Attention must be paid
“Among nations, as among neighbors, respect for the rights of others…” is still the cornerstone of Mexican foreign policy:
MEXICO CITY- Mexico called on Sunday for an “immediate” halt to Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip, where massive air raids have killed over 300 people so far.
The Mexican government asked for “an immediate halt to military operations” and expressed “grave concern about the bombings conducted on December 27 by the Israeli army and the excessive use of force,” the ministry of foreign affairs said in a statement.
Mexico “also rejects rockets launched from Gaza on Israeli territory,” it added.
The Latin American nation called for “the renewal of dialogue” between Israel and the Islamist movement Hamas, which rules Gaza.
The Israeli blitz, which also wounded some 600 people, came after days of spiraling violence since a six-month truce between Israel and Hamas expired on December 19.
Hamas has responded to the fighting — some of the bloodiest in the decades-old conflict — by firing more than 90 rockets and mortar rounds at Israel, killing one man and wounding some 20 people.
As far as I can tell, the Mexican government statement is being ignored by most of the foreign press (my source was the APF, printed in the Khaleej Times of the United Arab Emirates). However, it might be noted that Mexico (which has good relations with both the Palestinian Authority and the Israelis) will again be taking a two-year non-permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council in January.
Motley Crew
Colombian police sources recently leaked a new cache of photographs downloaded from a laptop computer that miraculously survived the 1 March missile attack inside Ecuador that killed FARC leader Raul Reyes.
Bush administration officials confirm the authenticity of the photos, which were studied by contract employees of the DEA and FBI. President George Bush said the photo is the clearest evidence to date that Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez is “in cahoots with evil doers who hate us for our freedoms.”
This día de los innocentes news flash confirmed by Inca Kola News.
Man is born free, but everywhere is in chains
In Telmixco, Morelos, the neighbors turned in the grandmother of three children who kept them chained up when she went out to keep them from wandering in the street. At least that’s her story. Preventative Police, Civil Protection units (EMT’s), the Fire Department and DIF (Family Services) all showed up — in force.
DIF (Family Protective Services) has taken charge of the children while the public ministry figures out what all they can charge granny — and the kids’ mother, who “forgot” about them — how to keep them locked up for a long, long time.
Given that normally kids are allowed to run around and act like kids here… and everybody in the neighborhood keeps an eye on them, there may be more to the story than appeared in the media. And, it’s a reminder that not every perverse act in Mexico has something to do with narcotics trafficking. Mexico has it’s just plain mean people too. And mean people suck. And need to be locked up… though legally they can’t be chained to a wall for a couple of years.
UN-reconciliable differences
Albania, Andorra, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chile, Colombia, Croatia, Cuba, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Ecuador, Estonia, Finland, France, Gabon, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Guinea-Bissau, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Mauritius, Mexico, Montenegro, Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Paraguay, Poland, Portugal, Romania, San Marino, Sao Tome and Principe, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Timor-Leste, United Kingdom, Uruguay, and Venezuela all signed a resolution last week at the United Nations.
Via Obsidian Wings:
In all, 66 of the U.N.’s 192 member countries signed the nonbinding declaration — which backers called a historic step to push the General Assembly to deal more forthrightly with any-gay discrimination. More than 70 U.N. members outlaw homosexuality, and in several of them homosexual acts can be punished by execution.
Co-sponsored by France and the Netherlands, the declaration was signed by all 27 European Union members, as well as Japan, Australia, Mexico and three dozen other countries. There was broad opposition from Muslim nations, and the United States refused to sign, indicating that some parts of the declaration raised legal questions that needed further review.
While a handful of non-English speaking nations in the Americas — Dominican Republic, Haiti, the CAFTA nations (El Salvador, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras and Panama) and Suriname (20% Muslim) — also voted against the resolution, the others were all former British colonies.
Nergui Manalsuren of IPS News (reposted by Alternet.org) argues that outside the Muslim world, most criminal laws regarding sodomy are holdovers from 19th century British imperial legal codes
…more than half of the world’s remaining “sodomy laws” derive from a single law on homosexual conduct that British colonial rulers imposed on India in 1860.
