Military flight to repatriate Mexicans fleeing Ukraine

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February 25, 2022

Marines on duty at the Mexico City International Airport. SEMAR

The navy has taken over responsibility for security at the Mexico City International Airport (AICM), assuming the work previously carried out by the National Guard.

The takeover is the start of a new trend: President López Obrador announced Friday that the military will assume responsibility for security at all airports across Mexico.

The Navy Ministry (SEMAR) announced in a statement Tuesday that 1,500 marines would collaborate with tax, customs and immigration authorities to carry out “surveillance, inspection, support and control” operations in the airport to counteract the illegal trafficking of weapons, drugs, cash, illicit merchandise and people as well as theft of luggage and other belongings.

It said that López Obrador ordered the navy to cooperate with other authorities to guarantee security at the airport, Mexico’s busiest.

SEMAR also said that the National Immigration Institute and the Federal Civil Aviation Agency had trained 69 marines to act as airport commanders and immigration officials.

The president announced the military's new airport security responsibilities at his Friday morning press conference in Colima. — The president announced the military’s new airport security responsibilities at his Friday morning press conference in Colima. Presidencia de la República

The navy is now responsible for security in all areas of the AICM, including both terminals and outside areas. SEMAR said that 23 vehicles and 16 dogs would support the marines’ security work.

“We have to cover the whole airport, … we can’t leave any space without personnel. We even have to check the bathrooms,” a navy captain told his subordinates in Terminal 1 earlier this week, according to Reforma.

One woman who works as an airport security guard for a private security company told the newspaper that the marines were watching over them.

“They stand behind you, they’re scary; sometimes they come with a trained dog, … they watch our inspection process and sometimes suggest that we check a bag or suitcase; they’re very arrogant,” she said.

“They don’t talk much. They arrived, placed themselves over there at the doors and just watch us. It’s uncomfortable,” a customs agent said.

A navy commander told Reforma that the navy was deployed to the AICM because airport employees as well as Mexico City and federal officials are under investigation for smuggling drugs, weapons and cash through the airport.

A marine supervises airport staff at a screening area. SEMAR

Reforma reported that failures in security operations at the airport while it was under the control of the National Guard were also a factor in the decision to put the navy in charge. For instance, two men were shot outside Terminal 2 last October.

Asked about the deployment at his regular news conference on Friday, López Obrador told reporters that security will be the responsibility of either the navy or the army at all airports in Mexico.

The navy will be deployed to some airports and the army will be dispatched to others “to guarantee there’s no corruption in customs and that passengers are treated well,” he said.

The National Guard was slated to oversee the security work of 1,610 military police at the Felipe Ángeles International Airport, which will open north of Mexico City next month, but the president’s remarks appear to place that plan in doubt.

The deployment of the military to the nation’s airports will add to López Obrador’s already heavy reliance on the armed forces.

Even though he pledged to remove soldiers and marines from the streets, López Obrador has perpetuated the militarization of public security, assigning the construction of major infrastructure projects, including the new Mexico City airport, to the army and putting the military in charge of the nation’s ports and customs offices.

In addition, the military has played a role in the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, nurtured saplings for the government’s tree-planting employment program and delivered textbooks, among other nontraditional tasks.

López Obrador has defended his reliance on the armed forces, casting the military as an honest institution and an essential ally in the fight against corruption.

With reports from El País, Reforma and El Universal

Mexican-made nano robots will be sent to explore the moon this year

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February 25, 2022

An illustration of a nano robot on the lunar surface.

Five tiny robots developed by researchers at the National Autonomous University (UNAM) will depart for the moon in June to carry out a range of unprecedented lunar measurements.

Weighing less than 60 grams each and with a diameter of just 12 centimeters, the two-wheeled, disc-shaped nano robots will travel more than 380,000 kilometers to the moon on a rocket supplied by Astrobotic Technology of the United States.

The United Launch Alliance Vulcan rocket would be the first U.S. spacecraft to land on the moon in almost half a century.

During their month-long mission, the Mexican made and designed robots will take unprecedented lunar plasma temperature, electromagnetic and regolith particle size measurements, according to an article published in the UNAM gazette in early February.

Gustavo Medina Tanco, a UNAM scientist who is leading the project, told the news agency Reuters that the robots – made from stainless steel, titanium and space-grade aluminum and equipped to collect lunar minerals – will work together like a swarm of bees once they are on the moon, communicating with each other as well as a command center on Earth.

For that reason, the endeavor is called the Colmena, or Beehive, Project. Some 200 engineering, math, physics and chemistry students have contributed to the project, which began almost four years ago, while the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Mexican Space Agency and the state of Hidalgo have also collaborated.

“This is a small mission where we’ll test the concept, and afterwards we’ll undertake other missions, first to the moon and then on to asteroids,” Medina told Reuters.

