, Arozarena got his professional start at age 21 with brief stints in the Mérida Winter League in the state of Yucatán, in the Norte de México League and with the Tijuana Toros of the Mexican League before catching the baseball world’s attention with the Navojoa Mayos of the Mexican Pacific League.
Known largely for hitting 10 home runs with 13 RBIs for the Tampa Bay Rays in the 2020 playoffs and World Series, Arozarena professed his desire to play for the Mexican team three years ago and became a Mexican citizen last year.
Before the game Monday, Arozarena wore a large sombrero and cowboy boots while shagging flies during batting practice. During the game, he flipped at least two balls into the crowd after making catches and signed autographs for fans behind the left-field wall during a pitching change.
Fans responded by chanting “M-V-P!” at him.
“I leave with much joy because of all the love I received from the fans,” Arozarena said. “It was a beautiful experience for me.”
And for the Mexican team as well.
“I think that they are not aware of what they have done for Mexico and for the Mexican boys and girls,” Gil said. “These two weeks are going to attract so many young players in Mexico, and also Mexicans that live abroad.
“For that reason, I believe that this was a victory, even when we didn’t win today.”
