MEXICO'S
DRUGS WAR
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| Mexico's armed forces have been accused of widespread abuses in the fight against drugs gangs |
Mexican
activists have asked the International Criminal Court to investigate President
Felipe Calderon over the torture and killing of civilians in the war on drugs.
A petition
signed by more than 18,000 people also asks the ICC to investigate Mexico's
most-wanted drugs lord, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman.
The Mexican
government has denied the accusations of crimes against humanity.
It says its
security policy cannot constitute an international crime.
Human
rights lawyer Netzai Sandoval filed a complaint with the ICC in the Hague,
asking it to investigate the deaths of hundreds of civilians at the hands of
the security forces and drugs gangs, as well as alleged torture and rape.
"The
violence in Mexico is bigger than the violence in Afghanistan, and bigger than
the violence in Colombia," Mr Sandoval told Reuters news agency.
"We
want the prosecutor to tell us if war crimes and crimes against humanity have
been committed in Mexico, and if the president and other top officials are
responsible".
The office
of the prosecutor said it had received the request and would study it and make
a decision in due course.
Rule of law
The Mexican
government responded to the complaint when the petition was launched in October.
"The
federal government categorically rejects that security policy could be
considered an international crime," the foreign ministry said in a statement.
"In
our country society is not victim of an authoritarian government or of
systematic abuses by the armed forces," it added.
"Mexico
has a rule of law under which crime and impunity are fought without
exceptions".
The
government also stressed its commitment to human rights and responsibility to
protect its citizens from criminal violence.
Mexico is a
signatory to the 2002 Statute of Rome that established the ICC as the world's
first permanent international war crimes court.
The ICC
investigates and tries cases of war crimes and crimes against humanity in
countries that are unwilling or unable to prosecute them on their own.
Most of its
cases are initiated after referral by the country involved or the UN Security
Council, but the prosecutor's office can also start investigations on its own
initiative on the basis of information received from individuals or
organisations.
So far, all
its cases have been in Africa, but the prosecutor's office has begun
preliminary examinations in other countries including Afghanistan, Colombia,
Honduras and Korea.
Correspondents
say any decision to begin an investigation into alleged crimes in Mexico could
take months or even years to reach.
More than
40,000 Mexicans have died in drug-related violence since December 2006, when
President Calderon began using the military to combat the drug cartels.
Many of the
dead are thought to be members of the gangs, killed by the security forces or
in clashes with rival groups, but there have also been a growing number of
civilian casualties.
Last month
a report by Human Rights Watch found evidence that the Mexican police and
military were involved in 24 killings and 39 disappearances in five states, as
well as systematic torture.
It said few
of the cases it documented were properly investigated, in part because Mexican
soldiers are subject only to military courts.
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