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Mexico City, October 19, 2010 –<\/strong> The bill proposing reforms to military jurisdiction that Mexican President Felipe Calder\u00f3n presented in the Senate yesterday would leave intact the structures that currently promote impunity in cases of human rights crimes committed by military personnel against the civilian population.\u00a0 The proposed reforms fall short of complying with the government\u2019s duty to adjust its laws to conform to its international human rights obligations.<\/p>\n The central required reform, emphasized by victims of human rights violations, civil society organizations, and international human rights bodies, is not reflected in the bill, because the proposal does not aim to establish civilian controls over the armed forces.\u00a0 In particular, it is necessary to limit military jurisdiction to matters directly related to military discipline only.\u00a0 The current bill contains a list of just three crimes that would be excluded from military jurisdiction, leaving a wide margin for impunity.\u00a0 There is no justification for continuing to allow military jurisdiction to be applied to cases beyond matters of military discipline.<\/p>\n The exclusion of three crimes \u2013 forced disappearance, rape, and torture \u2013 which would nonetheless still be investigated in military jurisdiction; the possibility of reclassifying these crimes to keep them in military jurisdiction even in the trial stage; and the manipulation of the facts of such cases by military investigators, give rise to more problems than advances and jeopardize the rights of victims.\u00a0 The only possible way to end impunity in such cases is to exclude from military jurisdiction entirely all crimes committed by the armed forces against civilians.<\/p>\n In addition, the powers assigned in the bill to the Military Investigatory Police, as a body of the Public Prosecutor, and in particular the proposal that the Military Investigatory Police should be the authority that provides protection to victims or witnesses of military abuses, goes against all reason and would be ineffective to safeguard the lives and well-being of such individuals.<\/p>\n It is absurd that the President has presented this bill as a sign of commitment to human rights and the government\u2019s international treaty obligations.\u00a0 This is a cosmetic gesture meant to give the appearance of reforming what, in practice, will continue to remain the same, especially considering that the tendency for the military to commit human rights crimes continues unabated.<\/p>\n The bill cannot be considered in any way to comply with the binding reparations orders issued by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in the cases of Rosendo Radilla Pacheco, In\u00e9s Fern\u00e1ndez Ortega, and Valentina Rosendo Cant\u00fa, in which the Court specifies that Mexico must reform article 57 of its Code of Military Justice in light of the requirement that military jurisdiction cannot intervene under any circumstances in any crime committed by the armed forces against civilians.<\/p>\n None of the actions taken thus far by Mexico\u2019s President and Defense Department indicate a change in the lack of political will to put an end to one of the chief obstacles that makes access to justice impossible for victims of military abuses: the unconstitutional use of military jurisdiction to investigate and judge these cases.\u00a0 Until this panorama changes, it will likewise be impossible to consolidate democracy in Mexico.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Centro de Derechos Humanos Fray Bartolom\u00e9 de Las Casas, Chiapas<\/p>\n Centro de Derechos Humanos Fray Francisco de Vitoria (CDHFFV)<\/p>\n Centro de Derechos Humanos Miguel Agust\u00edn Pro Ju\u00e1rez (Centro Prodh)<\/p>\n Centro de Derechos Humanos de la Monta\u00f1a Tlachinollan, Guerrero<\/p>\n Centro de Derechos Humanos de las Mujeres, Chihuahua<\/p>\n Centro por la Justicia y el Derecho Internacional (CEJIL)<\/p>\n Centro de Justicia para la Paz y el Desarrollo, Jalisco<\/p>\n Comisi\u00f3n Mexicana de Defensa y Promoci\u00f3n de los Derechos Humanos (CMDPDH)<\/p>\n Fundaci\u00f3n Diego Lucero, Michoac\u00e1n<\/p>\n IDHEAS, Litigio Estrat\u00e9gico en Derechos Humanos<\/p>\n Indignaci\u00f3n, Promoci\u00f3n y Defensa de los Derechos Humanos, Yucat\u00e1n<\/p>\n Instituto Mexicano de Derechos Humanos y Democracia (IMDHD)<\/p>\n Red Nacional de Organismos Civiles de Derechos Humanos \u201cTodos los Derechos para Todas y Todos\u201d (conformada por 70 organizaciones)<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"template":"","categories":[],"class_list":["post-3565","comunicado-de-prensa","type-comunicado-de-prensa","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cejil.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comunicado-de-prensa\/3565","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cejil.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comunicado-de-prensa"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cejil.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/comunicado-de-prensa"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cejil.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3565"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cejil.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3565"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}