The law, known as Section 377 under the Indian penal code, was designed to set standards of behavior, both to “reform” the colonized and to protect the colonizers against “moral lapses”.
It was the first colonial “sodomy law” integrated into a penal code, and it became a model for countries across Asia, the Pacific Islands and Africa — almost everywhere the British imperial flag flew…
This might explain those Caribbean nations that were British colonies at least a hundred years AFTER 1860, but the United States had been founded four score and four years prior to Section 377, as “a new nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”
The British legal code doesn’t completely explain it, though the early settlement by English Puritans (who assumed the state should enforce personal behavior) might. But, then too, the United States seems to interpret that “all men” very narrowly. Two other U.N. Resolutions (both non-binding) called for a right to food, and for strengthening the existing Convention on the Rights of the Child (which the U.S. refused to ratify) were passed, almost unanimously — in both resolution votes, the United States was the sole “No” vote:
…the representative of the United States said he was unable to support the text because he believed the attainment of the right to adequate food was a goal that should be realized progressively. In his view, the draft contained inaccurate textual descriptions of underlying rights.
The Committee also approved a draft resolution on the rights of the child by a vote of 180 in favour to one against ( United States), with no abstentions. Among other things, that omnibus text would call upon States to create an environment conducive to the well-being of all children, including by strengthening international cooperation in regard to the eradication of poverty, the right to education, the right to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health, and the right to food.
This isn’t a “throw a shoe at Bush post”… the U.S. has been out of step with the rest of the world on a number of issues, and I don’t see that changing in January with a new Administration. I’ve tried to keep the focus on Mexico and Mexican issues, and much as I appreciate Mexican weirdness and local color, a lot of what I write is just the normal doings of a “normal” country. I’ve had on more than one occasion to explain that just because something is the norm in the United States, but not in Mexico, does not mean the Mexican way is uniquely Mexican.
It’s just next to a profoundly inexplicable one.
Border promotion…
If you come to Mexico to work, the first question any employer will ask is “what are you running running from?” Running from bourgeois convention is a perfectly legitimate answer (so if running from the Internal Revenue Service… depending on the job). But, for those moving to Mexico just to retire, or live on the fruits of their labors after years of slogging through mind-numbing, soul-killing work, it’s considered shameful to fess up to having lived a life of quiet desperation. If the only really interesting thing you ever did was write for your church newsletter, and you find yourself in San Miguel or Ajijic, you might be tempted to call yourself a journalist. Better yet, if you sent a few articles to your local newspaper about your trip to Tijuana back in the day, you can call yourself something exotic like a “foreign correspondent.”
The Border Promotion isn’t that unusual for a gringo heading to Mexico. It “generally” doesn’t work going the other way:
A 23-year-old Mexican national was wearing what appeared to be a U.S. Army brigadier general’s uniform when he struck a Border Patrol agent at an Interstate 8 checkpoint in October, authorities said Tuesday.
Fernando Mejia-Baron of Tijuana pleaded guilty Tuesday in federal court to assault on a federal officer, U.S. Attorney Karen P. Hewitt said in a statement.
He appeared before Magistrate Judge Anthony J. Battaglia.
Mejia-Baron was driving a Honda Accord with three illegal immigrants in the trunk when he approached the I-8 checkpoint in Pine Valley on Oct. 7, Hewitt said.
Agents who were suspicious that a young man could achieve such a high Army rank tried to stop the vehicle, Hewitt said. When Mejia-Baron tried to flee, the car struck an agent.
The California Highway Patrol said at the time that the agent suffered minor injuries.
Mejia-Baron is scheduled to be sentenced March 23 before U.S. District Judge Marilyn L. Huff.
There she is…
From Miss Hispanoamerica 2008 to Miscreant of the Year… the pride of Culiacan, Laura Elena Zúñiga Huizar.