“No one has done this, nobody, not just in Mexico,” he said. “We can make a difference in the technology and for international cooperation that can then lead to important joint ventures to study the minerals or undertake other scientific exploration.”

With reports from Reuters

Journalist murdered in Sonora is the sixth to die this year

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February 25, 2022

Jorge Camero published a news site in Empalme.

Jorge “El Choche” Camero, founder of the Sonora news site El Informativo, was murdered Thursday night while working out at a gym in the city of Empalme. The 28-year-old is the sixth practicing journalist murdered this year, a list that doesn’t include a former television host in Mexico City and the founder of a now-defunct Tijuana news portal who were also killed.

Armed men on motorcycles arrived at the Spartan gym around 8 p.m. and shot Camero at least three times. When Red Cross paramedics arrived at the scene, he was already dead.

The motive for Camero’s murder remains up in the air, and may be unrelated to his journalistic work. Less than two weeks before his death, he had quit his job as personal secretary to Luis Fuentes, the mayor of Empalme, after government colleagues accused Camero of being involved in criminal activity. The state Attorney General’s Office noted that in addition to his colleague’s allegations, he was a person of interest in a murder investigation.

It was only after leaving government employment earlier this month that Camero returned to journalism and El Informativo, a news page he had founded in 2018 to cover Empalme and nearby areas, including Guaymas.

Camero is the second person associated with the Empalme municipal government to be murdered this year. Daniel Palafox, an Empalme IT worker, disappeared in January and was found dead, with signs of torture, in early February.

After Palafox’s death, a video of an apparent interrogation circulated on social media in which he confessed to helping an armed branch of the Sinaloa Cartel install internet and video surveillance systems. In the video, Palafox also mentioned a man named Jorge who went by “El Choche,” apparently a media worker employed by the same band of criminals, and two online news portals, Sonora Informativo and El Informativo.

Camero started his career with XEPS, a radio broadcasting group he founded in Empalme, before working at a station in Guaymas. He also owned a publicity and vehicle-mounted loudspeaker advertising company.

With reports from El Universal and Infobae

Another student rescued from cartel recruitment through online video game

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February 25, 2022

Free Fire screenshot — Criminals recruited the girl via the online multiplayer video game Free Fire, which can be played for free on a cell phone.

Another young person has been rescued from a cartel’s most recent recruitment strategy: befriending children and adolescents through online video games, then luring them away from home based on their relationship with the kidnapper or with promises of work.

This time, the victim was a young woman from the municipality of Santa Cruz Xoxocotlán in the Oaxaca city urban area. Like previous targets, her kidnapper befriended her through Free Fire, a popular online-only shooter video game.

The man contacted her through the game and gained her trust over an extended period, even visiting her in Oaxaca. He convinced her to meet him in México state, where he took her to Naucalpan, a municipality just outside Mexico City. From there, he planned to take her north, where she would join a criminal group.

An investigation coordinated by the attorney generals’ offices of Oaxaca (FGEO) and México state (FGJEM) foiled the plan and located her within 24 hours.

Her family reported her missing on Monday after she claimed to be going out with friends but did not return home. Initial investigations quickly uncovered the connection she had formed online with her kidnapper, the FGEO said in a statement.

In coordination with México state law enforcement, the FGEO located the woman on Tuesday afternoon and turned her over to officials from her home state who continued investigating the incident while coordinating her return to her family.

It is the third known case of criminal groups recruiting young people through digital platforms. Two weeks ago, a 12-year-old boy from Tlaxiaco, Oaxaca, was kidnapped by a presumed cartel recruiter he met online. The other incident involved a group of boys kidnapped from Tlacolula de Matamoros, Oaxaca. All the children were found and returned home safely.

All three cases involved the Free Fire video game. The federal government has also warned parents to beware of recruitment efforts through other violent online video games, including Grand Theft Auto V, Gears of War and Call of Duty.

With reports from Milenio and El Universal

More than 10,000 forced from their homes by gang violence in Jerez, Zacatecas

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February 25, 2022

Parral de las Huertas, one of the Zacatecas communities from which residents have fled.

More than 10,000 residents of Jerez, Zacatecas, have been displaced due to a turf war between the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) and the Sinaloa Cartel, according to municipal authorities.

Jerez government secretary Marco Antonio Vargas said people have been forced from their homes in 18 communities in the municipality, located west of Zacatecas city.

“They are communities in the sierra area adjacent to two municipalities with an insecurity problem – Fresnillo and Valparaíso,” he said.

Among the communities that have become virtual ghost towns are Palmas Altas, Ermita de los Correa, Sarabia and Parral de las Huertas.

Most of the displaced people are now living in the homes of friends or relatives in the town of Jerez or Zacatecas city, although some have traveled to the northern border to seek asylum in the United States.

