Mexico must face up and investigate widespread torture after scathing UN report

[Judi Lynn]

Mexico must face up and investigate widespread torture after scathing UN report
9 March 2015, 14:09 UTC

A new United Nations report detailing how torture is widespread among Mexico’s police and security forces must prompt the authorities to address this sickening practice once and for all, said Amnesty International today.

The report from Juan E. Méndez, the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, was presented to the UN Human Rights Council today. It outlines how officials in Mexico often fail to investigate the complaints of torture victims and forensic doctors working for the government often ignore signs of torture.

“Police and soldiers have regularly turned to torture to punish or extract false confessions or information from detainees in its so-called War on Drugs. Frequently, victims are forced to sign declarations under torture and in many cases are convicted solely on the basis of those statements. When medical forensic examinations are practised, they usually fall short of international standards.”

Amnesty International is calling for the government to ensure that forensic officials provide prompt, impartial and thorough examinations to anyone who alleges torture. It is also calling on the authorities to accept forensic reports by independent experts as valid evidence in court cases.

More:
https://www.amnesty.org/press-releases/2015/03/mexico-must-face-up-and-investigate-widespread-torture-after-scathing-un-report/

[Judi Lynn]

1. UN: torture in Mexico occurs with 'impunity' at hands of security forces

UN: torture in Mexico occurs with 'impunity' at hands of security forces

Report based on a fact-finding visit to Mexico last spring outlines methods used during detentions to combat crime that include waterboarding and rape

Jo Tuckman in Mexico City
Monday 9 March 2015 17.52 EDT

A scathing UN report has sharply rebuked Mexico for its widespread problem with torture, which it said implicates all levels of the security apparatus in the context of the government’s efforts to combat crime.

“Torture and ill treatment during detention are generalized in Mexico, and occur in a context of impunity,” the UN special rapporteur on torture, Juan Méndez, wrote in the report he presented on Monday before the Human Rights Commission in Geneva.

The report was based on a fact-finding mission Méndez made to Mexico last spring, and says methods used include beatings, electric shocks, suffocation, waterboarding, forced nudity and rape, as well as threats and insults.
Méndez’s report links torture in Mexico to government efforts to combat the country’s drug cartels, saying the majority of cases he studied involved victims detained for alleged links with organized crime. He also implicates local, state and federal police in the practice, as well as the armed forces.

The army and navy’s role in public security operations escalated dramatically when President Felipe Calderón launched a major offensive against organized crime at the end of 2006. His successor, President Enrique Peña Nieto, has made few major changes to the strategy since he took office at the end of 2012.

More:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/09/mexico-torture-human-rights-violations-united-nations-report