Politics Outside US

Mexican officials are reacting with a mixture of bemusement and frustration after residents in two US states, Colorado and Washington, voted to legalize marijuana. Some are calling for the legalization of Mexican marijuana exports, while others, including key advisors to incoming President Enrique Pena Nieto, are saying that Mexico will have to "rethink" its drug policies in the wake of the vote.

Mexico has seen as many as 60,000 people killed in the last six years as the government of outgoing President Felipe Calderon declared war on the so-called cartels, which traffic large quantities of Mexican marijuana to the US, as well as methamphetamine, heroin, and cocaine. The Mexican government has grown increasingly frustrated with what it sees as US laxity when it comes to fighting the drug war north of the border, especially with the broad acceptance of medical marijuana in states where it is legal.

And now, two states have moved to okay outright legalization.

In an interview the day after the elections reported by the Associated Press, key Pena Nieto advisor Luis Videgaray, who is heading the new president's transition team, said that his government remains opposed to drug legalization, but that the votes in Colorado and Washington complicated its efforts to prosecute the drug war.

"Obviously we can't handle a product that is illegal in Mexico, trying to stop its transfer to the United States, when in the United States, at least in part of the United States, it now has a different status," Videgaray said. "I believe this obliges us to think the relationship in regards to security. This is an unforeseen element. These important modifications change somewhat the rules of the game in the relationship with the United States. I think that we have to carry out a review of our joint policies in regards to drug trafficking and security in general."

Videgraray's remarks come just three weeks before Pena Nieto is scheduled to meet with President Obama in Washington.

Conversely, Cesar Duarte, governor of the violence-plagued state of Chihuahua, said Wednesday that the legalization votes north of the border offered a "very clear" hint on what Mexico should do: legalize marijuana exports.

"It seems to me that we should move to authorize exports," Duarte told Reuters in an interview. "We would therefore propose organizing production for export, and with it no longer being illegal, we would have control over a business which today is run by criminals, and which finances criminals."

If the US doesn't want to prosecute the drug war -- as evidenced by the votes in Colorado and Washington -- asked Duarte, why should Mexico?

"We can't go on suffering for the effects of America's vices," he said.

There will be no national "weed pass" for marijuana consumers in the Netherlands. The Associated Press has reported that the new Dutch coalition government has agreed on a provisional governing pact that kills the "weed pass" plan proposed last year by the then-ruling conservatives, but gives cities the option of banning foreigners from the country's famous cannabis cafes.

With the "weed pass" proposal, foreigners were to have been banned from the cannabis cafes nationwide as of next year, and Dutch nationals would have been required to register with the state to obtain a permit (the "weed pass") to be able to purchase marijuana at the cafes. The plan had already gone into effect in some border cities.

It was touted as reducing "drug tourism" and associated nuisances in border towns. But since it was put in place in selected border towns, some cannabis cafes have closed in protest, while reports of increased street dealing have been on the increase.

Under the governing pact between left-leaning Labor and the conservative VVD, the government says it wants only Dutch citizens to have access to the cafes, but leaves enforcement up to the cities. The city of Amsterdam, among others, has already rejected the "weed pass" idea, saying it would hurt tourism.

Some cannabis café owners told the AP they are satisfied that the country's policy of pragmatic tolerance toward will remain intact, but others said the proposed deal lacked clarity.

The conservative Dutch government was all set to introduce the controversial "weed pass" system, in which Dutch citizens would have to register with the government to buy marijuana at the county's famous cannabis cafes or coffee shops and foreigners would be out of luck, nationwide on January 1, but then the government fell in a September election.

Now the leading conservative party, the VVD, is in talks to form a new government with the Labor Party, which opposes the weed pass, and Dutch News is reporting that the two parties are working on a compromise solution. In any case, it looks like nationwide introduction of the weed pass is now dead.

The weed pass system is already in place in selected Dutch border towns, where it was imposed in a bid to stanch the flow of "drug tourists" from more repressive France, Germany, and Belgium. The VVD justice minister, Ivo Opstelten, has described it as "a great success," but there have also been numerous reports of increased street dealing and other prohibition-related nuisances in its wake.

