Global News Journal

“Collateral damage” grows in Mexico’s army-led drug war

I heard the bursts of gunfire near my house in Monterrey as I was showering this morning. Then the ambulance sirens started wailing, and as I drove my kids to school about 20 minutes later, a convoy of green-clad soldiers, their assault rifles at the ready, sped by us. In northern Mexico, where I cover the drug war, it has become a part of life to read about, hear and even witness shootouts, but today I shuddered at the thought: what if those soldiers accidentally ever shot at me?

It was in February 2007 that Amnesty International raised concerns over Mexican President Felipe Calderon’s decision, two months earlier, to send thousands of troops across the country to control Mexico’s spiraling drug violence. Echoing worries voiced by the United Nations, the rights group warned that sending the army onto Mexican streets to do the job of the police was a bad idea. Even individual soldiers have commented to Reuters, off the record of course, that they feel very uncomfortable about their new role.

Back then, when there was still plenty of optimism about winning the war against drug cartels, many Mexicans brushed off concerns of rights abuses and the possible deaths of innocent bystanders. Washington praised Calderon for his bold move.

But almost four years on, it would seem Amnesty, the U.N. and a host of other rights groups were right. For the family of slain architect Fernando Osorio, who was shot dead by soldiers who mistook him for a hitman late last month, they were certainly right. Fernando, 34, was killed on the outskirts of Monterrey, Mexico’s richest city, as he worked on a piece of land soon due to become a housing development. “The army is committing atrocities, they destroyed my family today,” Fernando’s father Oswaldo Osorio told reporters on Oct. 28.

In another tragedy a month before, four soldiers opened fire on a family traveling in their SUV along a highway outside of Monterrey, killing a 15-year-old boy and his father. Two students at Monterrey’s prestigious Tecnologico university were killed just outside the campus by soldiers earlier this year. Sadly, the list goes on.

The army occasionally apologizes. But for the Osorio family, little has been made clear. The army at first tried to justify their actions by saying Fernando was a drug hitman. The family found out what was going on from local media and from those working with Fernando on site. “It made the whole thing so much more painful,” his brother David told Reuters at the family home in suburban Monterrey. “If the army had come to us and said they were sorry and clarified things, well we might be able to understand that they are fighting a difficult battle. But right now, we don’t even know how to get Fernando’s belongings back (from the crime scene),” he said.

from Reuters Investigates:

Enter stage left — Brazil’s next president?

Not every president has a police mugshot, but it's not so surprising in Latin America.

A special report out of Brazil today sheds new light on Dilma Rousseff, a former guerrilla leader who is likely to be elected the booming country's next president. She spent nearly three years in jail in the early 1970s and was tortured by her military captors. She's come a long way since then.

The product of more than a dozen interviews with Rousseff and her top advisers, the story gives a glimpse of how Rousseff could govern at the helm of a country that, with India, Russia and China, is among the worlds few economic bright spots.

The upshot: while Rousseff is not the leftist-in-waiting that many investors fear, there is legitimate concern that hers could be a status-quo presidency, unable or unwilling to push through major reforms to Brazil's tax, labor or fiscal structure. As a result, there is a risk that Latin America's biggest economy could eventually stagnate under her administration.

Watch Brian Winter discuss the October 3 election on Reuters Insider here.

from Reuters Investigates:

Dive in, the water’s fine

Special reports are the best of the best from Reuters, and this is the place to find them. We'll be featuring investigative stories, in-depth profiles and long-form narrative stories here.

Reuters has a global Enteprise Reporting team with editors in New York, London and Singapore, drawing on the work of some 2,900 journalists in 200 bureaus around the world.

To kick it off, take a look at this story from Frank Jack Daniel in Caracas. Venezuelans will elect a new parliament on Sunday and the opposition is hoping to make a dent in President Hugo Chavez's power.

Chavez has dominated politics for more than a decade -- as one opposition figure put it: "In Venezuela, you have to win elections like David beat Goliath." FULL STORY

We'll have more on Latin America tomorrow with a profile of Dilma Rousseff, the frontrunner in Brazil's presidential elections.

Colombian election heats up

Just a month ago all seemed set for Juan Manuel Santos to secure Colombia’s presidency. Santos, a former defense minister for President Alvaro Uribe, is credited with some of the most successful operations against the country’s FARC guerrillas. But now Santos has a fight on his hands after the surprising surge for two-time Bogota mayor Antanas Mockus. 

 Known as much for his successful city administration as for his off-beat style, Mockus has won supporters with his message of clean government and continuity of Uribe’s policies. Polls now show Colombians are more concerned with bread-and-butter issues like jobs, healthcare and education than with violence from the waning war.

