IACHR Criticizes Mexican Government for Alleged Widespread Use of Torture Roque Planas - The Huffington Post | |
go to original October 4, 2015 |
Torture and ill-treatment in Mexico is out of control with a 600 per cent rise in the number of reported cases in the past decade, according to a report published by Amnesty International. (Amnesty International)
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights excoriated Mexico’s human rights record Friday, saying the country’s security forces routinely torture and kill people with impunity.
The Washington-based IACHR, an arm of the Organization of American States devoted to protecting human rights in the hemisphere, fielded a group that has visited several cities in Mexico since Sept. 28. Group members have met with members of all three branches of the federal government, as well as victims of human rights violations, members of nongovernmental organizations, social activists and journalists.
The group's preliminary findings, posted online Friday, come on the heels of a separate report by a different IACHR panel last month that said the Mexican government’s investigation in the high-profile case of the disappearance of 43 students from the city of Iguala was marred by torture, and its conclusions were unsupported by forensic science.
“The Inter-American Commission confirmed on the ground the grave human rights crisis that Mexico is experiencing, characterized by a situation of extreme violence and lack of public safety, extrajudicial executions and torture, high levels of impunity and insufficient care for the victims and their families,” the preliminary findings of the report read.
Friday's report highlighted several positive steps the Mexican government has taken in recent years, including reforming the constitution to specify that all Mexicans enjoy human rights guarantees.
But the group’s preliminary findings present a dismal image of a country in which people fear security forces who kill and torture with impunity, where criminal groups pay off authorities to traffic drugs and people, and where the armed forces have taken on a policing role, leading to what the commission called a “militarization” of criminal justice.
Read the rest at The Huffington Post
Related: Torture Banned, But Remains in the Shadows (Amnesty International)
Call on the Mexican president, Enrique Peña Nieto, to uphold all anti-torture safeguards, including proper medical examinations, and investigate all allegations of torture in his country at Amnesty International.
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