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| Caribbean-Latin America |
| Mexican National Security Law to be expedited |
| 2011-08-30 |
| By Chris Covert In yet another stunning reversal for a new national security law, a Mexican Chamber of Deputies leader said Monday the National Security Law, which has been held up in legislative process since last spring would be "expedited", according to Mexican news sources. Jorge Carlos Ramirez Marin, president of the Board of the Chamber of Deputies said that in the wake of the Casino Royale massacre in Monterrey, Nuevo Leon last Thursday, he would expedite passage of the controversial new law. To read the Rantburg story on the Casino Royale massacre, click here Referring to Mexican president Felipe Calderon Hinojosa's call last Friday for a "unity of institutions", Ramirez Marin said, "We are going to take this call as a shared call of unity. We are going to have a National Security Law." The statement by a senior member of the PRI caucus in the Chamber of Deputies will likely be seen by both peace advocates and independent Mexican left as a betrayal. The National Security Law, which has been working its way through the Mexican legislative process, has been held up from its final approval by the Mexican senate which considered the law even as the new Movement for Peace and Dignity was making such a strong showing with its demonstrations last spring and this summer. The nascent movement, headed by leftist writer and poet Javier Sicilia, has staged three large marches since the spring. Sicilia lost a son to a drug related abduction and murder, which began his involvement in a protest movement to end cartel violence in Mexico. His high profile demands, many of them so loopy that the Mexican press has not dared repeat them, has gained him a seat of sorts at the negotiating table with Mexican national legislators as talks began earlier this month. One series of talks was abruptly ended by Sicilia when a Chamber of Deputies panel recommended the law with "locks", or passages open to amendment be considered in the next regular session, which begins next Thursday, September 1st. To read the Rantburg report on the Sicilia decision to cancel talks with Mexican legislators, click here The vote was made even as the Mexican senate refused to take up consideration of the law in a special session. The vote also caused Sicilia to end his talks with legislators, calling the procedural vote a betrayal. Since that time three weeks ago, Sicilia has made good on his threat to refuse to talk to legislators until his demands to permanently table the law were met. Apparently the Casino Royale massacre has changed the politics, and has changed the security environment as well. The city of Monterrey has been under a curfew being maintained by the functional equivalent of two brigades of armed effectives including Mexican Army soldiers, Mexican marines and Mexican Federal agents. Also nationwide a crackdown on casinos has begun with news published over the weekend that the Los Zetas criminal gang uses casinos for money laundering. Casinos have been shut down in states such as Nuevo Leon and in Jalisco, and the campaign is apparently far from over. The controversial national security law is such because it seeks to give the Mexican president expanded powers of emergency without prior approval from the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate, and the president's cabinet, which is required for a nationwide state of emergency as currently written in the Mexican constitution. The new law permits the president to declare states of emergency in specific regions such as municipalities and for limited times without prior approval, but still requires endorsement after military actions are already under way. The new law also gives local commanders a large amount of autonomy in dealing with suspects and evidence. Currently Mexican law requires military commanders to turn over all suspects and evidence to local legal authorities and to request prior permission to pursue information collected at the scene of a crime. The new law as written allows local commanders to cut power, communications and to cancel events without prior warning to local politicians. As matters stand now Mexican governors have next to no say in how federal forces are deployed, except that Calderon and the ministry of the interior have been sensitive to those concerns, and do not deploy forces at least without prior warning. The mainstream Mexican left in the form of the Partido Revolucion Democratica (PRD) are leery of the new law. Many of its members have been abused by Mexican national security forces in the past during the Dirty War of the 1960s to the 1980s. Even so, Maria de Dolores Padierna Luna, General Secretary of the PRD has expressed an endorsement of the new law if restraints on presidential powers are in place in the new law. The new law does not change the relationship of the Mexican military with the civilian legal systems. As matters are now, any crime committed by Mexican military would be investigated and prosecuted by the military. A Mexican Supreme Court decision July 12th requiring courts not to turn over cases to the military authorities changes the relationship of the military to civilian court system, but the new security law would affect that decision since states of emergencies are martial law by definition. Calderon has sought to make the law more acceptable to human rights concerns by separating crimes such as rape and forced disappearances as crimes to be prosecuted civilian legal authorities. Calderon's proposal left the crime of murder as one to be prosecuted by military prosecutors. |
| Posted by:badanov |