At the 47th US-Mexico Interparliamentary Commission, held June 6 in Monterrey, Nuevo León, Mexican politicians from all of the three leading parties protested the imposition of human rights conditions on aid recently approved by Washington under the Mérida Initiative, popularly known as "Plan Mexico." Ruth Zavaleta of the left-opposition Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), president of the Chamber of Deputies, joined with Sen. Santiago Creel Miranda of the ruling conservative National Action Party (PAN) in decrying the conditions as patronizing and hypocritical. They were joined by Nuevo León Gov. José Natividad González Parás of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), who also spoke out against construction of the border fence. (El Universal, Mexico, June 7)

On June 4, a detachment of some 200 Mexican army troops and federal police in a convoy of ten vehicles led by an armored personnel carrier occupied several communities around the Zapatista settlement of La Garrucha, on the edge of the Chiapas rainforest, on an ostensible marijuana eradication mission. The Zapatista Good Government Junta (JBG) "El Camino del Futuro," based at La Garrucha, said residents mobilized to defend their homes with sticks, machetes and slingshots as troops spread out to the corn fields, taking photographs and "intimidating the population." The troops found no marijuana, but reportedly warned that they would return in 15 days.

On May 24, campesinos from Ejido Huizopa, Madera municipality, in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua, launched a protest occupation of the Minera Dolores company's giant open-pit gold mine, which they say has been illegally established on their lands. The decision to launch the blockade was taken after two ejido leaders, Enrique Torres González and José Armando González, were arrested by Federal Preventative Police, later released without charge. The local company director Carlos García Droguett said the occupation places at risk a $200 million investment in the zone. (Excelsiór, May 29) Minera Dolores is owned by the Minefinders Corporation of Vancouver. (GeoMex.com)

On May 21 Jose Leopoldo Gonzalez, secretary general of the Conference of Mexican Bishops (CEM), said the Catholic bishops had voted unanimously to call for the government to make former president Carlos Salinas de Gortari (1988-1994) testify again about the killing of Cardinal Juan Jesus Posadas Ocampo and six people in a bloody shootout at Guadalajara's airport on May 24, 1993. Gonzalez said Salinas' previous testimony, on Aug. 2, 2006, was "full of omissions."

Families are desperate a year after five workers and three pensioners from the Mexican state oil company Pemex disappeared, with federal authorities claiming no progress in the case. Mexico's opposition is pointing at the security forces. "No one seems to care about this case, least of all the Prosecutor General's Office, if in fact it was soldiers who took them," said Sen. Rosario Ibarra (Labor Party-PT), who chairs the Senate Human Rights Commission.

As part of an emergency appropriations bill, the Senate May 22 approved $350 million in drug war aid to Mexico, with an adittional $100 million for Central America, the Dominican Republic and Haiti. Reducing the Bush administration's request for $500 million to Mexico and $50 million to Central America, the Senate also adopted language that would hold up a quarter of the funds until the State Department rules that Mexico is meeting human rights markers. The House approved $400 million for Mexico, with similar provisions. Differences need to be worked out in a joint conference. "Human rights abuses in the army are routinely investigated by the military itself, and that leads to impunity," said Tamara Taraciuk of Human Rights Watch. "The big issue is accountability." (NYT, May 23) The Senate bill also provides $165 billion for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan into 2009. (AP, May 23)

The Authentic Labor Front (FAT), an independent Mexican labor group, announced on May 13 that one of its affiliates is set to declare a strike at the Central de Abasto, Mexico City's huge wholesale food market, on May 30. For the past four years the affiliate—the Union of Workers of Commercial Buildings, Offices and Stores, and the Like and Related (STRACC)—has represented 41 workers who clean bathrooms in the flowers and vegetables area of the giant facility, which is operated by the Federal District (DF) government. The workers are mostly women, and several are older or have disabilities.

Ciudad Juárez Public Safety Director Guillermo Prieto submitted his resignation following a string of killings that included some of his top officers. AP May 18 cites a city spokesman saying Prieto would be replaced by a military officer on leave from the armed forces. The local El Diario cites Mayor José Reyes Ferriz saying the new police chief will be a retired military officer. Neither source named the new appointee.