Showing posts with label Mexico. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mexico. Show all posts

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Tories Fail Martin

Brenda Martin who languishes in a Mexican jail got a visit from Harpers Mouthpiece; Jason Kenney yesterday. After the media focused on her case of Mexican injustice, the Harper government has finally acted. After two years. However considering the corruption of the Mexican judiciary and cops Kenney should have simply taken a bushel of money with him and paid off all concerned, and Ms. Martin could have been winging her way home.

Instead after a weak tea protest she has been promised yet another trial on trumped up charges, in thirty days. Thirty more days, perhaps Kenney should share her cell to insure she gets her trial. After all it's his government that got her put there in the first place. Despite Harpers protests to the contrary.

"Brenda Martin failed to receive any of this from the Canadian consulate. The inaction of the Canadian consulate contributed to the problem."

Martin eventually hired a lawyer from a list provided by the Canadian consulate. He turned out to be a "mercantile" lawyer, rather than a criminal defence lawyer. Family in Canada and friends in Puerto Vallarta raised $10,000 to pay the lawyer who promptly disappeared with the money and did nothing for Martin.

If she would have had an experienced criminal defence lawyer, that lawyer would have simply paid a bribe to justice officials at the local level to secure her release before her formal arrest warrant was filed.

Once again the Department of Foreign Affairs fails another Canadian, it is not only dysfunctional and incompetent in this case it is criminally negligent.

Free Brenda Martin Now Petition


SEE:

Fix Those Balconies


Mexican Cover Up Redux

Mexican Murder Cover Up


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Sunday, November 25, 2007

Fix Those Balconies

Cancun hotels sure do have a lot of faulty balconies. Seems Alberta tourists have a tendency to fall to their deaths from them. After partying at local nightclubs.
Can you say cover up.

Another Canadian dies in Cancun after balcony fall
six months ago, another Alberta man fell to his death from a balcony in Cancun.

CALGARY -- Family of an Okotoks-area man who fell to his death in Cancun dispute Mexican authorities' claims that he took his own life.

Chris Morin, 30, was found dead outside a resort hotel early Thursday after he apparently fell from a fourth-floor balcony.

The Associated Press reported Friday that Mexican authorities suspect the death was a suicide, a claim rejected by Morin's sister, Tina Shipley.

CALGARY - The grieving family of an Okotoks man is disputing claims by Mexican authorities that he committed suicide by leaping to his death off a fourth-storey hotel balcony in Cancun.

Mexican police say that Christopher James Morin's diary, found in his Costa Maya Barcelo hotel room, indicated he was depressed.

But a distraught Tiffany Ennis, Morin's longtime girlfriend, said Saturday that Morin gave no signs that he was suicidal.

"He was so excited. He put his foot in the ocean and he was going to go surfing the next day," said Ennis, who received a late-night text message from Morin on Wednesday, talking about his plans.

"He'd never been on a trip before. It was his dream to swim in the ocean," Ennis said through tears.

Morin, 30, and a friend, Joseph Clayton, arrived for a sunny resort holiday on Wednesday. By Thursday he was dead. Hotel staff found his body at 6 a.m., lying on a tiled patio beneath his room.


And the government still has not issued a travel warning about Mexico.


SEE:

Mexican Cover Up Redux

Mexican Murder Cover Up


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Friday, October 12, 2007

Horse and Carriage

America has capital, Mexico has labour. They go together like a horse and carriage. Mexican President Calderon sounds just like Herr Doctor Professor Marx.

“It’s impossible to stop that by decree. It’s impossible to try to stop that with a fence. Why? Because the capital in America needs Mexican workers. And Mexican workers need opportunities of jobs. Capital and labor are like right shoe and left shoe, and one needs the other,” he said, in an interview with Diane Sawyer on “Good Morning America.”

Calderon told Sawyer that some of his own relatives live and work in the United States— "some of them in the vegetable fields, others in restaurants and others in construction," he said.

Immigration to America is a "natural phenomenon," Calderon said, because Mexico has a large, young labor force that is needed by U.S. businesses, a sentiment that some politicians and business leaders across the country agree with.


SEE:

Farmer John's Robot

Thanks Lou and Tom

Farmer John Exploits Mexican Workers


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Wednesday, May 09, 2007

Another Canadian Victim of Cancun Drug Wars

Perhaps this will cause Foreign Affairs to finally declare a warning on Mexico for Canadian tourists but don't count on it.