The newspaper Milenio reported that the 33-kilometer road between Jerez and Palmas Altas is littered with spent bullet casings, remnants of battles between Mexico’s two most powerful cartels.

The facades of some of the houses in Palmas Altas are emblazoned with threatening messages from the feuding criminal organizations.

“It’s an issue that doesn’t allow us to be at ease,” Vargas said, referring to the bloody turf war that made Zacatecas Mexico’s most violent state last year in terms of homicides per capita.

“Our objective … [is] for people to be able to return to their homes and communities. We need the support of the Mexican army and National Guard,” he said.

One former Palmas Altas resident told Milenio that his father died of grief a year ago after his brother was abducted and presumably killed. He said that numerous people were kidnapped in the small town and most were never seen again. Those who did return had had their ears mutilated, he said.

The man, a farmer who wasn’t identified for security reasons, was the last Palmas Altas resident to abandon the town, Milenio said. He is now trying to start a new life in Jerez but hasn’t been able to find a job.

Homicides have increased over the past six months in Zacatecas despite additional efforts by the federal government to bring insecurity under control. The army this week moved at least 10 armored all-terrain vehicles into the state, a sign that the authorities intend to further ramp up their fight against organized crime.

With reports from Milenio

Mexico condemns Russian invasion; Ukrainians urge boycott of Russian products

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February 25, 2022

Foreign Affairs Minister Marcelo Ebrard shared a video on social media Thursday evening, condemning Russia's invasion of Ukraine. — Foreign Affairs Minister Marcelo Ebrard shared a video on social media Thursday evening to condemn Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Twitter screenshot

Mexico has condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and called for an immediate ceasefire in the eastern European nation.

Foreign Affairs Minister Marcelo Ebrard conveyed the message on behalf of the Mexican government in a video message posted to social media Thursday evening.

He said President López Obrador had asked him to communicate the instructions given to Mexico’s permanent representative to the United Nations to guide the country’s actions on the UN Security Council, of which it is a non-permanent member, and other international forums.

“It’s very clear to us that we’re dealing with an invasion, there’s no longer any doubt about that. It’s an operation with a scale that covers almost the entire territory of Ukraine,” Ebrard said. “… Our main position is to reject the use of force and vigorously condemn the presence of Russian Federation forces in Ukrainian territory.”

The foreign minister noted that Mexico was invaded twice by France and twice by the United States before declaring that “due to history and tradition, due to our formation as a nation, we have to reject and vigorously condemn the invasion of a country like Ukraine by a power such as Russia.”

México rechaza el uso de la fuerza y condena enérgicamente la invasión Rusa a Ucrania. Demanda cesen las hostilidades,se inicie diálogo,se proteja a la población.Aquí instrucciones al Dr.Juan Ramón de la Fuente para el Consejo de Seguridad de mañana. pic.twitter.com/NoGDWbwQpG

— Marcelo Ebrard C. (@m_ebrard) February 25, 2022

“We demand that the Russian Federation cease the military operations in Ukrainian territory, that they respect [Ukraine’s] territorial integrity [and] that its civilian population be protected. We’re going to continue insisting on the need for a diplomatic way out and support the secretary-general of the United Nations in his difficult task at this time. These are the instructions that I’ve just shared with our [UN] ambassador in New York, Juan Ramón de la Fuente,” Ebrard said.

“Mexico … calls for an immediate ceasefire that allows a diplomatic way out, protects the population and avoids suffering,” he added.

The video was posted to social media just hours after Ukraine’s ambassador to Mexico, Oksana Dramaretsha, called on Mexico to condemn Russia’s aggression and take a “clear position” on the conflict.

Ebrard said earlier Thursday that Mexico wasn’t considering suspending diplomatic relations with Russia.

“We’re maintaining the relations with the Russian Federation, it’s one of the things we have to do – maintain dialogue with the different parties that are unfortunately participating in this conflict,” he said.

Ukrainians protesting outside the Russian embassy in Mexico City on Thursday called on Mexicans to boycott Russian products to show their opposition to the assault on their homeland.

Ukrainians and supporters protest outside the Russian embassy in Mexico City on Thursday.

About 50 of an estimated 400 Ukraine citizens who live in Mexico City attended the protest, the newspaper El Universal reported. One woman said that bigger protests will be held in the coming days.

Mexico imports a range of products from Russia that could be part of a boycott. They include steel, iron, aluminum, fertilizer and chemicals, as well as consumer products such as vodka, beer, chocolate, shoes, bags and clothes.

According to the Foreign Affairs Ministry, Russia was Mexico’s 35th largest trading partner in 2020 with two-way trade worth just under US $1.3 billion. Russian products accounted for two-thirds of that amount.

Among Mexico’s main exports to Russia in 2020 were cars, telephones and beer.