Our lovely contestant impressed the judges at the 17th Federal Court for Penal Processing with prima facia evidence of
— participation in criminal organizations
— crimes against public health (aka narcotics smuggling)
— operating an enterprise with funds obtained from criminal enterprise
— violating various federal firearms laws
and — lucky girl — has been ordered into custody for the next forty days, while the public ministers prepare for the next round of judging. Probably better for Miss Hispanamerica to be in prison where she has a relatively decent chance of not winning the “Miss Inghead” contest.
The Chamber of Deputies is shocked (shocked, I tell you!) to discover that beauty contests are run by private businesses and infiltrated by gangsters.
Meat-ing out justice
The U.S. Department of Agriculture keeps finding new and creative ways to undermine NAFTA when it comes to Mexican agricultural exports. The latest ploy has been to require a “country of origin” certificate on meat (even when the cow you’re eating was a legal immigrant). On the other hand, the U.S. insists on flooding Mexican markets with indirectly subsidized (by was of corporate tax breaks for the producers and export credits) beef.
You think those issues might be related to this item (from Reuters):
CHICAGO, Dec 26 (Reuters) – The U.S. meat plants barred by Mexico from shipping meat there are some of the largest in the country and owned by leading U.S. meat companies, including Cargill Inc, Tyson Foods Inc (TSN.N), JBS (JBSS3.SA), Seaboard (SEB.A) and Smithfield Foods (SFD.N), according to a list on USDA’s website on Friday.
The list of the affected plants can be found here
A reason was not listed for the suspensions but meat industry sources said Mexico may be retaliating for the U.S. country of origin labeling law that went into effect earlier this year.
In another import issue likely to lead to retaliatory measures, “chocolates” (older model used cars from the United States) can again be imported, causing auto dealers to call for protectionist measures. While I’m about as pure as the driven slush when it comes to importing chocolates (without going into details, I disposed of a clapped out old Volvo irregularly), the Mexican auto dealers aren’t going to be the only ones complaining … expect the greenies and the Mexico City government to push for new restrictions.
My take on it: Auto regulations — or rather, dropping them — was sold as a consumer issue by the conservatives and free-trader in PAN. I get the sense that — like the U.S. Republicans who threaten to fight proposed job creation measures because it will benefit their political rivals, PAN will fight for this one, because improving the health and safety of Mexico City residents benefits the leftists. Stupid, but that’s politics.
Tuqui tuqui tuqui Christmas video
The Scruffy Little Burro has been a hit on the Latin American kiddy Christmas Pageant circuit for the last few centuries. I don’t have a video of the show-stopping number I saw starring two six year olds in a burro suit… a couple of natural hoofers, when it came to “Tuqui tuqui tuqui tuqui,
tuqui tuqui tuqui ta.” This version is from Voces de los Andes (which, suprisingly enough, is from Rhode Island!)
Con mi burrito sabanero, voy camino de Belén.
Con mi burrito sabanero, voy camino de Belén.
Si me ven, si me ven, voy camino de Belén.
Si me ven, si me ven, voy camino de Belén.
Lucerito mañanero, ilumina mi sendero.
Lucerito mañanero, ilumina mi sendero.
Si me ven, si me ven, voy camino de Belén.
Si me ven, si me ven, voy camino de Belén.
Con mi cuatrito voy cantando, mi burrito va trotando.
Con mi cuatrito voy cantando, mi burrito va trotando.
Si me ven, si me ven, voy camino de Belén.
Si me ven, si me ven, voy camino de Belén.
Tuqui tuqui tuqui tuqui,
tuqui tuqui tuqui ta.
Apurate mi burrito,
que ya vamos a llegar.
Tuqui tuqui tuqui tuqui,
tuqui tuqui tuqui tu.
Apurate mi burrito,
vamos a ver a Jesús.
Posting will be light for the next few days… the number of “hits” on this site always drop off during the Holiday, and it’s a good time to resolve some … uh… challenges. Santa gave me a sweater. That was nice. Some Grinch sent a computer virus. That was naughty.
¡Jo! ¡Jo! ¡Jo! …¡Feliz Navidad!
North or south of the border…
Pancho Claus (aka Pete Martinez) makes his annual appearance in Odessa, Texas (Houston Chronicle photo by Nick de la Torre).
