Mexico: Joint Briefing Note on the Situation of Human Rights Defenders in View of EU-Mexico Bilateral Human Rights Dialogue, Mexico City, April 2015
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Mexico: joint briefing note on the situation of human rights defenders in view of EU-Mexico Bilateral Human Rights Dialogue, Mexico City, April 2015 The briefing note is complete with an annex of individual cases raised by Front Line Defenders in 2014 1. Facts and figures on Human Rights Defenders (HRDs) in Mexico In 2006 Felipe Calderón took up office as President of Mexico and under his administration a “war on drugs” was launched. Mexico experienced unprecedented levels of violence and insecurity throughout the country. The risk of defending human rights and practising journalism in Mexico increased at an alarming rate in the context of the “war on drugs”. Numerous cases of intimidation, legal harassment, death threats, enforced disappearances, killings and acts of aggressions have been documented against human rights defenders (HRDs) as a result of their human rights work. While the perpetrators are not identified in a great majority of cases, civil society has expressed concern that both state and non-state actors are reportedly responsible for such attacks. Regarding the involvement of state actors, such tendencies were observed either by their direct collusion in the aforementioned incidents, or by acquiescence. Although there was a change of administration in Mexico in December 2012, the public security strategies utilised by the current administration under Enrique Peña Nieto continue to arouse cause for concern and continue to place HRDs and journalists at risk. In recent months, Mexico has attracted international attention due to the enforced disappearance of 43 students from Ayotzinapa in the southern state of Guerrero at the end of September 2014. In its 2015 Mexico Report1, Human Rights Watch stated that this case was one of the worst tragedies that have been seen in the country, yet it reflected a broader pattern of gross and systematic human rights abuses and impunity. The case, which sparked widespread protests in the country, highlighted the pervasive corruption of public officials, their involvement with drug cartels and organised crime gangs and violence. Human rights defenders, including parents of the missing students and other victims of the violence and security strategies employed during Mexico's “war on drugs”, who started to investigate the disappearances and other violent acts and participate in protests in order to demand justice for the victims have faced retaliation, including threats and acts of intimidation, between the end of 2014 and the beginning of the year 2015. In Mexico, a variety of human rights issues place HRDs in high-risk situations: • Violence against HRDs continues escalating. The Cerezo Committee and ACUDDEH have registered 204 cases of aggressions against HRD between June 2013 and May 2014 (the figure has doubled since January 2011). From November 2010 to December 2012, the OHCHR documented 89 alleged acts of aggression against human rights defenders2. However it pointed out that the numbers might be higher due to data sub register. • New trends in acts of aggression: according to the report of the Cerezo Committee and ACUDDEH, throughout the last three years, the patterns of aggressions have become more serious: documented cases of harassment and aggressions have exceeded the threats3. 1 For more information see: https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2015/country-chapters/mexico 2 OHCHR-Mexico, Report on the situation of human rights defenders in Mexico: update and evaluation, 2013 3 ACUDDEH, National Campaign Against Efnorced Disappearance and Cerezo Committee Mexico, La defensa de los derechos humanos en México: una lucha contra la impunidad [The defense of human rights in Mexico: a fight against impunity] (June 2013 to The National Campaign against Enforced Disappearance affirms that if you compare the first 18 months of Felipe Calderon’s presidency with Enrique Peña Nieto’s, the enforced disappearance of human rights defenders increased by 60%, which means that currently in Mexico, every two weeks a human rights defender is a victim of enforced disappearance4. • Impunity: according to OHCHR figures which date from 2013, more than 95% of the violations against human rights defenders remain in impunity. • Perpetrators of attacks: The “All Rights for All” National Network of Civil Human Rights Organizations (Red TdT) reports that, of the 104 cases of aggressions against human rights defenders that were documented between 2011 and 20135, the main group of perpetrators that were identified were members of state security forces. In addition to this, and according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, “it is important to note that a majority of [the cases] point to non-state actors, mainly identified as local bosses (caciques) or criminal groups that see their interests affected by the work of defenders in the region, since they uncover and confront their illegal actions and interests. In some cases they have been able to demonstrate the acquiescence of governmental actors. One piece of data to highlight is that in 23% of the cases, public officials have played a role either though action or omission”6. • Defenders most suffering attacks are journalists, migrants' rights defenders, land rights defenders, environmental defenders and those fighting against impunity or denouncing drug trafficking. Women HRDs also face additional and specific risks, including sexual violence and defamation campaigns based on gender stereotypes. The National Women Human Rights Defenders Network in Mexico reported that violence against women HRDs and women journalists has intensified, without noticeable political will nor specific results from the Mexican State to counter this. In the first four months of 2014, it reported 41 direct attacks on 25 women rights defenders and female journalists, as well as 6 assaults on their organisations. In addition, between 2010-2014, at least 30 women rights defenders and journalists were assassinated. There is an incredibly high level of impunity for these attacks. An emblematic case is the one of Lucha Castro and her organisation Centro de Derechos Humanos de las Mujeres A C.- CEDEHM (Centre for Women's Rights in Chihuahua), which promotes and protects the rights of women and offers legal and psychological support to women victims of violence in their communities in Chihuahua and Juarez. In March 2015, Front Line Defenders launched the graphic novel ''La Lucha: The Story of Lucha Castro and Human Rights in Mexico”7 based on their true stories. • Violence against journalists has also intensified. During the first nine months of 2014, the Mexican chapter of the international organization Article 19 documented 222 attacks against members of the media; since 2010, Mexico’s National Human Rights Commission (Comisión Nacional de los Derechos Humanos, CNDH) has documented 97 cases of journalists who were allegedly killed as a result of their work. • According to the Committee Cerezo and ACUDDEH, Oaxaca, Mexico City and Chiapas are identified as the most dangerous states for the work of human rights defenders. The state of Mexico, Chihuahua, Michoacán, Guerrero, and Coahuila are also among the states where the majority of attacks are reported. May 2014), 2014 4 idem 5 See: Red TdT, El derecho a defender los derechos humanos en México: Informe sobre la situación de personas defensoras 2011- 2013 [The right to defend human rights in Mexico: report on the situation of human rights defenders 2011-2013] , 2014, pp.57-58 6 OHCHR-Mexico, op.cit, p.13 7 For more information see: https://www.frontlinedefenders.org/la-lucha-donate 2. The National Protection Mechanism for Human Rights Defenders and Journalists The National Protection Mechanism for Human Rights Defenders and Journalists was established in 2012; however, just over two years after its creation, the mechanism still faces many obstacles to guarantee its effective implementation. Human rights defenders who have requested the Mechanism's protection have not received to date a timely and efficient answer. The processing of petitions faces excessive delays, and in rare cases, there has been a follow up of prescribed measures. As a result, human rights defenders have become highly sceptical of the Mechanism’s capacity to provide them with effective protection. The Mechanism's deficiencies are mostly due to a lack of trained and experienced staff, necessary material resources and sufficient political support to guarantee that authorities effectively apply the protection measures. Civil society has particularly stated that, in practice, there is still a lack of coordination between the different levels of government (ie. federal and state level) involved in their protection. In addition, the Protection Mechanism further fails to identify and prosecute the perpetrators of attacks against defenders. In 2014, Front Line Defenders, PBI and other organisations expressed their concern at recent developments concerning the Mechanism: • Several staff resignations from key posts occurred in March 2014. The Mechanism lost one third of its staff as a result of the resignations of Mr. Juan Carlos Gutierrez Contreras, Director of the Interior Ministry's Human Rights Unit, together with four other members of staff in the Protection Mechanism. In response, the Consultative Council, a body that represents civil society at Governing Board meetings concerning protection measures for HRDs and journalists, withdrew their participation in such meetings, considering that the conditions to conduct analysis or address issues surrounding