Impunity / Mexico

WHEREAS Congress in March passed an amendment to Article 73 of the Constitution which makes crimes committed against freedom of expression federal offenses, but still pending is for the majority of local legislatures to vote in favor, and in no more than six months time must enabling legislation be adopted, but if this continues to be delayed it means that not until 2013 can the Mexican Attorney General’s Office deal with these kinds offenses WHEREAS six years after the creation of the Office of Specialized Public Prosecutor for Dealing with Crimes Against Freedom of Expression, previously with another name, it has failed to give any results that enable those responsible for the murder and abduction of journalists to be put on trial, neither does it have its own budget nor sufficient staff, meaning this office fosters impunity and erodes confidence in the Mexican institutions WHEREASthe Assistant State Attorney’s Office for Specialized Investigation of Organized Crime (SIEDO) has under its jurisdiction at least four cases of attacks on journalists committed since 2004 and no case has been solved by that dependency of the Attorney General’s Office WHEREAS self-censorship and relocation of journalists to other cities or countries is on the increase in those states in which threats are mounting and becoming more serious, but silence or escape is preferred to denunciation due to a lack of confidence in officials of the three levels of government – federal, state and municipal – in the states of Veracruz, Tamaulipas, Coahuila, Chihuahua, Durango, Sinaloa, Sonora, Zacatecas, Michoacán, Guerrero, Tabasco, Chiapas, Oaxaca and Nuevo León, which shows that in Mexico there do not exist the conditions for a full exercise of freedom of expression and the people’s right to be informed WHEREAS criminal organizations and groups of political or economic power use threats to journalists and the hacking of Web sites to halt the distribution of newspapers and make direct attacks on news media offices by hurling grenades, setting fires or shooting up entryways to apply pressure and undermine freedom to report, in states such as Tamaulipas, Veracruz, Coahuila, Quintana Roo and Guerrero, without the authorities having solved even one of these cases or giving guarantees to the press to enable it to do its work independently WHEREAS President Felipe Calderón pledged two years ago to deal with and solve the cases of the murder and disappearance of journalists that the IAPA has submitted to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), this being not the case and there remains only a little more than seven months of his term in office WHEREAS there exists the possibility that in the next few months, given the electoral process that Mexico is undergoing, there will be an increase in threats and risks to journalists, mainly in the states in which freedom of expression is limited and there is a high level of impunity surrounding attacks made on journalists WHEREAS despite the constant threats and the various forms of risk that journalists are facing the mechanism for protection of members of the press and human rights defenders, which in September 2010 was a commitment made to the Inter American Press Association, has not been put under way as an effective government mechanism, it not having even the infrastructure, although it has at its disposal 29.5 million pesos to use in this year 2012 WHEREAS the Mexican Senate is debating a bill for a Law on Protection of Defenders of Human Rights and Journalists, which would make formal the creation of a Mechanism of Protection and if passed before the Mexican legislature’s session ends (in April) it would be implemented in four months, as the bill envisions, otherwise it would have to wait for the following legislative session, which will not start until September this year WHEREAS President Felipe Calderón will end his term in office in December this year and in his six years in government there has been not one conviction of those responsible for murder and disappearance of journalists in the cases that the federal authority has under its jurisdiction, nor has there been offered clear and timely information that enables one to learn the motives for these attacks and the alleged perpetrators, despite the fact that in a number of these cases more than eight years have passed since they occurred WHEREAS the IAPA has news of attempts by Mexican local governments to legislate on the work of the press, on the pretext of giving it protection but in reality they appear to be attempts to control and restrict a free exercise of freedom of expression and the people’s right to be informed, as has occurred in the cases of Sinaloa and Zacatecas WHEREAS in the states of Veracruz, Chihuahua, Coahuila, Guerrero, Sinaloa, Quintana Roo and Tamaulipas there continue to be reports of attacks on and the arbitrary detention of journalists while doing their job on the part of local and federal police officers and members of the Armed Forces, without these attacks being punished, which increases risks for reporters WHEREAS despite the fact that Mexico has arrested and brought before the criminal courts on other charges three persons allegedly responsible for crimes against journalists, they have not been tried for these offenses and in some cases they have been extradited from the United States without being given an exemplary sentence for the attacks made on journalists and which would serve as a weapon to halt the assaults, such is the case of journalists Manuel Burgueño, Francisco Ortiz Franco and Armando Ramírez, all killed because of their work allegedly on the orders of Humberto Rodríguez Bañuelos, a.k.a. “La Rana,” brothers Benjamín and Francisco Arellano Félix, and Antonio Acosta Hernández, a.k.a. “El Diego,” respectively WHEREAS there persists a lack of will on the part of state and federal authorities