The use of military forces in security tasks sets off alarms

The increase in violence in Mexico Since the military was “temporarily” involved in public security tasks for the so-called “war on drugs”, it is seen after 16 years by human rights observers as “a failure and risk for democracy” of the government. Aztec country.

In a hearing held on Tuesday in the framework of the 185 Period of Sessions of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), a group of 26 civil society organizations expressed their concerns about what is happening in the country with the delivery of security functions to the Mexican Armed Forces, which operate under the command of the Secretary of National Defense (SEDENA).

Frida Ibarra, from the organization México Unidos Contra la Delincuencia summed up the current situation with the expansion of powers to the military institution, which from now on has the power to operate public security budgets and manage tasks that would be reserved by constitutional mandate to civil order.

“We are not only in the process of militarizing public security, but in expanding the tasks of a civil institution, awarded to the armed forces,” said the petitioner who presented the scaffolding on which the reform promoted by the Executive has been based. by Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador.

Since 2006, having already completed 16 years of citizen security tasks, “the armed forces have centralized public resources,” the expert pointed out at the hearing. ‘Militarization of public security in Mexico’.

At the beginning of September, the Chamber of Deputies of Mexico approved a reform sent by the Mexican president so that the direction of the National Guard, created as a civil institution, passes to the command of SEDENA.

For María Luisa Aguilar, from the National Human Rights Commission, both the Armed Forces and the National Guard have accumulated thousands of complaints of human rights violations. “The resistance to accountability and the impunity on the part of the armed forces invite us to reflect on the risks,” she deepened.

The State challenges the petitioners

To respond to an issue as complex as the country’s security framework and the multiple fronts pointed out by the petitioners at the hearing, the Mexican State chose to send the ambassador, Luz Elena Baños, Mexico’s representative to the Organization of American States (OAS) Organization to which the IACHR belongs.

Ambassador Baños read a document that, she said, came from the Presidential Palace and by order of President López Obrador, where she presented figures on the actions of the military in public security tasks and in combating illicit drug trafficking activities.

The official said that the operations are successful and show the degree of effectiveness of the plan in seizing drugs and dealing with organized crime groups.

Regarding the accusations of human rights violations and abuses of authority by the military in their tasks with respect to the citizenry that the petitioners highlighted, Ambassador Baños pointed out in her reading that the events are isolated and cannot compromise the entire institution.

“The Mexican army, the stains it may have, do not stain the entire institution,” argued the diplomat.

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