Aussie hunger for drugs helps fuel cartel horrors
Australian drug users are fuelling a wave of political violence in Mexico, where 22 candidates have been murdered ahead of national elections on June 2.
Activists have demanded an international reaction to the deaths – driven largely by cartels running the country’s spiralling drug trade – to put pressure on the Mexican government.
Gisela Gaytan was the latest candidate to be executed, gunned down in a hail of bullets on her first day of campaigning on April 1.
The 38-year-old was the only female candidate wanting to be mayor of Celaya – a three-hour drive from Mexico City – but one cartels felt they could not control.
The murders have had a chilling effect on the elections, with dozens of candidates withdrawing because of fears for the safety of their families.
“No official candidate is even talking about this, there is 95 per cent immunity in Mexico,” human rights activist Michael Chamberlin said.
“We need an international criminal court to look into the disappearances. There has to be some international reaction because it’s not happening in Mexico, the criminal groups have too much power.”
Mr Chamberlin, who lives in Mexico City, is a senior fellow at the Centre for International Policy and president of Solidaria Consultora.
He said the political murders were part of a wider issue in Mexico, where more than one person is murdered every hour across the country.
Ruthless cartels hire “cooks” to dismember bodies and burn them in fields because there are so many murders there.
Many are linked to drug cartels fighting over control over the lucrative drug market, with Mexico overtaking Asia as the major source of ice shipments into Australia
There were 23.6 tonnes of Mexican meth seized in Australia, or destined for our shores, in the 2023 financial year. The Australian Federal Police estimates 70 per cent of the ice taken on Australian streets now comes from Mexico. Australian criminals can import Mexican ice for $1000 a kilo, compared with paying between $3000 and $5000 for the same drugs produced in Asia’s Golden Triangle.
The Sinaloa cartel has been the dominant cartel, but has been fighting for territory with the CJNG cartel.
The battles increased after the Mexican government started a war on the cartels in 2006, which led to a splintering of the market. The Gulf Cartel, Los Zetas, and Tijuana cartels were among those which had been weakened by the bloody battles.
More than 400,000 people have been murdered since 2006, while 111,896 people were reported missing, presumed dead, according to a United Nations statement in October 2023.
“The bodies are dismembered and they burn the parts, you can find fields where there are small pieces of bones that are human remains,” Mr Chamberlin said.
“People are somehow trained to do that.
“They are called the cooks, they are in charge of dismembering and burning the bodies.
“We have several groups of victims’ families, the mothers of those who have disappeared who are looking for their loved ones.
“They are called seekers, they get together and go looking in fields.”
Mexicans will elect a new president in June, along with 20,000 other officials in the largest poll ever undertaken in the country.
The Institutional Revolutionary Party had a stranglehold on Mexican politics for 71 years, ruling from 1929 to 2000.
The National Action Party took power for 12 years, before the traditional party won the election again. The Morena political party, set up by Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, won the 2018 election.
Asked about violence against political candidates, he said drug cartels had been influencing elections.
“They make an agreement and say, ‘This person is going to be mayor; we don’t want anyone else to register to run’ and anybody who does, well, they know what to expect,” he said.
Political candidates can get police protection, but first must prove them have received threats. Ms Gaytan had applied for armed security but it was not processed before her murder.