Could Santos be a victim of Uribe’s security success in that Colombians now see the need for someone like Mockus, who promises to crack down on corruption and pay more attention to social and economic development? Or is Santos paying the price for scandals over rights abuses and corruption that rattled Uribe’s second term?

Both men will guarantee the continuity of Colombia’s tough security and pro-business approach. But Mockus has caught voter attention for now with a fresh approach that contrasts sharply with the way conservative Uribe ran the presidency.

A former university rector, he once dropped his pants and showed his backside to students to get their attention. As mayor he used street mimes to shame Bogota residents into obeying the law. He says he is more conservative now and touts his fiscal management and his solid law-and-order record in the capital as credentials for the presidency. 

Undoubtedly the race is still very tight, but after eight years of Uribe could Colombians be ready for a change in style in the presidential office?

 Reuters photo by Jose Miguel Gomez

China’s Long March into Latin America

A $16 billion oil deal between China and Venezuela signed this week illustrates Beijing’s growing economic might and political influence in Latin America.

Trade between the region and China has swelled from $10 billion in 2000 to more than $102 billion in 2008.

Latin American leaders — not just leftists like Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez but also moderates such as Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva — have beaten a path to Beijing and Chinese officials are frequent visitors in return.

China is gobbling up Latin American commodities from soy to iron ore and at the same time eyeing a market of 500 million people while growth in its traditional trade partners remains flat.

And increasingly, China is a source of financing and investment in a continent that the United States has traditionally considered its backyard.

“It is important to recognise the Chinese engagement is significant and is having a significant effect,” R. Evan Ellis of the Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies in Washington said at a presentation at London’s Canning House. “Latin American politics and economics are coming of age and the region is looking to a number of players, not just the United States.”

Former U.S. President George W. Bush’s government is widely seen as having paid too little attention to Latin America during its eight years in power. Some U.S. politicians have raised the alarm about communist China’s intentions, warning that it poses a security threat. So should the United States be afraid?

When is a coup not a coup?

Honduran President Manuel Zelaya was seized by the military, bundled onto a plane in his pajamas and flown out of the country. The people who took over the country last Sunday say it was not a coup.

The interim government, led by Congress speaker Roberto Micheletti, argue that Zelaya’s ouster was legal as it was ordered by the Supreme Court after the president had tried to extend his four-year term in office illegally.    They say he was acting unconstitutionally and had to be removed.    The rest of the world seems to disagree. From U.S. President Barack Obama to arch-U.S. rival Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, world leaders have condemned Zelaya’s removal and used the term “coup.”   In the days before the coup, opposition leaders said they planned to impeach Zelaya over his plan to hold an unofficial public survey to gauge support for letting presidents run for re-election beyond the current one four-year term. They said a congressional committee set up to investigate Zelaya found he had violated the Central American nation’s laws and would ask Congress to declare him unfit to rule.    Does one unconstitutional act justify another? In a democracy, is it ever justified for soldiers to seize a president and spirit him out of the country? Does the fact that Congress quickly elected a successor, who will serve only until presidential elections in November, make any difference?

  Defining the nature of the “coup” has been troubling lawyers at the U.S. State Department.   By law, no U.S. aid — other than for the promotion of democracy — may be given to a nation “whose duly elected head of government is deposed by military coup or decree.”    Two U.S. officials said the legal determination of this was complex despite the fact that Zelaya was grabbed by the military and put on a plane to Costa Rica in his pajamas.    “The military moved against the president. They removed him from his home and they expelled him from the country. So the military participated in a coup,” said a senior U.S. official.        “However, the transfer of leadership was not a military action. The transfer of leadership was done by the Honduran Congress and therefore the coup, while it had a military component … is a larger event,” he added.    Zelaya was unpopular with many in Honduras, particularly the country’s wealthier conservative elite, for his alliance with Chavez. His popularity was down to 30 percent.    Many Hondurans struggle to understand why foreign leaders, from Obama to most of Latin America’s presidents, have backed Zelaya.    “They have only listened to (Zelaya) abroad, they haven’t listened to the population. But that doesn’t matter. We will continue alone,” said Adela Guevara, a hotel worker.     Tell us what you think. When is a coup not a coup?

(Pictures in Honduras by REUTERS/Edgard Garrido. Pictures show: Soldiers crawling through a hole in the fence to enter the presidential residency; members of Congress praying before Roberto Micheletti is sworn in as interim president; Zelaya (L) being welcomed by Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez (R) and Nicaragua’s President Daniel Ortega (C) after his arrival in Nicaragua June 29, 2009. )