The Mexican Chancery, or Foreign Affairs Office (the equivalent of the U.S. Department of State) filed the government’s first legal response, which says that every one of Calderon’s actions against the drug cartels is in strict accord with and based upon Mexican law. The Chancery says that the government’s sole strategy is to destroy the cartels and avoid further violence in the country.
"The International Court is justified in taking action against a State only if the State is incapable of, or refuses to, suppress lawlessness and thereby protect its citizenry," the Chancery will argue before The Hague tribunal. "In our country, society is not a victim of an authoritarian government, or of systematic abuses carried out by the armed forces. The Mexican State acts in accordance with and fully conforms to the law."
The complaint will be officially presented to the International Court on November 25. In addition to Calderón, several high ranking members of the Mexican government are also named as respondents, including cabinet ministers and military officers. The legal papers allege that Calderon’s offensive against narcotics traffickers has caused more deaths than U.S. military operations in Afghanistan and Pakistan combined, and that Mexican civilians have been tortured, raped and in some cases murdered by members of the armed forces.
According to press accounts, documents to be filed with the Court apparently will include the claim that Calderón’s government is hiding or protecting the world’s most wanted man, Joaquín El Chapo Guzmán, leader of the Cartel Sinaloa. Guzmán escaped from a Mexican prison more than a decade ago, long before Felipe Calderón took office in 2006, and he is still on the lam. The United States has a standing offer of $5 million for his capture, alleging that he and his Sinaloa cartel are responsible for the majority of marijuana and cocaine smuggled into the U.S. from Mexico and Columbia. Mexico has put a $2 million bounty on Guzmán's head.
"Calderón has ordered systematic attacks against Central American migrants passing through Mexico on their way to the United States," the complaint also says. Evidencing the intensely political nature of the charges to be submitted to the International Court, Ackerman and the other primary sponsors infer that the entire war against the narcotics trafficking industry is part of a PAN (National Action) Party agenda established by and controlled from Washington. PAN is the party of president Calderón, and Ackerman is an outspoken critic of both. Ackerman has been particularly harsh in his denunciation of Calderón's close personal relationship with president Barack Obama, and of U.S.-Mexico security cooperation agreements such as the Mérida Initiative.
Mark my words: John Ackerman and his fellow traveler "intellectuals" will end up with egg on their faces when this “criminal case” comes to a quick end before the International Court. The Court will never take jurisdiction, as it's called in the law -- in other words, accept these allegations for formal consideration -- because they’re factually and legally groundless and transparently political. The only thing this fleeting 10 minutes of fame will accomplish for Ackerman and the other proponents is to position them for government posts if and when a PRI government (Calderón’s political nemesis) takes over after the 2012 elections. The latter is a very real possibility, given the current political climate here.
Must read other stories:
About the International Criminal Court case: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.com/2011/10/mexican-intellectuals-will-file-hauge.html; and: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.com/2011/10/prominent-mexican-professor-leads.html.
About "El Chapo” Guzman, the world’s most wanted man: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.com/2011/10/sinaloa-cartel-of-el-chapo-guzman.html; and: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.com/2011/09/escaped-mexican-drug-lord-joaquin.html.
About PRI, one of Mexico’s most powerful political parties: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.com/2011/10/writer-excoriates-mexicos-pri-party.html.
About the Mérida Initiative: http://mexicogulfreporter-supplement.blogspot.com/2011/11/new-us-ambassador-to-mexico-stands.html.
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