Translated by Amanda Moody
In the final weeks of the Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts' (IGIE) second term, a smear campaign is intensifying against several of its members, including officials of the United Nations and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) as well as renowned national activists who have denounced the country’s severe and widespread human rights crisis.
The intense and extensive smear campaign, initiated by several private individuals and in which even a segment of the government has participated through action and omission, has forced various agencies and international bodies to speak out. As well as supporting the activities of the civil defense workers, they have also demanded that President Enrique Peña Nieto condemn these acts of disparagement and defamation. This demand has received only a tepid response from the government.
Abel Barrera, of the Tlachinollan Mountains Center for Human Rights; Édgar Cortez, of the Mexican Institute of Human Rights and Democracy; Juan Carlos Gutiérrez, of Strategic Litigation Ideas for Human Rights, and José Antonio Lara, of the Zeferino Ladrillero Center, consider that this campaign could intensify in the coming weeks with the approach of April 30, the end date of the IGIE’s second term, when it will present its final report on the investigations into the Iguala [Ayotzinapa] case. According to the researcher Édgar Cortez, this adverse climate of suspicion of the IGIE could be used by the federal government to decide not to renew its mandate.
In their analysis, they all emphasize that this campaign started last September when, in the report at the end of its first term, the IACHR’s group of experts overturned the so-called historical truth that the 43 Ayotzinapa student teachers who disappeared had been executed and their bodies cremated in the Cocula garbage dump. The IACHR also insisted that they want to interview the soldiers who were in Iguala on 26 and 27 September 2014, the days when the attacks on the youths occurred.
Personalities from the most conservative sectors of the political spectrum participated in this smear campaign: Isabel Miranda de Wallace, chairman of the Stop Kidnapping organization and lawyer José Antonio Ortega, of the Citizen’s Council for Public Security, both appear visibly and the latter’s blog focuses on the topic.
In recent days, José Antonio Ortega has lodged a criminal complaint with the Attorney General's Office against the Executive Secretary of the IACHR, the Mexican Emilio Álvarez Icaza, for the crime of fraud. He has also demanded that the Mexican government stop supporting the work of the IGIE, arguing that it "has diverted the work" done by the Attorney General’s Office during its investigations into the case in Iguala.
But the defamations have also been of UN officials. Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, expressed his disagreement with the virulent personal attacks against the Special Rapporteur on Torture, Juan Méndez, who was described as unprofessional and unethical by the Mexican government because in his latest report he said that torture is widespread in the country.
MV Note: This past week, the Mexican government announced that, because of scheduling conflicts. it could not schedule a return visit by Méndez prior to the end of his term in office in October of this year.Meanwhile, attacks on the IGIE have focused mainly on the two female members, the Guatemalan Claudia Paz and the Colombian Ángela Buitrago. In the face of the Mexican government’s silence, the Commission was even forced to publicly express its total, absolute and unconditional support for the group of experts.
The attacks have also reached national activists. Miranda de Wallace accused the UN rapporteur Juan Méndez of leading a network of corruption that benefits from the victims. Infographics circulated through Miranda de Wallace’s Twitter account allegedly make connections between activist organizations and an alleged plot to support criminals. Those mentioned include recognized human rights defenders in Mexico such as Marieclaire Acosta [board of directors, Mexican Committee for Defense and Promotion of Human Rights], Juan Carlos Gutiérrez, José Antonio Guevara [Executive Director, Mexican Committee for Defense and Promotion of Human Rights] and Miguel Sarre [professor of law, Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico].
In the midst of this campaign, the president of the National Commission for Human Rights himself, Luis Raúl González Pérez, said that discrediting civil human rights defenders, as well as international organizations and bodies, not only fails to contribute to solving the problem, but diverts attention from where it needs to be, which is on the need for the authorities to do their job well and to do so according to the law, respecting individual dignity. Spanish original
In the midst of this campaign, the president of the National Commission for Human Rights himself, Luis Raúl González Pérez, said that discrediting civil human rights defenders, as well as international organizations and bodies, not only fails to contribute to solving the problem, but diverts attention from where it needs to be, which is on the need for the authorities to do their job well and to do so according to the law, respecting individual dignity. Spanish original