Mérida, Yucatán -
In August 2008, the unthinkable happened. Twelve decapitated bodies were found in Mérida, the obvious victims of narco executions. At first, local residents were convinced that they were drug dealers from outside the state - until investigators confirmed that all but two were from the Yucatán. Many also presumed that the murders had occurred elsewhere, and the bodies were simply dumped here. But then police discovered that the executions had occurred in a house just blocks from Mérida's premier avenue, Paseo de Montejo. For the first time since Mexico's war against the drug cartels began in December 2006, the Yucatán's belief in its natural immunity to narcoviolence was severely shaken.
"At first, people here were in a collective state of disbelief," U.S. embassy officials cabled their bosses in Washington. "The event was a wake up call to (Yucatán) locals that their state cannot forever remain immune to organized crime violence." In October 2008 and January 2009 cables about the decapitations, U.S. diplomats wrote: "The worst is yet to come. (Yucatecans) are living in a state of denial." The then U.S. ambassador to Mexico noted that the perception of Yucatán as an "oasis of security" was about to change.
The American diplomatic cables, which were released by Wikileaks over the past 18 months, were translated into Spanish and analyzed by Mérida's principal daily newspaper, Diario de la Yucatán, in its Nov. 9 edition.
WikiLeaks
More than two years ago WikiLeaks - which publishes, online, information received from anonymous sources - began releasing classified cables sent to the State Department by 275 U.S. consulates, embassies, and diplomatic missions worldwide, between 1966 and Feb. 2010. Many of the 250,000 cables contain sensitive analyses of international situations, as well as diplomats' assessments of events and officials in the countries where they were based. The cables have embarrassed the United States, complicated its diplomatic relations with several countries and in some instances severely stressed old friendships. Nowhere is that more evident than in the arena of U.S.-Mexico affairs, where a former American ambassador was forced to resign last year over confidential comments he made to Washington about Mexico's anemic drug war efforts. The last WikiLeaks cables were released in Sept. 2011, but because of their size - over 260 million words - it may take years to analyze them all.
The U.S. diplomatic cables
In a cable captioned 08MEXICO3116, the U.S. consulate in Mérida at the time quoted the then state prosecutor, José Alonso Guzmán Pacheco, who allegedly said that "there's no organized crime here in Yucatán, because we're a completely separate zone of Mexico." Guzmán Pacheco pointed out that Yucatán had always been geographically isolated from the rest of Mexico, and was so internally independent that a 19th century movement sought to declare it a separate country, according to the cable. Another local official told consular officers that the absence of narco violence in the region was due to the presence of large numbers of indigenous peoples -- principally Mayans -- who have a "natural passivity" and whose customs and social traditions strongly militate against delinquency.
The U.S. ambassador to Mexico at the time, Anthony Garza, offered a rather different explanation for the Yucatán's reputation for immunity to serious crime. "People there really know their neighbors well . . . they report to the police any slight concern about 'strangers' who appear in town, who obviously have come from somewhere else."
In any case, those perceptions radically changed with the August 2008 decapitations, and the belief that the peninsula would forever remain a cradle of security quickly evaporated. The Mexican government rushed 130 federal agents to back up local police forces, at the urget request of Yucatán's current governor, Ivonne Ortega. In the words of the then U.S. consul in Mérida, Karen Martin, "These kinds of high profile criminal acts serve as a reminder that narco violence is everywhere in Mexico." Authorities eventually said the 12 executed men were street sellers of drugs. Their murders have never been solved.
Governor Ivonne Ortega threatened
El Diario de la Yucatán says that its cable analysis indicates that Yucatán's governor Ivonne Ortega was herself threatened soon after the August 2008 decapitations. She beefed up her personal security significantly, and special checkpoints manned by heavily armed guards were installed near her residence, according to the paper. Ortega canceled several public appearances at the suggestion of advisers. But she participated in Mexican independence day festivities on the evening of Sept. 15, even mixing with the crowd for awhile, which greatly worried the governor's security detail, according to Diaro.
What lays ahead?
To be sure, Yucatán and it's capital city of Mérida have experienced nothing like the events of August 2008 for the past 39 months. But a continued assumption that the state is naturally invulnerable to organized crime would be foolhardy, whether based upon theories of geographic or socio-cultural immunity. Grave danger lurks just to the east, in the neighboring state of Quintana Roo, most of which appears to be headed in the same direction as once famous destinations like Acapulco and Veracruz. Mexico's Riviera Maya, including the popular international resorts of Cancún, Playa del Carmen and Isla de Mujeres, are experiencing unprecedented levels of violence, including frequent narco executions, which local authorities refer to as "adjustments of account." The government says the Los Zetas cartel dominates organized crime in Q.R., and a local newspaper reports that the group is following its predictable course of branching out far beyond narcotics trafficking, infiltrating and taking over all types of once legitimate businesses, investing in local enterprises as a means of laundering untold millions of illicit drug profits.
Perhaps Los Zetas will eventually arrive in Mérida, where the locals still sleep well at night, convinced that nothing untoward is going to happen and that in any case, their police will protect them. Perhaps the Zs are already here. But it would be wise to remember that a deadly organization which thus far appears invulnerable is hard at work 250 miles away. The trip across this dry, flat peninsula can be made in just under four hours.
Apr. 12, 2013 - Another fascinating report concerning U.S. diplomatic focus on Yucatán appeared in today's Diario, once again via Wikileaks' recent release of additional cables. The most interesting one concerns a bombing at the Cuban consulate in Mérida's Colonia García Ginerés early on the morning of May 14, 1974. The American consul reported the incident to the State Dept. at 5:23 p.m. that day, about 12 hours before the story first appeared in Diario de Yucatán. The consul, whose local sources must have been pretty good, noted that two bombs were "thrown, not planted" at the Cuban mission, and told his bosses in Washington that it was the fifth attack against Cuban installations in Mexico in the previous six months, all the previous ones having occurred in Mexico City. In May 1974, Richard Nixon had about 90 days left in office. He resigned in August, the only U.S. president ever to do so.
Former Yucatán men nabbed in Colorado cocaine bust
Does eastern Yucatán belong to El Chapo Guzmán?
U.S.-bound drugs move through Yucatán, but on a small scale, says local military
Yucatán a haven for Mexican fugitives
Yucatán retains popularity with Canadians, less so with U.S. Americans
No comments:
Post a Comment