El Santo Claus
Updates in italics.
If you managed to convince John Le Carré, Gabriel García Márquez and Danielle Steel to plot of a collaborative novel, you couldn’t come up with anything nearly as good as what you find just reading the crime pages of the Latin American newspapers… the gift that keeps on giving all year round for bizarro entertainment.
Alleged Juarez narco-biggie Angel Orlando García Urquiza was captured the other night in Zapopan, Jalisco. The Toyota SUV and a Chevy pick-up had on board the usual gangster cargo — 2 AR-15s, three pisols, nine mazagine clips, 600 various rounds of ammunition, 16 mobile phones, marijuana, cocaine, 18,000 US dollars in cash (some reports say up to 100,000 five more guys… and — sorry, no partridge in a pear tree — just Laura Zúñiga Huizar, the newly crowned Reina Hispanamerica 2008.
The last is what makes this story interesting. Laura Zúñiga Huizar, of Culiacan (where else?) said she was headed for Colombia and Bolivia on a shopping trip. That sounds incredible. I could see gangsters heading for Colombia on a buying trip … but they may have making a sales call, given the weapons and cash, suggested by this item from “World War Four Report“:
Colombian authorities announced Dec. 19 the dismantling of a narco network linked to Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel, with seven arrested by the elite Technical Investigation Group (CTI) in the cities of Calí, Palmira and Bogotá. Vehicles, “communications equipment” and four weapons were seized. The CTI said the ring smuggled cocaine, heroin and marijuana to Mexico from the southern port of Tumaco.” (Xinhua, El Pais, Cali, Dec. 19)
Zúñiga was the winner of something called “Nuesta Belliza Sinoala”… which qualified her for the “Reina Hispanamerica” contest. These contest, and several others throughout Latin America arerun by an outfit called “Promociones Gloria“.
“Gloria” is Gloria Suárez de Limpias whose Latin American modeling and beauty contest empire is headquartered in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, where Suárez lives in an exclusive neighborhood.
Santa Cruz, of course, was the center of an attempted fascist coup against the Bolivian government earlier this year, that fell apart despite the U.S. Ambassador’s attempts to support the plotters. The Ambassador, the Drug Enforcement Agency and the Agency for International Development were all unceremoniously booted from the country as a result. One of the Promociones Gloria’s better known contest winners, Mr. Bolivia 2004, Dustin Larsen, together with his father– U.S. born cattle rancher Ronald Larsen — are both now fugitives from Bolivian justice, and said to be hiding in Montana.
Ms. Zúñiga probably had nothing to do with the Bolivian coup (isn’t hanging with gangsters sleazy enough?) and Gloria Suárez de Limpias may be doing nothing worse than running slighly crooked beauty contests won by more than slightly crooked contestants, and having Nazis for neighbors but … like all too many Latin American crime stories, making sense of it all is damn near impossible.
Paco Ignacio Taibo II, aside, there aren’t a lot of Latin America writers who dabble in crime thrillers. What for?
(News sources: Milenio (Mexico), El Nuevo Día (Bolivia), Huffington Post (USA). Photos: Huffington Post)
The naked and the read
Now that Gods, Gachupines and Gringos is starting to sell (the print copies were delayed unconscionably longer than I thought it should, though the Amazon “kindle” version is for sale now, and there are pre-publication orders being taken. The book book should be out early to mid January), I’m getting … not “fan mail exactly… but “suggestions” for the second edition. Not that I was really planning to write a second edition, but I’m sure they are well meant.
My favorite so far is from an e-mail correspondent who wondered why I didn’t write more about nudism in Mexico. The short answer is I never thought about nudism in Mexico, nor — to my knowledge — have any of the profesoriati written learned treatises on the subject. Or even pop fiction. Other than a brief mention of the sartorial customs of the Otomi (or, rather, their lack of sartorial custom), I don’t think I said anything about naked Mexicans.
My correspondent wondered if it was a “Catholic thing,” but then contradicted his own easy suggestion by noting that Argentines and Brazilians, shall we say, dress down? Or, rather, un-dress down?