Since we are one of the three amigos of NAFTA, and the secret continental
Security Prosperity Partnership of North America, Mexico gets kid glove treatment from the Canadian government. Despite the murders and attacks on Canadian tourists.

Alta. man fights for life after attack in Cancun

The family of an Alberta man severely injured in Mexico suspect he was beaten, while local authorities say the man was involved in an accident.

Jeff Toews, 34, of Grande Prairie, Alta. is now on life-support, according to his brother Murray. He was found early Monday at the Moon Palace Golf and Spa Resort in Cancun.

"He received serious head injuries, four blows to the head and he's been beaten very bad on his back," Murray Toews said by phone.


Once again the corrupt Mexican provincial regime in Cancun covers up the results of the drug war to keep the tourista bucks flowing. And like other recent Canadian deaths in Cancun the Attorney General claims the deaths as accidents.

"They're playing typical tourism crap. Like it happened to other Canadians, it's just always an 'accident.' Nobody's seen nothing and no witnesses, of course."

However, Bello Melchor Rodriguez y Carrillo, attorney-general for the state of Quintana Roo, dismissed the claim.

"He wasn't beaten. He fell from a second storey of the hotel where he was staying," he told the Canadian Press. "That's the report that we have from the security guard from the hotel, and the report we're getting from the hospital too."

Carrillo has also overseen the controversial Ianiero case, the Canadian couple murdered at another Mexican resort. He has blamed two women from Thunder Bay, Ont. for the killings, despite heavy criticism.



Cancun is more dangerous to Canadians than Israeli or Lebanese beach resorts. But we have a warning for the latter. Cancun and Acapulco are the centers of the drug cartel wars, which have taken more Canadian lives than the Israeli/Lebanon war.

Toews is the latest case of a number of Canadians injured or killed while vacationing in Mexico:

  • Domenic and Nancy Ianiero, of Woodbridge, Ont., were staying at the luxury Barcelo Maya beach resort near Cancun when they were found with their throats slashed on Feb. 20, 2006. The murder remains unsolved.
  • Another Woodbridge resident, 19-year-old Adam DePrisco, was killed outside an Acapulco nightclub last January. Local authorities said he was the victim of a hit-and-run, but relatives say the teenager was beaten to death.
  • In February, Rita Callara, 55, and a Canadian man, both from the Niagara Falls region, were each shot in the leg after a gunman fired a semi-automatic weapon at the Casa Inn hotel in Acapulco.
The same weekend the Canadian tourist was attacked this happened; Gunmen attack police chief in Cancun beach resort Coincidence? I think not.

While not apparently connected to the death of the Canadian tourist, it reflects the dangers of the drug wars occurring under the surface in the land of umbrella drinks, sun and surf.


Zeta Mercenaries Attack Troops In Mexico
In the real city of Cancun -- rather than the "Hotel Zone" -- the chief of police was ambushed with his entourage. His bodyguard was killed and others wounded. He survived.

Some sources estimate 900 people have been murdered since the beginning of the year in Mexico in drug-war violence but that is not confirmed. The AP reported that figure from the Mexico City magazine, Milenio. The government does not confirm any figure.

Mexico: The Price of Peace in the Cartel Wars

This current cartel war is being waged not only for control of the smuggling plazas into the United States, such as Nuevo Laredo, Mexicali and Tijuana, but also for the locations used for Mexico's incoming drug shipments, in places such as Acapulco, Cancun and Michoacan, and for control of critical points on transshipment routes through the center of the country, such as Hermosillo.



While there has always been some level of violence between the Mexican cartels, the current war has resulted in a notable
escalation in the level of brutality. One significant cause of this uptick is the change in the composition of the cartels' enforcement arms. Historically, cartel leaders performed much of their own dirty work, and figures such as Cardenas and Ramon Arellano Felix were recognized for the number of rivals they killed on their rise to the top of their respective organizations. In the recent past, however, the cartels have begun to contract out the enforcement functions to highly trained outsiders. For example, when cartels such as the Tijuana organization began to use active or retired police officers against their enemies, their rivals were forced to find enforcers capable of countering this strength. As a result, the Gulf cartel hired Los Zetas, a group of elite anti-drug paratroopers and intelligence operatives who deserted their federal Special Air Mobile Force Group in 1991. The Sinaloa cartel, meanwhile, formed a similar armed force called Los Pelones, literally meaning "the bald ones" but typically understood to mean "new soldiers" for the shaved heads normally sported by military recruits. Although the cartels had long outgunned Mexican police, these highly trained and aggressive enforcers upped the ante even further, introducing military-style tactics and even more advanced weapons.

