Category Archives: Mexico

Mexico’s president defends decision to barricade palace ahead of women’s march

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Andrés Manuel López Obrado claims the measure is only intended to avoid provocation

The Mexican president has claimed that a metallic barrier to wall off the presidential palace ahead of a planned women’s march is intended to avoid provocation and protect historic buildings from vandalism.

In a country where femicides rose nearly 130% between 2015 and 2020, critics said the decision to erect the three-metre-high (10ft) barriers was symptomatic of Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s apathy toward the crisis of violence against women.

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Hong Kong activists and plight of the Uighurs: human rights this week in photos

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A roundup of the coverage on struggles for human rights and freedoms, from Colombia to the Sahara

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Golden Trump statue turning heads at CPAC was made in … Mexico

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Artist Tommy Zegan reveals figure was constructed in country the former president has assailed and demonized

A golden statue of Donald Trump that has caused a stir at the annual US gathering of conservatives was made in Mexico – a country the former president frequently demonized.

Related: Mitch McConnell says he'd 'absolutely' support Trump as 2024 nominee

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‘A cause for worry’: Mexico’s monarch butterflies drop by 26% in year

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Butterflies had bad year after four times as many trees were lost to illegal logging and extreme climate conditions

The number of monarch butterflies that reached their winter resting grounds in central Mexico decreased by about 26% this year, and four times as many trees were lost to illegal logging, drought and other causes, making 2020 a bad year for the butterflies.

The butterflies’ population covered only 2.1 hectares (5.2 acres) in 2020, compared to 2.8 hectares (6.9 acres) the previous year and about one-third of the 6.05 hectares (14.95 acres) detected in 2018, according to government figures.

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Hunting the men who kill women: Mexico’s femicide detective

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Although femicide is a recognised crime in Mexico, when a woman disappears, the authorities are notoriously slow to act. But there is someone who will take on their case

On the night of 30 October 2019, as many Mexicans were preparing to celebrate the Day of the Dead, the family of Jessica Jaramillo stood in the pouring rain watching two dozen police search a house on the outskirts of Toluca, the capital of Mexico State. At about 9pm, the authorities carried out a dead dog, followed by two live ones and a cat. Then they pulled out a woman’s body.

Jessi, a 23-year-old psychology student at a local university, had gone missing a week earlier. On 24 October, she hadn’t appeared at the spot where her parents usually picked her up after class. Within a few minutes, she called her mother to say she was going out, abruptly hung up, then texted to add, “Don’t worry, I’m with Óscar”.

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Mexican president under fire for defending politician accused of rape

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Amlo again clashes with women’s rights activists as he dismisses complaints against Félix Salgado Macedonio, candidate for governor

A growing row over a gubernatorial candidate facing accusations of rape has once again pitted Mexico’s populist president against women’s rights campaigners.

Félix Salgado Macedonio has registered to run for governor in southern Guerrero state with the ruling Morena party, despite accusations of sexual violence and rape by five women dating back as far as 1998.

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El Chapo’s wife helped him run drug empire from jail, US court hears

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Emma Coronel is ‘not a big fish’, experts say, but indictment accuses her of assisting dramatic jailbreak in 2015

The wife of the world’s most notorious drug cartel boss, Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, has appeared in court charged with helping him run his drug empire from jail, a day after she was arrested at Washington’s international airport.

Emma Coronel Aispuro, a 31-year-old Mexican-American who married the drug kingpin in 2007 after he spotted her in a beauty pageant, is also accused of helping organise her husband’s breathtaking jailbreak in 2015, which involved a mile-long tunnel leading from his prison shower and a motorbike adapted to run on rails from one end to the other.

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Emma Coronel, wife of El Chapo, arrested on drug trafficking charges

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Joint US-Mexican citizen has also been charged with conspiring to help arrange her husband’s escape from prison in 2015

Emma Coronel Aispuro, the wife of Mexico’s most notorious cartel boss Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, has been arrested in Virginia on drug trafficking charges.

In a statement released on Monday, the US justice department said that Coronel, 31 – who is a joint US-Mexican citizen – was arrested at Dulles international airport and was scheduled to make her initial appearance in federal court on Tuesday via video conference.

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Mexico calls on rich countries not to hoard coronavirus vaccines

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  • Foreign minister says 100 countries have yet to give out vaccine
  • Three-quarters of all doses administered in just 10 countries

Mexico has made a plea at the UN security council for countries to stop hoarding vaccines against Covid-19 as poorer ones fall behind in the race to vaccinate their citizens.

Three-quarters of the first doses have been administered to citizens in only 10 countries that account for 60% of global gross domestic product (GDP), the Mexican foreign minister, Marcelo Ebrard, said, while in more than 100 countries no vaccines have been applied at all.

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Mexico was once a climate leader – now it’s betting big on coal

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As the climate crisis worsens, Andrés Manuel López Obrador plans to buy nearly 2m tons of thermal coal from small producers

The men on the midnight shift smoked cigarettes and cracked jokes in the glow of their helmet lights as they prepared to go underground. They were loading safety equipment and coils of pipe onto wheelbarrows, in readiness for a second shift due to start working later that week.

“We’re reactivating the industry,” said Arturo Rivera Wong, who had just taken on 40 more workers at the mine he owns in the scrublands of the border state of Coahuila.

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‘It feels like a placebo’: Mexico’s vaccine program sees disastrous launch

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Pace for vaccinations has slowed as government website to register crashes repeatedly and Covid death toll is third highest

Rodolfo spent hour after aggravating hour trying to register his elderly mother for a Covid-19 vaccination through a Mexican government website, only for the system to crash repeatedly.

