Tag: Michoacán

Mexico: specter of US strikes amid cartel terror

UruapanMayor Carlos Alberto Manzo Rodríguez was assassinated during a Day of the Dead celebration in the main square of Uruapan, in the violence-torn Mexican state of Michoacán. He had been an outspoken opponent of the drug cartels and their reign of terror in the state, and his death sparked protests across Michoacán. The US State Department said in response to the killing that the United States is ready to "deepen security cooperation with Mexico to wipe out organized crime on both sides of the border." But this comes as the specter of unilateral US intervention has been raised. NBC News reports that the White House has started planning a "potential mission" involving US troops and intelligence officers to target the cartels on Mexican soil. (Photo: Juan José Estrada Serafín/Cuartoscuro.com via Mexico News Daily)

Mexico

‘Blood avocados’ in the news amid Michoacán violence

MichoacanThe US Department of Agriculture suspended inspections of avocados in the Mexican state of Michoacán due to security concerns, halting the top source of US imports. The move was taken after two agents of the USDA's Animal & Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) were accosted during a protest in the town of Paracho, beaten and briefly detained. Michoacán is Mexico's heartland of avocado production, but the trade has been notoriously co-opted by the local warring drug cartels to launder narco-profits, leading to charges of "blood avocados" in the violence-torn state. (Map: Google)

Mexican elections see record number of assassinations

MexicoThe results are in from Mexico's presidential election and Claudia Sheinbaum of the ruling left-populist National Regeneration Movement (MORENA) has won by some 60%, handily defeating a rival backed by an alliance of the country's more traditional political parties. But the ongoing human rights crisis in Mexico that will obviously pose a grave challenge for Sheinbaum was dramatically exemplified by the record number of political assassinations that marred the elections. (Map: PCL)

Mexico

2023: ‘bonkers year’ for global climate

anthropoceneRecords were once again broken last year for greenhouse gas levels, surface temperatures, ocean heat and acidification, sea level rise, and retreat of glaciers, according to a new global report issued by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). The WMO State of the Global Climate 2023 report finds that on an average day in 2023, nearly one third of the ocean surface was gripped by a marine heatwave, harming vital ecosystems and food systems—far beyond the already inflated levels seen in recent years. Antarctic sea ice reached its lowest extent on record—at one million square kilometers below the previous record year of 2022, an area equivalent to the size of France and Germany combined. One leading oceanographer wryly stated: "The scientific term is bonkers year." (Photo: CounterVortex)

Mexico
Mexico army

Mexico: drug war dystopia unabated

ApureSo-called "dissident" FARC factions that have refused to accept the Colombian peace accords and taken refuge across the border in Venezuela now appear to be waging a local insurgency against the Nicolás Maduro regime. A group calling itself the Martin Villa 10th Front announced last month that it had captured eight Venezuelan soldiers during a battle in Apure state, near the Colombian border. Venezuela's National Bolivarian Armed Forces later announced that the soldiers had been freed in a rescue operation. But independent media in Venezuela report that the eight were actually released under terms of a deal negotiated in Cuba. The deal was said to have been brokered with the help of the National Liberation Army (ELN), a second Colombia guerilla group which remains in arms and whose leadership is based in Havana. (Photo of captive soldiers being released via FANB)

Mexico
narcotanks

Corporate cannabis targets bleeding Mexico

JNIMAlarming reports that Nigeria has established "concentration camps" for the Fulani ethnic minority cast an ironic light on Nigeria's tension with the Sahel states of Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso to the north. These three regimes have broken from the Western imperial camp (to embrace the nascent Russian imperial camp)—but are likewise subjecting their Fulani minorities to persecution and massacre. With the recent shock rebel offensive in Mali, the "terrorist" stigma that attaches to the Fulani and Tuareg peoples across the imperial camps makes their position more precarious than ever. Meanwhile, prominent voices on the both the right and the (supposed) "left" are spreading propaganda about the struggle in West Africa that is alarmingly wrong, because it exclusively views the crisis through a campist lens. In Episode 327 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg tries to provide some clarity on these fast-escalating and grossly under-reported conflicts. (Photo: Az-Zallaqa via LWJ)

Mexico

Mexico: double assassination of indigenous leaders

KSAA group of 40 rights organizations issued a joint statement calling on authorities in Saudi Arabia to release all those unfairly jailed for their online activities before Riyadh hosts the United Nations Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in December. The organizations stated that the detentions contradict the IGF’s stated values of advancing human rights and inclusion in the digital age. They charged that Saudi authorities are subjecting citizens to unprecedented repression, including decades-long prison sentences for expressing critical views online. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)

Mexico

Mexico: AMLO-Trump populist convergence?

AMLOAndres Manuel Lopez Obrador—known by his initials AMLO—will be Mexico's next president, following his victory in the July 1 election. This marks the first time a Mexican presidential candidate of the left has had his victory honored. An obvious question is how AMLO will deal with Donald Trump—who attained office by demonizing Mexicans and pledging to build a wall on the border (and make Mexico pay for it). Last year, AMLO actually filed a complaint with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights against Trump's proposed wall. But he also hired Trump's current crony Rudolph Giuliani as anti-crime czar when he was mayor of Mexico City in 2002. As populists and opponents of free-trade economics, there may be unlikely common ground between the two men. (Photo: El Txoro)

Mexico

Mexico: Zapatistas host Ayotzinapa families

The Zapatista rebels in Mexico's southern state of Chiapas marked the anniversary of their 1994 New Years Day uprising by hosting a national activist gathering in their territory.