ALBUQUERQUE — Police officers, journalists and businessmen are among those who have shown up at the U.S.-Mexico border recently, claiming they fear for their life.



An onslaught of drug-related violence has sent a record number of Mexican citizens north of the border seeking political asylum. Between October and July there have been 63 cases, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, nearly double the number from all of last year.



The demise of some of Colombia’s largest drug cartels in the ’90s has pitted Mexican cartels against each other as they battle for turf and control of the drug routes that lead into the United States. This infighting has wreaked havoc in Mexico and has played out most viciously along the border.



Fear of violence in and of itself does not qualify one for asylum, and corruption within various police agencies as well as in the Mexican military complicates the case for every applicant. As Mexico’s president, Felipe Calderon, calls on the military to perform more policing duties in the border region, the lines become more and more blurred as to who is fighting whom. The recent passing of the Merida Initiative, legislation to assist Mexico with security and surveillance capabilities, will send $1.6 billion in U.S. aid to help Mexico try to stabilize drug-related violence. Many fear that because the initiative comes with no strings attached, the lines will blur even further.



Who gets asylum



"The bottom line is that one’s fear of violence in their country has to be on account of race, religion, political opinion, being a national minority or being a member of a particular social group," says Carlos Spector, an El Paso immigration attorney. He adds that membership within a social group rests on immutable characteristics — things people cannot change about themselves.



"These new applications for asylum are really quite rare," says Spector. "In the past its been mainly political dissidents."



Pam Kennedy, an Albuquerque immigration attorney, agrees: "This surge is really unique. In the past homosexuals have been granted political asylum in light of Mexican societies attitude toward them. People from Chiapas have also been granted asylum."



One’s fear of violence must emanate from the government of the country in question, says Kennedy. She adds that it can also stem from being targeted by another group, but the case rests on whether the government is able to stop the group from acting out its violence.



Another factor is that political asylum in the United States is rarely granted to those coming from a friendly or allied nation. "It is supposed to work as an independent judiciary," says Spector, "but there is bias within the system." Spector adds that the political climate in the applicant’s home country may play on a judge’s personal political position. "In my experience there are a lot of straight-shooter judges out there, but — let me put it this way — if a leftist were president of Mexico, there would be a lot more of these granted."



"There’s real danger down there, but its not going to be a slam-dunk for these people" says Kennedy.



An April article from The Washington Post confirms the stringent conditions under which asylum is granted: "Asylum requests are long shots at best — of the 2,611 requests from Mexicans in 2006, the most recent year for which figures are available, 48 were granted."



Who are the bad guys


According to a report by the Foreign Affairs, Defense and Trade Division, there are seven major drug cartels in Mexico. The Juarez cartel is the strongest and has control of the U.S. drug entry routes in and around Ciudad Juarez, which borders El Paso. Since the crackdown on the infamous Colombian drug cartels, warring factions in Mexico have formed alliances and now fight as teams against other alliances over turf and smuggling routes. The report states:

 

"Mexico’s cartels have existed for some time, but have become increasingly powerful in recent years with the demise of the Medellín and Cali cartels in Colombia. Closure of the cocaine trafficking route through Florida also pushed cocaine traffic to Mexico, increasing the role of Mexican cartels in cocaine trafficking. The National Drug Intelligence Center now considers Mexican drug cartels as dominating the U.S. illicit drug market."

 

Mexico as a whole has seen rapid changes within the last decade. In 2000 Vicente Fox was voted in as president, marking the end of a nearly 80-year stranglehold by the Institutional Revolutionary Party or PRI, which despite its name was known as a rightist regime. In 2006 the conservative Felipe Calderon took over as president in a highly contested election that saw less than 1 percent of the vote separating him from his political rival.

 

The Mexican government for decades has used its military as a police force. Today, with the spike in drug-related violence, it is amping up its military presence near the border in an effort to crack down on the cartels. "We are truly hitting crime’s operative structure," Calderon said in a recent CNN article, "This is making it so that the gangs are fighting among themselves and that is causing the deaths that are occurring in the country. For example, of all the violent deaths that we have seen, 65 percent have been in two states — in Chihuahua and Sinaloa."