“I spent three days fighting with the website,” he said. “My mom would have been unable to do it without me.”

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Coronavirus live news: variant first found in UK now accounts for 6% of German cases; Israel to ease lockdown

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Germany warns new variants are set to spread; Israel to keep borders closed despite easing lockdown

Slovak regional authorities have quarantined a Roma settlement after a quarter of its residents tested positive for the coronavirus.

The settlement of Sacurov near Vranov nad Toplou in the east of the country, made up of two three-storey apartment blocks and around 70 shacks, is to be closed off for 10 days.

“In a week-and-a-half it grew [from five] to the unreal number of 113, due to a failure to maintain quarantine and isolation,” he said.

More than 80% of people in some developing countries have seen their incomes fall due to the coronavirus pandemic, economists have found, warning that rising poverty could mean poorer countries struggle to curb infections – especially with mass vaccination potentially years away.

“Economic help is part and parcel of fighting the virus,” co-author of the study Shana Warren told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

“If you want people to stay home to stop the virus spreading while they wait for vaccines you need to provide them with the economic support to do so.”

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‘A moral and national shame’: Biden to launch taskforce to reunite families separated at border

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President decries Trump administration that ‘literally ripped children from the arms of their families’ as he signs executive orders

Joe Biden plans to create a taskforce to reunify families separated at the US-Mexico border by the Trump administration, as part of a new series of immigration executive actions signed at an Oval Office ceremony on Tuesday.

Biden condemned Donald Trump’s immigration policies as a “stain on the reputation” of the US.

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Crushing costs of Covid care leave grieving Mexican families facing ruin

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As the death toll mounts, even for those with health insurance medical bills can run into tens of thousands of dollars

For more than 50 years, Pedro Martínez would drive his truck through the mountains of Jalisco state, carrying stock for clothing business in the week, and taking his family on excursions at the weekend.

Martínez, 90, was long retired when he was admitted to hospital in early October with coronavirus-linked complications. His family prayed he would soon recover and return home, but 33 days later he died, leaving them emotionally and financially ruined.

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Missing Guatemalan woman’s family urges Mexico to solve killings of 19 suspected migrants

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The family is providing DNA samples to Mexican authorities to help investigators identify the remains found in Tamaulipas

The family of a young Guatemalan woman believed to be among 19 victims of a massacre in northern Mexico is urging the Mexican government to bring those responsible to justice.

State prosecutors in Mexico’s Tamaulipas state said there were at least two Guatemalans among the bodies found. The attorney general’s office said in a statement that investigators had so far genetically identified four of the dead with the aid of their families.

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Mexico authorities attempt to identify 19 charred corpses found near US border

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Authorities found the bodies late on Saturday in burning vehicles left beside a dirt road outside the town of Camargo

Mexican authorities are attempting to identify 19 charred corpses which were found near a town across the Rio Grande from Texas, in an area that has seen violent territorial disputes between organized crime groups in recent years.

Authorities found the bodies late on Saturday in two burning vehicles which had been left beside a dirt road outside the town of Camargo. All the victims had been shot, but shells were not found at the site, leading investigators to believe they were killed somewhere else.

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Mexico president rebuked for careless response to Covid after testing positive

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Andrés Manuel López Obrador tests positive day after saying crisis nearing the end and ‘little lights’ at end of tunnel could be seen

Mexico’s president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, declared at the weekend that his country was nearing the end of the coronavirus crisis, telling supporters that “little lights” at the end of the tunnel could already be seen.

The next day he tested positive for Covid-19, throwing the country into tumult – and prompting fresh criticisms of his cavalier response to a disease that has killed nearly 150,000 citizens.

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Mexico faces challenge to light-touch Covid approach as US restricts travel

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Biden administration’s demand that travelers provide a negative test and self-quarantine could hit Mexico’s tourist industry hard

New US coronavirus travel restrictions are likely to have an outsized impact on Mexico, which is also struggling with an uncontrolled outbreak of the virus and record-breaking deaths.

Related: Covid fatalities soar in Mexico as president condemned for inaction

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How creating wildlife crossings can help reindeer, bears – and even crabs

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Sweden’s announcement this week that it is to build a series of animal bridges is the latest in global efforts to help wildlife navigate busy roads

Every April, Sweden’s main highway comes to a periodic standstill. Hundreds of reindeer overseen by indigenous Sami herders shuffle across the asphalt on the E4 as they begin their journey west to the mountains after a winter gorging on the lichen near the city of Umeå. As Sweden’s main arterial road has become busier, the crossings have become increasingly fractious, especially if authorities do not arrive in time to close the road. Sometimes drivers try to overtake the reindeer as they cross – spooking the animals and causing long traffic jams as their Sami owners battle to regain control.

“During difficult climate conditions, these lichen lands can be extra important for the reindeer,” says Per Sandström, a landscape ecologist at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences who works as an intermediary between the Sami and authorities to improve the crossings.

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Mexico: witness to disappearance of 43 students alleges soldiers involved in attack

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Witness testified soldiers detained group of students, interrogated them and then handed them to a drug gang

A witness to the disappearance of 43 Mexican student teachers has alleged that soldiers were involved in the 2014 attack , the country’s president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has confirmed.

The disappearance of the trainees from the Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers’ College on 26 September 2014 rocked Mexico, sparking widespread protests and calls for justice, but the investigation into the case has been widely criticized.

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