Wow! This piece by Ricardo Ravelo in Proceso really underscores the waste of funds and likely harmful impacts of the proposed U.S. Merida Initiative (aka Plan Mexico). The second round of funds is currently being pushed for this failed drug war policy. Let’s hope President-elect Obama comes up with practical, non-ideological and human rights-respecting approaches to the huge drug markets in the United States. We know that the current approach throwing good money after bad; increasing the corruption, violence and human rights abuses; thereby destabilizing Mexico is not working. RJ

The agencies in charge of Mexico’s drug war have high-ranking officials who protect the cartels

By Ricardo Ravelo, Proceso
Translation from the original Spanish and notes by Kristin Bricker

The animosity between the heads of Federal Attorney General’s Office and the Public Security Ministry don’t just immobilize the federal government and make its crusade against drug traffickers and organized crime futile. It also shows that both institutions are so porous that the gangsters have already positioned themselves in them. The infiltration is of such magnitude that even Eduardo Medina Mora and Genaro Garcia Luna have become suspect. (more…)

By Jorge Carrasco Araizaga and Francisco Castellanos J., Proceso
Translated from the original Spanish by Kristin Bricker for NarcoNews

Through confessions obtained “under torture” and with multiple irregularities, the Federal Attorney General’s office (PGR in its Spanish initials) maintains the three alleged culprits under arrest in the September 15 terrorist attack in Morelia, Michoacan—which left eight people dead and 106 injured—even though many family members and neighbors assure that the accused were in Lazaro Cardenas [250 miles south of Morelia] the moment the attacks occurred.

Juan Carlos Castro Galeana, Julio Cesar Mondragon Mendoza, and Alfredo Rosas Elicea, the suspects in the grenade attack, were kidnapped and tortured by armed men in Lazaro Cardenas and later brought to a house in Apatzingan, where they were tormented again, before federal authorities took charge of them.

According to the criminal investigation PGR/SIEDO/UEITA/110/2008, the accused say they were kidnapped and psychologically and physically tortured for days so that they would confess to the attack and to being members of Los Zetas.

According to their statements, which Proceso had access to, the kidnappings happened between September 18-23 in Lazaro Cardenas, a port city in the zone controlled by the La Familia cartel, which is involved in a turf war with Los Zetas for control of drug trafficking in Michoacan. La Familia had offered to undertake its own investigation to find people responsible for the attack.

Despite the fact that the Assistant Attorney General for Specialized Investigation of Organized Crime (SIEDO), Marisela Morales Ibañez, credited an anonymous call that revealed the location of those who are now detained, a memo provided to this weekly by a member of an intelligence organization says that on September 18 “there was a meeting between the security authorites in Michoacan and La F. (La Familia), in some cabins in the vicinity of Cuitzeo (security barracks), agreeing that they would detain various people” in order to blame the Morelia attacks and the grenade attack against the Michoacan Assistant Attorney General’s Office in Lazaro Cardenas, which occurred this past August. (more…)

As U.S. voters go to the polls the issue of the ‘war on drugs’ looms large both domestically and internationally.

The best journalism on the international ‘front’ has come out of Rolling Stone magazine[the failed ‘war on drugs’ (Dec. 2007)and the ‘war next door’ (Nov. 2008). On the domestic ‘front’, Alternet (Nov. 2008) has written a compelling short piece about efforts to undo some of the damage in the U.S.

And as a corruption scandal hits the Mexican AG’s (Prosecutor General of the Republic’s) office, with more than 35 of its officials revealed to be working for narcotraffickers. today’s New York Times also has an important piece from which a key excerpt is included here.

Take note that it is this AG’s office - which Bush’s Plan Mexico/Merida Initiative is slated to provide $60 million to - which promoted the cover up story that Brad was shot at close range and that he was shot by the activists who in reality were helping him (as is clear in the video and photographic footage, forensic and witness evidence etc.).

November 2, 2008
In Mexico’s Drug War, Sorting Out Good Guys From Bad
By MARC LACEY

It has long been known that drug gangs have infiltrated local police forces. Now it is becoming ever more clear that the problem does not stop there. The alarming reality is that many public servants in Mexico are serving both the taxpayers and the traffickers.

The latest corruption scandal has prompted President Calderón’s attorney general to order a restructuring and purging of his office, and specifically of Siedo, which was formed from another agency that was shut down after being infiltrated by drug spies.

The men in suits, it turns out, were both bureaucrats and bad guys, officials say, corrupt employees high up in an elite unit of the federal attorney general’s office who were feeding secret information to the feared Beltrán Leyva cartel in exchange for suitcases full of cash.

Their arrest, and the firing of 35 other suspect law enforcement officials, represents the most extensive corruption case that this country, which knows corruption all too well, has ever seen. And it raises a question that is on the lips of many Mexicans: how does one know who is dirty and who is clean?

Blindman’s Buff #228 by JOHN ROSS
Contact: 011-5255-5518-1213 X102 and johnross@igc.org

Excerpt of this excellent piece: “Then five local cops in civilian dress appeared at the head of the street about 35 to 50 meters away and turned their weapons on the APPO supporters milling around outside the compound. When the plainclothes police began to fire, Brad turned towards them, still filming. A .38 caliber slug caught him square in the chest. The impact caused him to drop his video camera and swerve to the left where a second bullet smashed into his right side destroying vital organs. Mortally wounded, Brad Will slid down to the sidewalk as the bullets continued to explode around him.”

AS THE DAYS OF THE DEAD DAWN OVER MEXICO, BRAD WILL IS STILL DEAD - AND KICKING!

MEXICO CITY (Oct. 31st) - The Dias de los Muertos, (November 1st & 2nd ) when Mexicans celebrate those who have passed on to Mictlan, are upon us again and Brad Will, the U.S. photo-journalist murdered at the height of the Oaxaca rebellion two years ago, is still dead - although his spirit keeps kicking. (more…)