Pena Nieto Government Rejects Visit by United Nations Rapporteur on Torture Aristegui Noticias
go to original March 28, 2016

Juan E. Mendez, Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, speaks during a press conference. (AP/Keystone/Martial Trezzini)

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, Juan Méndez, will not visit Mexico this year, as requested in September 2015. The government, through the Secretariat of Foreign Relations (SRE), rejected his [Méndez's] request on the grounds that visits by other experts are scheduled; hence, it isn't possible to schedule a visit before October, when Juan Méndez completes his mission.

In an interview with El Universal, Méndez said the Mexican government's responded that this year he will not be able to make a visit to continue the work he did in April and May of 2014. Following that visit, the following year, on March 9, 2015, he produced a country report whose content generated a diplomatic dispute.

In the document, the UN expert maintained that torture in Mexico is a widespread practice. The Mexican government discredited and flatly rejected the report. Officials from the Secretariat of Foreign Relations even accused the Rapporteur of acting in an unprofessional and unethical manner.

Méndez explained that on Monday, March 7, in Geneva, Switzerland, in an interview with Mexico's Ambassador to International Organizations from the SRE, diplomat Jorge Lomónaco explained that the follow-up visit Méndez requested could not take place. Lamónico explained that what is eventually to be scheduled for the Rapporteur on Torture will be scheduled with his successor, as deemed by the [Mexican] government. The Rapporteur said that he has not yet received a written document confirming this decision.

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