 

The use of the military as a police force has resulted in a slew of accusations of human rights violations. According to a recent article in The Washington Post, "in nearly every state where the army has deployed, residents have accused soldiers of grave human rights violations that now number in the hundreds."

 

Calderon’s response to the civilian violence in the CNN article was: "It will cost human lives because we have decided to fight to rescue our country, that unfortunately will mean that some Mexicans will lose their lives."

 

This relationship between the Mexican Army and its government has been one of power and secrecy for decades. A 2002 New York Times article about the Mexican Army says:

 

It is a tough institution to tamper with. The army’s power reaches back to the Mexican Revolution of 1910-1917. Military leaders ruled for the next two decades and created the Institutional Revolutionary Party in 1929. For the next seven decades the military was its silent servant.

The military had an unwritten agreement with the government: give us complete autonomy, and we will leave you alone,” said Raúl Benítez, a leading national security scholar at the National Autonomous University of Mexico…

Unlike many Latin American armies, Mexico’s never mounted a coup. But like so many others, it became a national police force.

 

In reference to the drug violence, Spector observes: "The lines are blurred. The military has been called in to clean up local corruption, yet the military itself has a history of corruption."

America to the rescue

In an effort at a shared solution, the U.S. Congress enacted the Merida Initiative on June 30, authorizing $1.6 billion in aid to Mexico over a three-year period to use in efforts to stabilize the region.

Promising at first glance, the initiative has some obvious drawbacks. Neither the Mexican nor American government has a stellar record in terms of fighting drug activity or distribution, regardless of the financial resources invested. The Council on Hemispheric Affairs sums it up in a 2007 report:

 

Looking over a lengthy history of disappointment and failure on the part of both nations when it comes to fighting drugs, it is unlikely — save for episodic and unsustained mobilizations — that criminal activities are likely to decrease. To a great extent this is due to Mexico’s organic corruption, its insistence on venality and the fact that the nation’s institutions are not strong enough to stand up to threats, bribes, unremitting violence and the civic rectitude, when upwards of 50 billions of tainted dollars are in play.

 

Likewise, the way that the initiative is worded raises concerns that favoritism will play a part in the way funds are distributed. Laura Carlsen, director of the Americas program for the Center for International Policy, says in a recent LA Times interview:

 

Congress has stipulated that Mexico receives no cash payments or budget support under the plan. All the resources will be given in kind, through military and hi-tech equipment and training programs.

This means that most of the money will remain in the United States with defense contractors, information technology firms and private security firms. This raises ethical issues of what constitutes foreign aid, and the impunity that these private security firms enjoy on foreign soil, where they have allegedly been involved in the murder of civilians and other human rights violations.

 

Private U.S. defense contractors may already be training Mexican forces, according to statements made by Mexican Police Chief Carlos Tornero in the city of Leon. Videos that surfaced a day after the Merida Initiative was signed show Leon police practicing torture techniques. A recent Associated Press report stated:

 

One of the videos, first obtained by the newspaper El Heraldo de Leon, shows police appearing to squirt water up a man’s nose - a technique once notorious among Mexican police. Then they dunk his head in a hole said to be full of excrement and rats. The man gasps for air and moans repeatedly.

 

In another video, an unidentified English-speaking trainer has an exhausted agent roll into his own vomit. Other officers then drag him through the mess.

 

"These are no more than training exercises for certain situations, but I want to stress that we are not showing people how to use these methods," Tornero said.

 

He said the English-speaking man was part of a private U.S. security company helping to train the agents, but he refused to give details.

 

 

According to recent figures, the Mexican drug trade brings in $23 billion annually.

 

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said in a June 30 press release:

 

“This will step up the fight against the drug traffickers in Mexico, and that in turn will enable Mexico to redouble efforts to develop its economy and trade with this country. Economic progress in Mexico comes across the border to economic progress in this country – particularly in border states like New Mexico.”

 

"I’m pretty sure that with the new funding from America we will see more requests for asylum" said Spector. "There’s really no restrictions or oversight written into it."