The life of a Mexican drug cartel enforcer can be exciting, brutal -- and short. Los Zetas and Los Pelones are constantly attacking one another and some members of the groups even have posted videos on the Internet of them torturing and executing their rivals. Beheading rival enforcers also has become common. The current cartel war has proven to be a long and arduous struggle, and there has been heavy attrition among both organizations. Because of this attrition, the cartels have recently begun to bring fresh muscle to the fight. Los Zetas have formed relationships with former members of the Guatemalan special forces known as Kaibiles, and with members of the Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) street gang.

It is this environment of extreme and often gratuitous violence -- killings, beheadings and rocket-propelled grenade attacks -- that has sparked Calderon's actions against the Gulf cartel. Why he is focusing specifically on the Gulf cartel is unclear, though it is possible the government has better intelligence on it than on the others. Or perhaps it is because the Gulf cartel has a more centralized command structure than does Sinaloa, which is a federation of several smaller cartels. Of course, the Gulf cartel itself has argued that the Calderon administration is on the Sinaloa payroll and is being used by Sinaloa to destroy its rival. Another possible reason is that taking out Los Zetas -- who have become emblematic of extreme cartel violence -- would be a major accomplishment for the new president.

Sunday, February 18, 2007

Corn Crisis


Once again the State interferes in the marketplace and prices jump on commodities exchanges.

In the U.S. George Bush announced subsidies for bio-fuels not once but twice in State of the Union addresses.

And while he talked about switchgrass and other waste material based biomass, no funding opportunities have been created to subsidize this.

Instead bio-fuel announcements have fed the monopoly agribusiness oligopolies like ADM, who specialize in corn and wheat based ethanol production.


In Canada part of the Governments Green Plan and its efforts to undermine the Wheat Board was to announce subsidies for ethanol production.

While the only existing wheat straw based bio-fuel company in the world with new technology, remember that new technology that the government talks about is going to solve the global warming crisis, can't find anywhere to pedal its technology in Canada and is looking for investors. Just as its American counterparts are.


Meanwhile in Mexico tortilla prices have skyrocketed on ethanol speculation as corn is transformed from a basic food stuff into a fuel for financial speculation.

In Canada and the United States the increase in corn speculation has led to higher costs for pig farmers.

Bio-fuels are not a green solution, in fact they are not ecological at all, but a way to subsidize big Agribusiness like ADM and the financial markets. The only green about them is greenbacks.

And their impact on climate change and global warming will be minimal since they only blend with existing fossil fuels not replace their use.


Last year Mexico had the largest corn harvest in its history – more than twice as much as in 1980. Yet the price of tortillas has doubled and in some regions tripled over the past few months.

Corn is a key ingredient in poultry feed because of its high energy yield and increasing demand for ethanol has nearly doubled the price of corn over the past year. Corn futures on the Chicago Board of Trade traded in the $2.20-per-bushel range one year ago; now they go for over $4.00. Corn is also an important component in hog feed. However, Hormel was able to keep costs in check in this area because it uses outside farmers to raise hogs, unlike its turkey operations, which are in-house. This deflected some of the higher costs to the contractors, explained Agnese

An explosion in U.S. production of corn-based ethanol has strained supplies of the grain for human and animal consumption. Making ethanol from inedible feedstocks such as bagasse, grasses, and agricultural waste could be a better way, but commercial success has been elusive despite years of efforts.

In fact, in the fall of 1998, Celunol, then called BC International, announced plans to build a cellulosic ethanol plant in Jennings with Department of Energy assistance. The plant was never built, a spokesman says, because the company wasn't able to secure the rest of the financing.

Today, Celunol has competition in the race to build the first cellulosic ethanol plant. The enzymes company Iogen operates a small wheat-straw-based facility in Canada and is scouting locations for a larger plant.

Kansas became America’s top wheat grower, regularly producing close to one-fifth of the country’s total harvest. With their sheaves of wheat, called shocks, stacked upright everywhere in the fields to dry, wheat became so ingrained in the Kansas mind-set that Wichita State University adopted the name Shockers for its mascot.

But in the last two decades, farmers have increasingly turned to corn and soybeans, which need nearly twice as much water.

“That part of the state is going to be out of water in about 25 years at the current rate of consumption,”
said Mike Hayden, the secretary of the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks and a former Kansas governor.