to investigate and bring to trial those responsible for the cases of crimes against 18 journalists that are in danger of becoming subject to statutes of limitations and only the state and federal governments can prevent this and provide full justice to Jesús Michel Jacobo, Felipe González Hernández, Manuel Burgueño Orduño, Linda Bejarano, Ezequiel Huerta Acosta, Alberto Ruvalcaba Torres, Alfredo Córdova Solórzano, Lázaro Cárdenas, Alejandro Campos Moreno, Juvencio Arenas Gálvez, Gabriel Venegas Valencia, Roberto Antonio Mancilla Herrera, José Herrera Cañas, Jessica Elizalde de León, Abel Bueno León, Víctor Hernández Martínez, Margarito Morales Ramírez and Pedro Valle Hernández WHEREAS Principle 4 of the Declaration of Chapultepec says “Freedom of expression and of the press are severely limited by murder, terrorism, kidnapping, intimidation, the unjust imprisonment of journalists, the destruction of facilities, violence of any kind and impunity for perpetrators. Such acts must be investigated promptly and punished harshly” THE IAPA MIDYEAR MEETING RESOLVES to ask the Mexican Congress to give prompt passage of the amendment of Article 73 of the Constitution, so as to put into effect making crimes committed against freedom of expression federal offenses to request President Felipe Calderón that he urgently send to Congress the proposed enactment of Article 73 of the Constitution and that the legislators, in their case, pass this measure, so that the federal authority be the one that investigates such cases and the Attorney General’s Office be that which responds to the investigations of the cases of the murder or disappearance of journalists to ask President Felipe Calderón and Mexican Attorney General Marisela Morales to urgently bring about the changes in the Attorney General’s Office’s Organic Law so that they be included in the administrative structure of the Office of Special Prosecutor for Dealing With Crimes Against Freedom of Expression, to provide human, technical and financial resources to enable it to do its work and give clear and convincing results to ask the new head of the Office of Special Prosecutor for Dealing With Crimes Against Freedom of Expression, Laura Angelina Borbolla Moreno, to seriously and promptly investigate all the case files of attacks on journalists that she has under her responsibility, and urgently provide support for the Assistant State Attorney’s Office for Specialized Investigation of Organized Crime (SIEDO), so that those cases under its jurisdiction do not remain unpunished either to call upon the governments of the states of Veracruz, Tamaulipas, Coahuila, Chihuahua, Durango, Sinaloa, Sonora, Zacatecas, Michoacán, Guerrero, Tabasco, Chiapas, Oaxaca and Nuevo León to ensure the unfettered practice of journalism to ask the Mexican Congress not to continue delaying passage of the law on protection of defenders of human rights and journalists so that a Protection Mechanism can be formally created to urge President Felipe Calderón to consolidate and push forward the Protection Mechanism for Journalists and Defenders of Human Rights as an essential and urgent resource to support journalists under threat and at high risk to ask the governments of the states of Tamaulipas, Veracruz, Coahuila, Quintana Roo and Guerrero not to continue keeping unpunished the cases of attacks on news media premises, Web sites and the distribution of newspapers and, mainly, the threats to journalists, because not bringing those responsible to justice makes them, voluntarily or not, responsible themselves to ask the Office of Special Prosecutor for Dealing With Crimes Against Freedom of Expression of the Attorney General’s Office to work with the state authorities in investigations into threats to or attacks on news media or even take up these cases to urge President Felipe Calderón to fulfill his commitment to comply with the resolutions issued by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights so that the Mexican government does not continue to be oblivious to the murders of Víctor Manuel Oropeza and Héctor Félix Miranda to urge the federal government to offer real guarantees to journalists so that they can carry out their professional work within the framework of the electoral process under way in Mexico to demand of President Felipe Calderón and Mexican Attorney General Marisela Morales that before the current term of office ends they present to the public a precise and accurate report regarding the investigations into the murders and disappearances of journalists that enable one to learn of the motives and those allegedly responsible, as a form of recognition by the government of its responsibility and in order to prevent those cases remaining in silence and, consequently, in full impunity to urge the governments of Zacatecas and Sinaloa to not use as justification the lack of safety of journalists in order to attempt to pass laws that, deep down, only seek to limit freedom of expression to demand of state and federal police forces, and the Armed Forces, that they establish protocols obligatory for their members regarding contact with journalists and that they severely punish those that seek to unlawfully limit the unfettered practice of journalism to urge Mexican Attorney General Marisela Morales to bring to trial brothers Benjamín and Francisco Arellano Félix, Antonio Acosta Hernández, a.k.a. “El Diego,” and Humberto Rodríguez Bañuelos, a.k.a. “La Rana,” for their alleged responsibility for the murder of Francisco Ortiz Franco, Armando Ramírez and Manuel Burgueño to call on the governments of the states of Sinaloa, Mexico State, Chiapas, Coahuila, Jalisco, Michoacán, Morelos, Chihuahua and Guerrero and of Mexico City for results in investigations into the murders of journalists under their jurisdiction, so as to prevent a lack of justice and these cases becoming subject to statutes of limitations.