GROUP: ‘CRITICAL’ LEVELS OF IMPUNITY IN MEXICO

OAS rights panel notes high level of journalist killings

Mexico is suffering “critical” failures in law enforcement and some of the worst levels of journalist killings outside a war zone, the InterAmerican Commission on Human Rights said in a report.

The Mexican government said Sunday that it is “strengthening its work” in the areas criticized by the commission, which is a body of the Organization of American States.

Those areas include lack of access to justice, weak police forces and the militarization of law enforcement. The report praised Mexico for searching for disappeared people, but activists say the government largely relies on volunteer efforts led by relatives of the missing.

“During its visit, the commission found critical levels of impunity and inadequate attention for victims and their families,” the report said. “Threats, harassment, killings and disappearances of those who seek truth and justice have intimidated the Mexican public creating a big problem with under-reporting” of crimes.

“Barriers to access to justice and its inaction have resulted in many cases in crimes going unpunished, and have weakened the rule of law and constitute urgent challenges,” the report said.

The group Zero Impunity estimates that as of 2020, almost nine of every 10 homicides in Mexico go unpunished.

While the National Guard created by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has taken over many law enforcement duties, the report noted that it is a largely military force.

The commission recommended Mexico “develop concrete plans for the gradual withdrawal of the armed forces from civilian law enforcement, and turning it over to civilian police.” But the report added that “since 2018, the budgets for strengthening local police have decreased or been eliminated.”

López Obrador created the National Guard, but staffed it largely with soldiers as he eliminated the federal police.

Homicides in Mexico remain high. Killings declined 4.5 percent in the first quarter of 2021 compared to the first quarter of 2020, but it was unclear whether that was a side-effect of the pandemic. At least nine journalists were killed in Mexico in 2020, the highest of any country in the Americas.