With reports from Milenio and El Universal

Consumer agency finds fault with several brands of mezcal

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February 24, 2022

A recently completed study from the federal consumer protection agency (Profeco) has bad news for some common mezcal brands, one of which could be pulled from the market.

The study is scheduled to be published in March, but Profeco has already started proceedings against some companies, according to Ricardo Sheffield, the agency’s chief.

The worst offender is the popular brand Gusano Rojo, which Sheffield described as “almost” mezcal.

“It doesn’t comply with the regulation … we started proceedings against [the company] and it will end up in proceedings against the Mezcal Regulation Council for having authorized a product that doesn’t comply,” Sheffield said.

Other lesser offenders will get away with fines or a slap on the wrist.

The fines will go to four products that contain less product than they advertise. Mezcal Amarás, Mezcales de Leyenda, Mezcal 1903 and Mezcal Alacrán will all have to pay. In some cases, the bottles contained as much as 5% less than the label stated, violating consumer protection regulations, Sheffield said.

Mezcal 1903 also fell short in terms of alcohol content with 37.2% alcohol instead of 38%, as advertised. So did the brands Apaluz, with 38.6% alcohol instead of the advertised 40%, and Kilómetro 70, with 39% instead of 40%. The watery brews were reprimanded by Profeco and told to correct the issue.

Sheffield acknowledged that the violations were small in some cases, but emphasized that slight anomolies “reflect a lack of control in the production,” a worrisome problem for alcoholic beverages.

Mezcal is liquor distilled from mashed, fermented agave hearts. The agave species used can take from 6 up to 20 years to grow to maturity.

With reports from Milenio

Honorary Russian consul resigns over Ukraine invasion

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February 24, 2022

russian-consul — Armina Wolpert, Honorary Russian consul to Quintana Roo, resigned in protest of her country's invasion of Ukraine.

Russia’s honorary consul in Quintana Roo announced her resignation Thursday due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, while President López Obrador expressed Mexico’s opposition to the assault on the eastern European nation.

Armina Wolpert said on Twitter that she couldn’t represent Russia without sharing the values and principles of the Russian government.

“I will miss working with the wonderful people from the embassy,” she wrote in a post that included the hashtag #UcraniaBajoAtaque, or #UkraineUnderAttack.

According to her LinkedIn profile, Wolpert has been Russia’s honorary consul in Quintana Roo since August 2016. She is also the owner and CEO of a travel agency that focuses on Russian tourism to Mexico.

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s ambassador to Mexico called on the Mexican government to condemn Russia’s aggression and take a “clear position” on the conflict.

Ukrainian ambassador Oksana Dramaretsha called on Mexico to show more support for her country as it faces invasion.

“We expect a clear position from Mexico because until now we haven’t felt the Mexican position clearly,” Oksana Dramaretsha told a press conference.

On Wednesday night, just before Russia’s full-scale invasion had begun, Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said on Twitter that Mexico “rejects the use of force,” while President López Obrador said Thursday that the country is not in “favor of any war.”

“Mexico is a country that has always declared itself in favor of peace,” he told reporters at his morning news conference. ” … We don’t want people to suffer, we don’t want the civilian population to be affected, we don’t want military confrontation. That’s our position,” López Obrador said.

But unlike many other countries, Mexico has not announced any economic sanctions on Russia.

López Obrador said that the invasion of Ukraine is already generating economic effects for Mexico, but asserted that the country is prepared to respond to them.

“If the price of imported gas increases a lot we can put all the power plants that don’t require gas to work in order to avoid an increase in the cost of electricity,” he said. “… We already have a plan … to produce more electricity with water; we’re going to put the hydroelectric plants to work at full capacity. … In the case of gasoline, there is a subsidy … so that even if the price of imported gasoline or crude oil goes up the increase isn’t passed on to consumers.”

A group of Ukrainian citizens protested outside the Russian embassy in Mexico City on Thursday.

Later on Thursday, a group of Ukrainian citizens gathered outside the Russian Embassy in Mexico City to protest the invasion of their homeland.

“We should all say no to this war,” one woman identified only as Sofia told the newspaper Reforma. “This is a hit against me, my family and my friends.”

Eugenio, a Ukrainian man currently studying in Mexico said that his political views are different from those of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, but he nevertheless supports him as he governs the country amid the Russian invasion.

“We have political differences but that’s not important now, the important thing is our country. I support our president,” Eugenio said. “Ukraine will win. … We’re going to defend our freedom.”

On Thursday morning, the Russian Embassy shared a photograph of President Vladimir Putin on its Facebook page superimposed with a quote from his address early Thursday (Russian time) in which he announced a “special military operation” in Ukraine and declared that an “empire of lies” has been created inside the United States.

With reports from El Universal, Milenio and Reforma

Dog dragged by vehicle through city streets is 3rd report of abuse in 14 days

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February 24, 2022