Group+2A

= = = The drug war in Mexico and how it is affecting the journalism and vice versa =
 * Group 2 A: Patricia Dwyer, Sandy Coronilla, Jeniffer Alburquerque, Clarissa Hanna, Larissa vom Lehn, & Megan Looney**

The History of Drug Trafficking in Mexico by Patricia B. Dwyer
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Not too much of Mexico’s history with drug trafficking is on record, because it is rare that government officials want to record their criminal activities.

Marijuana, cocaine, and opiates were used as prescription drugs in Mexico since the 19th century according to Luis Astorga, a social research at the University of Mexico. Small rural towns began harvesting poppy flowers and marijuana in order to produce these drugs for what they saw as medical reasons and a business.

But as long as the drugs have been used, they found their way to the US. But differences between the cultures have lead to problems. Mexico saw the drugs as medical and the US began to use them as recreational. This created a higher demand for the substances in US than in Mexico very early on, as reported in CQ Researcher's article Mexico's Drug War.

Mexico’s revolution came to an end in 1910, and the party that came to power formed a government that kept their officials in order by giving them the revenues of certain business, including drug trafficking.



http://www.old-picture.com/american-history-1900-1930s/Zapata-and-his-men.htm

Mexico’s history is full of accounts of anti-narcotics police, generals, and governors controlling the drug trafficking in their regions, and sometimes paying their workers with the drugs they seized. Sometimes it was made public against rival candidates during political races, but it was always occurring regardless of its presence in the media.

In 1917, Mexico’s congressman José María Rodríguez realized the negative affects of such substances in his own country, and made the first amendment to Mexico’s constitution to control and limit their presence and usage. But this did very little to control the trafficking.

Reporters affected personally by the drug war in Mexico by Larissa vom Leh**n**
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According to the news agency Reuters, the number of journalists being killed, kidnapped or blackmailed as drug war rages in Mexico is rising. Over 30 media workers have disappeared or been killed since President Felipe Calderon launched his war on drug cartels in 2006. .

Pedro Torres


The BBC News reported that Pedro Torres, an editor of the Mexican newspaper //El Diario// in Ciudad Juarez, was blackmailed this year. At //El Diario// he published a series of reports about a drug gang which have members in the Mexican state of Chihuahua all the way to Los Angeles, Calif. He had to stop writing about this gang after he received a phone call with a withheld number: ”If you publish other news about this we will kill your people,” said the voice on the other end of the line.

George Luis Aguirre


BBC News also reported that as a result of the rising danger that Mexican reporters are facing, some are getting political asylum in the United States. Mexican journalist Jorge Luis Aguirre, an editor in Ciudad Juarez and director for the news website ”La Ploska,” experienced this personally. After a crime reporter was shot to death on November 1, he received an anonymous phone call saying that he will be next. After this happened, the US government granted him political asylum. In 2010 he fled to America after getting the green light from the US government. “I left everything: my house, my office. I left my car in a public parking lot...This asylum opens the door to journalists caught in Mexico, where there is no justice and where the government is part of drug trafficking," Aguirre told Reuters.

Armando Rodriguez


Armando Rodriguez, a 40 year old journalist, became the latest victim in a bloody war between Mexico’s major drug cartels, according to Reporters without Borders. The journalist has been a crime specialist for the past 14 years. When he was leaving his home to drive his daughter to school an unidentified gunman ambushed and shot him dead.

Unified Command
The Mexican government announced a new plan to fight the drug cartels: Create a “unified command.” T he plan would rebuild public trust and help reduce corruption, which has allowed the cartels to flourish and carry-on illicit activities. This tactic will abolish local police departments and replace them with a “unified command.” Because the local police departments have become infiltrated and manipulated by the cartels, politicians hope that a unified command will present a more cohesive, professional force and demonstrate progress to the international world.

Enforcing Security
Mexican President Felipe Calderón has made the restoration of security the focus of his presidency. That has meant 50,000 troops and federal officials dispatched to take on drug criminals, but violence continues to increase, with more than 28,000 killed in drug-related violence since he took office in December 2006.

Judicial Reforms
Congress passed a series of constitutional reforms that examines criminal procedures in Mexico. The reforms include oral trials with public proceedings, sentencing based on the evidence presented during trial, and the creation of a group of judges that can rule quickly on requests for search warrants. Prior to these reforms, Mexico used a written trial procedure that could drag on for years.

Public Security Reforms
Calderon proposed a package of public security reforms (StratFor) to Mexico's Congress in September 2008, including the creation of a national criminal database and a department to oversee coordination among police forces and anti-corruption efforts. The main focus is on tracking flows of information, money, and people.

Deploying the Military
In December 2006, Calderon deployed almost thirty-six thousand troops to work with the federal police in nine states, including Michoacan, Guerrero, Sinaloa, Durango, and Chihuahua. These troops eradicate crops, gather intelligence, conduct raids, interrogate suspects, and seize contraband.