The only discussion I’ve seen of the Mexican nudity came out after my book was supposed to be at the printers (Gustavo Arellano, “Ask a Mexican, 12-June-2008 ):
Like gabachos, an alarming number of Mexicans are out of shape. According to a 2003 study by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 24 percent of Mexico’s population is overweight. That’s the second-highest obesity rate in the world following–wait for it–¡los Estados Unidos! (The Mexican’s present-day note: A 2008 study found the same results. I’d cite the exact survey, but here comes la migra–gotta run!) Unlike gabachos, Mexicans respect the public when it comes to flashing our flabby chichis, pompis and cerveza guts–so when we’re out near the pool or by the beach, we cover up. It ain’t Catholicism, machismo or an homage to our swim across the Rio Grande. It’s good manners.
Good manners has a lot to do with it. I’m not Mexican, and I live in a gringo ghetto resort town for now, so my Mexican-acquired standards have somewhat dropped — I don’t always iron my underwear, but I do think twice before wearing shorts downtown. I was taken aback this afternoon to see a tourist eating at a downtown sidewalk cafe shirtless.
It wasn’t that the shirtless fellow was aesthetically unpleasant, and Mexicans do show off their bodies (sometimes when they perhaps shouldn’t). When I had the body to do it, I did (at least in venues where it’s expected) and… as Mexicans (and Argentines and Brazilians, and everywhere else on the planet) do if they can. Alas, sometimes our vanity outruns our good taste, and of course, there are those who flaunt what they don’t got. In Mexico and everywhere else.
My correspondent didn’t mention (and I completely forgot) that the world’s record for the most naked people in one place was set in Mexico City last year. And…who can forget the string of naked farmers’ protests?
My seat of my pants… or, rather no-pants (oh, you know what I mean) thinking is that nudism is largely a European thing (mostly having to do with some German “back to nature” yadda, yadda movement of the early 20th Century) . If nudity has any meaning here (beyond the obvious one of not having clothes on), as seen in the farmers’ protests, it is a traditional way of showing disrespect and contempt. Shop-lifters, policemen drunk on duty and other social miscreants are sometimes stipped and exposed by angry mobs.
There’s nothing wrong with the human body, but personal dignity is a paramount virtue in Mexican culture. Shaming a person can be considered a human rights abuse (though it’s very difficult to prove) and, as Don Benito said, “respect for the rights of others” is the basis of peaceful co-existence. As Gustavo noted with much more humor than I, it’s just a question of good manners.
For the record… while I have no documentary proof, I am certain Benito Juarez, General Santa Ana and even Vicente Fox, were naked at some point in their life, and I can guarantee they came into the world that way. And, one is free to read Gods, Gachupines and Gringos: A People’s History of Mexico naked.
Thou shalt remain silent…
As far as anyone knows, there was a first in Mexican judicial history this week. The Bishop of Ecatepec, Onésimo Cepeda Silva, has the unique distinction of being the first prelate formally charged in a criminal court.
Bishop Cededa surrendered voluntarily to the Federal District Public Minister’s (Prosecutor’s) Office, but invoked his right to remain silent, in connection with criminal charges stemming from his administration of the art collection owned by the late Olga Azcárraga Madero. His Grace is specifially charged with forging documents that gave him control of the estimated 130 million dollar art collection. Although judicial reforms are supposed to reign in impunity, the Bishop was released on his own recognizance, and given until 20 January to answer interrogatories in writing.
Olga Azcárraga Madero was one of THE Azcárraga’s… as in Televisa… as in the devious filthy rich Mexican family that got that way thanks to the success of stories about devious filthy rich Mexicans.
There’s been a three or four way fight over the art collection — with the Mexican government insisting the Riveras, Orozcos, Tamanos, etc. are national patrimony, the various Azcárraga’s claiming their late relation was unduly influenced to change her will (or, it was changed by the Bishop on the sly), foreign museums and collectors making the usual arguement that only THEY have the resources to protect the art work from the brown horde… and — last time I looked, a Mexican lawyer hiding some of these works on behalf of another foreign claimant.
This is gonna be fun.
mexfiles.net 