See

Real Costs of Bio-Fuels

Conrad Black and ADM

Bio Fuels = Eco Disaster

GMO News Roundup

BioFuel and The Wheat Board

The Ethanol Scam: ADM and Brian Mulroney

ADM

Wheat Board

Farmers

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Thursday, February 15, 2007

Saudis Threaten Oil Production World Wide

The armed Islamicist faction of the Saudi State, bin-Laden Inc. issued a statement yesterday saying that competitor oil producing nations could be targeted for attacks.

An Arabian-peninsula-based terrorist website encouraging attacks on oil installations in Canada, Mexico and Venezuela to disrupt the U.S. economy. A statement on the al-Qaida Voice of Holy War e-magazine said “it is necessary to hit oil interests in all regions which serve the United States, not just in the Middle East.”


The Saudis are worried that the U.S. move to reduce its reliance on their oil, hence their involvement in the war in Iraq, they are Sunni's after all, a fact overlooked in all the finger pointing at Iran.

Nawaf Obaid, a security advisor to the Saudi monarchy, said in an article from the Washington Post:
...therefore the Saudi leadership is preparing to substantially revise its Iraq policy. Options now include providing Sunni military leaders (primarily ex-Baathist members of the former Iraqi officer corps, who make up the backbone of the insurgency) with the same types of assistance -- funding, arms and logistical support -- that Iran has been giving to Shiite armed groups for years. Another possibility includes the establishment of new Sunni brigades to combat the Iranian-backed militias.

Another possibility includes the establishment of new Sunni brigades to combat the Iranian-backed militias. Finally, Abdullah may decide to strangle Iranian funding of the militias through oil policy. If Saudi Arabia boosted production and cut the price of oil in half, the kingdom could still finance its current spending. But it would be devastating to Iran, which is facing economic difficulties even with today's high prices. The result would be to limit Tehran's ability to continue funneling hundreds of millions each year to Shiite militias in Iraq and elsewhere.

The sub-text of this article is clear. If American troops walk out of the Iraqi Armageddon, Saudi Arabia will walk in, not with troops but with oil, funds and possibly proxies, chosen from among the various Iraqi Sunni forces, both old and new. This is a clear warning to disaffected American constituencies who are calling for the return of their troops. Once again, Saudi Arabia is serving the interests of the Bush administration by calling on Americans to stay in Iraq because the alternative is going to be worse. When asked if Saudi engagement in Iraq would precipitate a regional war, Obaid replied “so be it, the consequences of inaction are far worse.”


Now that Bush has said for a second time that the U.S. needs to reduce its reliance on Saudi oil, and the Democrats concur the Saudis have again unleashed their puppets in Binladen Inc.

Al-Qaida has called for terrorist strikes against Canadian oil and natural gas facilities to "choke the U.S. economy." An online message, posted Thursday by the al-Qaida Organization in the Arabian Peninsula, declares "we should strike petroleum interests in all areas which supply the United States ... like Canada," the No. 1 exporter of oil and gas to the United States. Three western countries are mentioned in the call-to-arms -- Canada first, followed by Mexico and Venezuela. Would-be attackers are instructed to specifically target oilfields, pipelines, loading platforms and carriers.

Al-Qaeda's beliefs are those of Salafism, which originates in the Saudi Arabia as the State religion.

While a number of CIA veterans have written about Islamic extremism, Sageman's treatise provides the most detailed account of how Al Qaeda emerged from the rubble of war-torn Afghanistan to become the vanguard of a Sunni Muslim revivalist movement known as Salafism (deriving from salaf the Arab word for "ancient one"), which calls for the restoration of "authentic Islam" through the violent overthrow of the established order. Social bonds have played a more formative role than ideology in the growth of "the global Salafi jihad," as Sageman calls it, which became leaner and meaner and increasingly radicalized. "Conceptually we failed," admits Robert Baer, a former officer in the CIA's Directorate of Operations, who was right in the thick of things in the Middle East and Central Asia during his twenty-one-year cloak-and-dagger career. "We didn't consider Sunni Islam to be a threat to the West. We didn't want to see it."


Al-Qaeda attacked one of the Saudi refineries last year, but that was a feint. The refinery was not destroyed and conveniently the 'terrorists' were executed on the spot. Had the Saudis wanted to they could have found out who was behind this. Just as Jordan had, when attacked by Zarqawi's forces. But when you fund terrorist organizations in the game of geopolitics, plausible deniability is the name of the game, not ending terrorism.