= = =**Mexico's News Coverage of the Drug War by Clarissa Hanna**=


 * http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hNNex3ATBio **

//Covering the drug war's news has become a life threatening and deadly task//
Reporting the Mexican drug war couldn’t have been a harder task to do. A large number of journalists have suffered tremendously trying to gather news information to the extent of loosing their own lives or their families. The Wall Street Journal reports “When unknown assailants recently lobbed grenades at the offices of Mexico's powerful broadcaster Televisa in Monterrey and Matamoros, the blasts were seen as a message to the country's media: Beware covering the drug war.” In parts of Mexico, local media have largely stopped reporting on drug violence. Televisa anchor Carlos Loret de Mola cites that the reason behind this was that local reporters became accustomed to getting phone calls every day from drug gangs "telling them how to proceed. If they don't follow orders, then they pay with their lives or that of their families.”

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**//Failure and minimal reports on recent drug war news//**
A new analysis shows that Mexico's regional newspapers are failing to report many of the murders, attacks on police and other violence linked to the nation's war against drug cartels. "The Fundacion MEPI, an independent investigative journalism center, studied the crime coverage of 11 regional newspapers and found that the drug-trafficking cartels receive little mention. The data, and interviews with journalists, shows that threats, bribery and pressure are shaping the news delivered to hundreds of thousands of Mexicans who live outside the capital, Mexico City." Regional journalists told MEPI they routinely do not report the role of the cartels in the mounting violence. They said that with the central government is unable to protect prosecutors and police, they feel forced to chose between personal safety and professional ethics. "In Ciudad Juárez, for example, cartel gunmen were reported to have killed an estimated 300 people each month in 2010. But in the first six months of this year, the newspaper //El Norte//, a reputable daily, mentioned the drug organizations in fewer than 30 stories monthly, according to the MEPI Analysis." Alfredo Quijano, editor of //El Norte// agreed that his newspaper is very careful about how it addresses stories about violence. "Our stories are simpler today. We don´t do any follow up beyond one day.

=American Media Effects b y Sandy Coronilla =

Along the nearly 2,000 mile-long border that separates the United States from Mexico, there are a world of stories to tell. //The Los Angeles Times// project Mexico Under Siege estimates that over 28,000 people have died since January 2007 as a result of the drug war. The drug war coverage in the U.S. is strongly focused on killings and kidnappings in two border cities: San Diego and Tijuana, Baja California; and El Paso, Texas and Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua.

**Media Coverage of violence in El Paso and Ciudad Juarez**
Two University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) were shot and killed in Ciudad Juarez. Manuel Acosta Villalobos, 25 and Eder Diaz, 23, were returning from an event at UTEP on November 2, 2010 when 36 rounds were fired and both men were hit multiple times. UTEP has had to limit research in Mexico. Six days later, 20 more people were slain in Ciudad Juarez.

**Media Coverage of violence in San Diego and Tijuana **
The story isn’t much different in the border cities of San Diego and Tijuana. Sandra Dibble covers the instability in Mexico regularly. Dibble’s most recent story covered two bodies hanging from an overpass on November 19, 2010. She states, “ So far this year, more than 720 people have been killed, the majority the result of infighting between drug gangs...” Only a day before, a man was killed in leaving his house in Tijuana and another man was beheaded, reported the //San Diego Union-Tribune//.

American Public Opinion
The Pew Research Center’s News Interest Index is published online. In June 2010, World Cup Soccer in South Africa (6%) was followed more closely than the violence in Mexico (2%). When comparing news interest with news coverage, drug related violence in Mexico consumed less than 1% of all news coverage while the World Cup was covered more (2%). In September of this year, the News Interest Index revealed the following: “ News about the situation in Mexico made up 1% of coverage.”

**Solidarity** **/ positive efforts by Mexican journalists who are trying to maintain a sense of community and patriotism instead of keeping it all negative** By Megan Looney

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This recent SNL video clip depicts, to the extreme, what Mexico media outlets are trying to get across to tourists: //we’re not as dangerous as you think.// And it is working to a certain extent. Tourist attraction has slowly begun to level out again in the last few months (Crawford, 2010). That either means vacation goers see the violence as a norm or they think that it doesn’t exist anymore. It is true that journalists in Mexico are very rarely publicizing stories related to gang violence. However, chances are that’s because if they do, they will likely become another body in a bag. One group that is making a difference to lift spirits is called //[|Iniciativa Mexico]//. This group is backed by the top media organizations in Mexico. Tania Esparza, the group’s director, told //Catholic Online// in an interview: "We want to recover the idea that Mexico is a great country and it's our country, and that's why I think it's good to do something like Iniciativa Mexico in this time.” The goal of this program is to get nominations for everyday Mexican citizens who are trying to make their home a better place. According to www.catholic.org, they have already reached 47,000 nominations. This just shows how badly the people affected by this war want to hear about something other than death, drugs and destruction. The 2010 Bicentennial celebrated the 200th year of its Independence and the 100th anniversary of its Revolution, prompting President Felipe Calderón to call this the "Año de la Patria," or "Year of the Nation." Televisa (the #1 TV station in the country) aired various commercials, each one celebrating a different Mexican state and each proudly declaring, “Esto es Mexico” (translated: This is Mexico). //Commercial featuring// //Veracruz////:// media type="youtube" key="5Isfiygx6Ds" height="410" width="525"


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