Disappearances, the ‘Silent Side’ of Mexico's Narco War | México |
March 24, 2008
Frontera NorteSur
The unearthing of at least 48 murder victims from three properties in Ciudad Juarez and Chihuahua City during recent weeks grimly refocused attention on the persistence of torture and forced disappearance in Mexico. Since many - if not most - of the victims were presumably associated with illegal drug trafficking and other criminal activities, the popular wisdom is that common citizens who keep their noses out of trouble shouldn't be overly concerned by the discovery of mass horrors like the latest narco graves.
Meanwhile,
in the Guerrero state capital of Chilpancingo the Committee of Friends
and Relatives of Murdered, Disappeared and Kidnapped Persons contended
that Guerrero Governor Zeferino Torreblanca, and State Attorney General
Eduardo Murueta, have closed their doors to family members of missing
persons presumably kidnapped by organized crime elements.
"Not a
single state official has faced down the violence that this place is
going through," charged Filiberto Ceron Radilla, father of disappeared
architect Jorge Gabriel Ceron Silva. "It is as if they want to oblige
the citizenry to accept a reality that we are not ready to tolerate."
There was no immediate comment from either Governor Torreblanca or
Attorney General Murueta.
The
Guerrero relatives' committee has documented the cases of 107 people
who disappeared in the state from December 2006 to January 2008.
Additionally, the group reported at least 20 similar disappearances in
the first two months of this year. Although violence has diminished
somewhat from last year and 2006, high-profile disappearances and
murders, suspected of being carried out by organized criminal gangs,
continue on a fairly regular basis. In one of the latest cases to hit
the press, Edgar Calvillo Roux, the director of the Acapulco police
department's intelligence center, was reportedly kidnapped by armed men
on March 5. As of yet no information about Calvillo's fate has come to
light.
Condemned
by all human rights organizations, forced disappearance constitutes the
silent side of Mexico's narco war. Much more visible, of course, are
the inner city shootouts, street side body dumping and public
executions that have jarred entire regions of the country. In Ciudad
Juarez, for example, nine people were reported slain gangland style on
Monday, March 17, including one man who was shot to death inside the
popular Willy's dance club in the city's Pronaf district.
Since
the administration of Mexican President Felipe Calderon took office on
December 1, 2006 more than 3,000 people have been murdered in gangland
style killings. As of March 14 of this year, the victims included 2,811
men and 197 women. Added together with similar statistics from 2006,
more than 5,000 people have been killed in narco-tainted violence in
the last two years. The body count is significantly higher than the
total number of US soldiers killed during the first five years of the
Iraq war.
——————————
Sources:
El Diario de Juarez, March 18, 2008. Article by Martin Orquiz. Norte,
March 18, 2008. Article by Arturo Chacon. Los Angeles Times, March 15,
2008 Article by Marla Dickerson and Richard Marosi. La Jornada de
Guerrero, March 15, 2008. Article by Marlen Castro. La Jornada, March
10, 2008. Article by Antonio Heras. El Sur, March 1, 8, 15, 16, 2008.
Articles by Ezequiel Flores Contreras, Aurora Harrison, editorial staff
and the Agencia Reforma news service.
Frontera NorteSur (FNS)
Center for Latin American and Border Studies
New Mexico State University
Las Cruces, New Mexico
http://www.mexidata.info/id1763.html
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