Saudi Arabia and Global Terrorism: From al-Qaeda to Hamas


The Saudis welcome the current U.S. focus on Iran, its major competitor in the region for oil and gas exports.

Earlier key Sunni Arab allies while endorsing the goals of Bush's plan, and expressing hopes of success , almost in the same breath suggested that the Shia -led government in Baghdad cannot or would not implement the plan.

Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal was perhaps the most positive , who agreed " with the full objectives set by the new plan, the strategy." After talks with Rice earlier , he commented , "This has objectives that ... if it were applied, it will solve the problems facing Iraq." But he emphasized that it was the responsibility of the Iraq government alone. "We cannot be Iraqis more than Iraqis," Saud emphasised. "Other countries can help, but the burden, the whole burden and taking a decision will be the Iraqis'."

It was well put by the Saudi newspaper Al Jazirah which noted, "The Americans are trying to get out of the Baghdad bottleneck and they are looking for agent players in managing their conflict with Tehran to make their new strategy in Iraq successful."

Of course the Sunni Arab world would not trust Prime Minister al-Maliki's government with close ties with Shia Iran The Shias have become empowered after many centuries , courtesy Washington and would not let go .Rice did admit that" There are concerns about whether the Maliki government is prepared to take an evenhanded, nonsectarian path here. There's no doubt about that."

Intimidated and nervous, Sunni Arab rulers in Cairo, Amman, Riyadh and the Gulf are egging US to stay put in the region , to stop and roll back Iranian influence . They had acted similarly when Saudis, Kuwaitis , Emirates , Egypt , West et al had encouraged and funded 'brother Saddam' and Iraq in its 1980-88 war against a rampant Iran after the Khomeini led Shia revolution of 1979 .Iraq's Shia Arabs had fought against Iran's Revolutionary Guards and young boys seeking martyrdom .


In a recent Asia Times report, Amandeep Sandhu revealed that Saudi Arabia has boosted oil production with the express intent of lowering world oil prices and hurting Iran’s economy.

Moreover, Sandhu reports, Israel and Saudi Arabia have been engaged in secret talks that might be aimed at securing Saudi approval for Israeli overflight rights, should Israel opt to attack Iran’s nuclear installations. And, according to Sandhu, “a financial war on Iran has already begun”--noting that the Iranian parliament concedes that the country’s internal stability would be at stake if full economic sanctions were imposed.

Which explain's why this happened last summer after Israel invaded Southern Lebanon.

Leading Saudi Sheik Pronounces Fatwa Against Hezbollah

Wahhabism in the Service of American Imperialism: 
The Politics of a Fatwa

CIA funds Hizbullah rivals

The Telegraph said the American move is supported by the region heavyweight Sunni countries of Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt as well as Israel.

It added that former Saudi ambassador in Washington Prince Bandar bin-Sultan is believed to have been closely involved in the decision to take on Hizbullah.

Prince Bandar, now King Abdullah's national security adviser, made several trips to Washington and held meetings with Elliot Abrams, the senior Middle East official on the NSC.

Prince Turki al-Faisal, Bandar's successor, has resigned abruptly as ambassador to Washington last month.

Intelligence sources said that a principal reason for this was his belief he had been undermined by Prince Bandar, who had not told him of the Lebanon plan or even that he was visiting Washington.

The Israeli government, which sees Iran as its chief enemy, has also been involved.

"There's a feeling both in Jerusalem and in Riyadh that the anti-Sunni tilt in the region has gone too far," said an intelligence source.

He said the aim is to stopping Iranian hegemony in the Middle East emerging from the US invasion of Iraq.


After all the Saudi family business of Bin-Laden Inc. the parent operation is the largest engineering firm in the region which has cooperated with Bechtel and competes with Halliburton. It also owns Arbusto Energy in cooperation with the Bush regime.

With America's declaration that it wants to reduce its reliance on Saudi oil, the Saudis had to hit back. The fact they would also target Venezuela, no fan of the U.S. but a major supplier to America shows that this is aimed at allies of Iran as well as allies of America like Canada and Mexico.

Also tar sands production is the next stage in long term oil production, which will replace the need for Saudi oil. And both Alberta and Venezuela have vast reserves of oilsands coming on line.

The Saudis were worried when the U.S. invaded Iraq, Saudis helped fund the Sunni insurrection, a fact under-reported by the MSM. Partially because of the links between the Saudi Royal Family and the Bush Royal Family.