The weed pass system has been strongly opposed by cannabis cafe operators, as well as the administrations of major Dutch cities, such as Amsterdam and Rotterdam. Weed pass foes organized to get out the vote for left-leaning parties during the brief election campaign, but they may not be happy with the reported compromise solution.

According to Dutch News, the proposed agreement would end the weed pass system for Dutch nationals, but foreigners would not be allowed into the coffee shops. That solution would remove the fear that some Dutch have expressed of being on a government list of marijuana consumers, but would leave foreign visitors to Holland to look for their marijuana on the streets -- one of the very ills the coffee houses were meant to address.

The weed pass issue is one of the few remaining bones of contention between Labor and the VVD. The two parties will have to come up with some sort of compromise on it before they can form a new government.

Mexico must take decisive action to rein in systematic and widespread use of torture, ill-treatment, and other human rights abuses, which have increased dramatically since outgoing President Felipe Calderon unleashed the military to fight the country's so-called cartels nearly six years ago, Amnesty International said in a report released last Thursday.

The report, Known Abusers, But Victims Ignored: Torture and Ill-Treatment in Mexico, documents the increase of cases of torture and ill-treatment by the police and military forces, the lack of effective investigations and almost total lack of prosecutions, and the juridical weaknesses and lack of political will that allow such abuses to go unpunished and even allow testimony obtained through torture to be used to convict its victims.

An estimated 60,000 people have been killed and another 160,000 displaced in prohibition-related violence in Mexico since Calderon made waging the drug war the centerpiece of his then new administration in December 2006. The cartels are responsible for much of the mayhem, but as the violence intensified, human rights complaints filed with federal authorities have more than quadrupled, from 392 in 2007 to 1669 in 2011. Nearly 5,000 federal complaints have been filed overall, and those are just the cases when someone bothered to go through the formality of a process that too often produces no results.

And, the Amnesty report shows, it is mainly just a formality. According to the report, federal prosecutors prosecuted no torture cases in 2007 or 2008, one in 2009, and filed four more in 2010. Similarly, the number of state level torture prosecutions can be counted in the single digits each year since 2007.

"The Calderón administration has effectively turned a blind eye to the 'torture epidemic' we've been witnessing in Mexico," said Rupert Knox, an Amnesty International Mexico researcher. "The protection of human rights has been ignored or sidelined in favor of the government's strategy of militarized combat of organized crime and drug cartels. Across Mexico criminal suspects often face detention and trial on the basis of evidence obtained under torture and ill-treatment while prosecutors and courts fail to question seriously information or evidence obtained in this manner."

Miriam Isaura López Vargas is a case in point. She was arbitrarily detained in Ensenada, Baja California, on February 2, 2011. During interrogation in a military barracks in Tijuana by a civilian federal prosecutor, members of the army reportedly sexually assaulted her, subjected her to near asphyxiation and stress positions, and threatened her in order to coerce her into signing a confession falsely implicating other detainees in drug trafficking offenses.

"I heard a man scream many times, they kept on asking him, 'Where are the guns, where are the drugs?' A bit later I heard 'Take him away and bring me the next one.' I heard them open a door," Lopez Vargas recounted. "They put a wet cloth over my face, when I tried to breathe. I felt the wet cloth, it became difficult to breathe, I then felt a stream of water up my nose, I tried to get up but couldn't because they had me held down by my shoulders and legs… someone was pressing down on my stomach, they did this repeatedly as they kept on asking the same questions."

A week later, she was transferred to Mexico City and held without being brought before a judge until April 26, 2011, when she was charged with drug offenses. The following month, the case against her collapsed, and she was released by a federal judge. She filed a complaint alleging she was tortured; it has yet to be acted on.

The involvement of the Mexican military in the Lopez Vargas is not unusual. Across Mexico,  military personnel performing policing functions have held thousands of suspects in military barracks before presenting them to prosecutors. In this context, there have been numerous reports of torture and ill-treatment while in military custody.

"Federal authorities have shown an absolute lack of leadership to combat torture and ill-treatment seriously at the state level or federal level," said Knox. "The only way to tackle torture and ill-treatment is by ensuring that all cases are properly investigated and those responsible, brought to justice. In a letter sent to Amnesty International, Mexican President elect Enrique Peña Nieto committed to implement policies and take action to end torture, we urge the authorities to abide by their promises."