EVENT: Public Security in Mexico & Policing Standards

Tuesday, May 21, 2013 / 9-11am / Wilson Center

Details & RSVP: http://bit.ly/MexPo

At a time when the bilateral security relationship between the U.S. and Mexico is going through a period of change, and when the administration of President Enrique Peña Nieto is developing its own public security strategy, the Mexico Institute is pleased to present an event examining the role of standards in strengthening policing institutions. Three experts on security and policing standards will speak on the importance of developing standards for hiring, promotion, ethics, behavior and retirement in the policing field, and how to overcome the challenges that exist to their full implementation. Join us for this discussion of a new area of bilateral cooperation in the security field.

EVENT: Launch of The State of the Border Report

Thursday, May 23, 2013 / 3:30 – 5:30 pm / Wilson Center

Details & RSVP: http://bit.ly/StateofBorder

In conjunction with the North American Center for Transborder Studies and El Colegio de la Frontera Norte, The Woodrow Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute is pleased to invite you to the launch of The State of the Border Report.

The report provides a comprehensive look at the state of affairs in the management of the U.S.-Mexico border and the border region, focusing on four core areas: trade and competitiveness, security, sustainability, and quality of life.

U.S.-Mexico border, security cooperation & state elections – Weekly News Summary: May 17

The Mexico Institute’s “Weekly News Summary,” released every Friday afternoon summarizes the week’s most prominent Mexico headlines published in the English-language press, as well as the most engaging opinion pieces by Mexican columnists.

What the English-language press had to say…

A bipartisan immigration reform bill survived another week under review by the Senate Judiciary Committee [see this useful graphic by The Washington Post containing rulings to key amendments to the bill]. A  Los Angeles Times editorial pointed out that as baby boomers retire and U.S. birthrates continue to decline, immigrants will be needed to fill labor gaps. A different article in the same paper questioned whether or not a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants would lead to an increase of the unauthorized population similar to the increase that followed the IRCA legalization of 1986.

VOXXI, a news website, argued that while border security should be a factor in the immigration reform debate, improving the efficiency of cross-border flows would provide a huge economic boost to both countries. The New York Times, meanwhile, highlighted San Diego Mayor Bob Filner’s efforts to reach out to his counterpart in Tijuana and address border inefficiencies.

Mexico Aims to Triple Natural Gas Imports from U.S.

The Wall Street Journal, 5/16/2013

The construction of a natural gas pipeline from southern Texas to central Mexico will allow for a tripling of imports from the U.S. to meet increasing demand from industry, an official from Petroleos Mexicanos has said. Alejandro Martinez Sibaja, the director of the state-owned company’s gas division, said that Mexican industry is currently hampered by its reliance on more expensive fuels because of the lack of pipeline capacity for natural gas to come across the border.

“The lack of gas means that our industries are having to burn fuel oil,” which is currently about three times as expensive as natural gas, Mr. Martinez said in an interview on Wednesday. “A lot of investment is looking to come to Mexico, so we have to respond by providing natural gas as part of our offer to get these companies to come.” The gas supply problem is expected to be alleviated with the Los Ramones project, a pipeline that Mr. Martinez said will carry around 3 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day by 2015 from southern Texas to the central Mexican state of Guanajuato, which is a hub for the Mexican auto industry.

Read more…

In Mexico, fears for democracy as threatened journalists curtail coverage

McClatchy,  5/16/2013

Mexico is easily the most dangerous place in the Western Hemisphere for reporters to ply their trade. Dozens of journalists have been killed or disappeared. Nearly every month, a newspaper or a radio or TV station is firebombed, attacked with explosives or raked with gunfire, targeted by the country’s rising criminal gangs who use violence to discourage reporting the gangsters don’t like. And the violence has worked. In much of Mexico, local news outlets no longer report on organized crime or corruption. Analysts call these areas “zones of silence,” where the lights have gone out on the dark activities within.

The success of the intimidation alarms advocates of both free speech and democracy. With no news reports on Mexico’s drug and crime problems, citizens find it difficult to stay informed about what could be life-threatening situations developing nearby. They also cannot effectively participate in the normal give and take of public discussion that fuels a democracy. The muffling has been so effective that many Mexicans don’t even realize that a near blackout of news on crime exists in swaths of the country. “If journalists don’t act as a viewfinder to say who is winning the contracts, who will become police chief, if there’s no accountability, they can do whatever they want,” said Andres Solis Alvarez, a former crime reporter and author of a self-protection manual for Mexican journalists.

Read more…

To read the Mexico Institute’s newest publication on violence against journalists, click here.

Blog del Narco: author who chronicled Mexico’s drugs war forced to flee

The Guardian, 5/16/2013

The author of a pioneering blog about Mexico’s drug war has said that she has fled the country and that her blog partner has gone missing. The young woman, using her pseudonym Lucy, said her colleague phoned her last week to say a single word – “run” – and then vanished, prompting her to flee to the United States and then Spain. “I’m trying to think positively but I’m scared something terrible has happened. ‘Run’ was our codeword for when something was very wrong. We had never used it before.”

Blog del Narco is an internet sensation which has chronicled Mexico’s drug war with graphic images and shocking stories few others dare show. It has been a must-read for authorities, drug gangs and millions of ordinary people. The anonymous author was a mystery until last month when she revealed to the Guardian and Texas Observer she was a woman, not a man as previously assumed, and that with her colleague she had written a book, Dying for the Truth: Undercover Inside Mexico’s Violent Drug War.

Read more…

Slim comes second: Is Mexico’s president a monopoly buster?

Global Post, 5/17/2013

Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto vows big changes with the economic reforms he’s pushing and they’ve already taken more than a little change from the pockets of mega-mogul Carlos Slim. With stock in his flagship phone company America Movil slipping because of telecommunications reforms about to become law, Slim lost the title of world’s richest man Thursday to Microsoft founder Bill Gates for the first time in six years.

Peña Nieto seems on a roll with his campaign to shift the chatter about his country from drug war violence to economic possibility. Since taking office in December, he has worked with political opponents to push constitutional fixes aimed at breaking the choke hold interest groups have around Mexico’s economy.

Read more…

Senate group hopes bipartisan support will help immigration bill

The Washington Post, 5/16/2013

The bipartisan Senate group behind a comprehensive immigration bill is working privately to satisfy concerns raised by Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (Utah), hoping he will support the legislation and influence fellow GOP lawmakers. The bid to bring Hatch into the fold highlights the strategy of Senate immigration proponents who believe that building as much bipartisan support for the bill is crucial to improving its chances in the Republican-led House.

Negotiators in the House said late Thursday that they reached a tentative agreement on immigration reform but no details were disclosed. If the immigration bill were to pass the Senate with more than the 60 votes needed to avoid a filibuster, proponents say, House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) would be motivated to allow a vote on the legislation even if a majority of his caucus opposed it.

Read more…

To see a graphic of which amendments to the bill have been adopted, defeated or withdrawn, click here.