The Sunni attacks on Iraqs oil pipelines and refineries sabotaged the U.S. ability to rely on Iraq as a replacement for Saudi oil. Now the Saudis threaten their natural competition with Jihad. After all in the Saudis view it's their religious right to do so and it's in their economic and political interests.

Thanks to the Bush regime and its complicated personal business relations with the Saudis they can point the finger at al-Qaeda giving them both plausible deniability. And once again create the fictional need for more State Security in both the West and in the Middle East. We know who funds the Terrorism that the U.S. has declared war on, but of course its all one big geopolitical game of power politics between Bush Inc. and Bin-Laden Inc. A dance of the dialectic between the funders of terrorism and the funders of the war on terror.

In southern Adelaide, construction of Park Holme mosque halted this month, because the foreign minister, Alexander Downer ordered that the Saudi government should not be funding the building. The mosque had been a haunt of immigrant Warya Kanie, who was captured in Iraq last year, fighting against the coalition.

A report by terror analyst Jean-Charles Brisard, compiled for the UN Security Council in December 2002, stated that between 1992 and 2002, al-Qaeda received between $300 million and $500 million from Saudi businessmen and banks. This represented 20% of Saudi GNP.

According to Brisard, Abdullah Bin Abul Moshin al Turki, the secretary general of the Muslim World League (founded in Mecca in 1962), entered into business negotiations in Spain with Muhammad Zouaydi in 1999. Zouaydi was al-Qaida's main fundraiser in Europe. Abdullah al Turki was an adviser to the late King Fahd. In November 2003, Turki was awarded a prize by King Abdullah for his missionary work.

According to the Jamestown Foundation, the MWL spreads "radical and vehemently anti-American" propaganda, and also has an agenda specifically targeting Europe. The Saudis began a policy of globally disseminating their brand of Sunni Islam during the 1980s, as a reaction to the Iranian (Shia) revolution. According to former CIA director R. James Woolsey, the Saudis have spent nearly $90 billion spreading their ideology around the globe since the 1970s.

Al-Haramain received large donations from the Saudi royal family. Its international branches were involved in funding Al Qaeda. Omar al Faruq was al-Qaeda's senior representative in Southeast Asia. He was arrested by Indonesian authorities on June 5, 2002. According to Jean-Charles Brisard, al Faruq confessed: "Al Haramain was the funding mechanism of all operations in Indonesia. Money was laundered through the foundation by donors from the Middle East."

See:

Bin Laden Inc.


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Tuesday, February 13, 2007

No Travel Warning For Mexico

Foreign Affairs still has not posted a travel warning for Mexico.

Despite a new poll that shows Canadians want a travel warning issued. Especially those in Ontario where all of the Canadian tourists killed in Mexico have come from.

The Canadian government issues travel advisories, which are warnings used to alert travelling Canadians to stay clear of certain countries and areas when their personal safety cannot be guaranteed. Do you think the government should issue a travel advisory for Mexico?


All

Ont.

Yes

40%

51%

No

36%

33%


The Conservative government yesterday brushed aside opposition calls for an emergency debate on the escalating violence in Mexico.

"I don't think that it's necessary to have an emergency debate on this because millions of Canadians have travelled to Mexico without incident," Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Helena Guergis told the Toronto Star yesterday.

Yeah and millions of Canadians have traveled to Israel and Lebanon and live there but they are on the travel warning list. The difference is the Middle East is a war zone, while Mexico just suffers from drug wars and graft ridden police and justice bureaucracy.


As Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay arrived Wednesday in Mexico for high-level meetings on the deaths and mishaps that have befallen Canadian tourists there in the last year, Amnesty International released a scathing report on Mexico's justice system.

The report raises questions about the level of trust Canadians should have in the assurances they have received from Mexican authorities that they can investigate these cases, said Amnesty and Liberal opposition critic's. The human rights group and Grit MPs also argued the report should give MacKay ammunition to push Mexican authorities to allow greater intervention from Canada.

The report documents serious flaws in Mexico's judicial system, such as: arbitrary detention, torture, the flouting of the presumption of innocence, fabrication of evidence and the targeting of human rights defenders.

And what did Pete do? Ignore the Amnesty Report and blithely accept assurances from corrupt incompetent officials

Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay said yesterday he was assured by Mexican officials they will follow investigations into a string of violence involving Canadian tourists.
Meanwhile I wonder how he missed this; which is worthy of a Travel Warning

Acapulco's rising drug violence imperils Mexican tourist industry


See

Crime

Mexico

Peter MacKay


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