UTEP offers solace to its Mexican students

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EL PASO, Texas — The office of the vice president for student affairs at the University of Texas at El Paso has issued a letter addressed to students commuting to class from Mexico, encouraging those who may be experiencing difficulty coping with the recent murders in Juarez of two UTEP students to utilize the services the university provides. “The recent loss of students, Manuel A. Acosta and Eder A. Diaz, has been a difficult situation for the entire UTEP community. I am aware that for those of you who live in Juarez and other parts of Mexico or those of you who have immediate family there may be experiencing that loss more acutely,” said Dr. Richard Padilla, Vice President for Student Affairs. Padilla encouraged the UTEP student body to watch for students who may be struggling with the recent tragic events. “Let them know that there are people on campus who may be able to help.

UTEP helps students and faculty deal with tragedy

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EL PASO, Texas — Last week tragedy struck the University of Texas at El Paso when students Eder Andres Diaz Sotero, 23, and Manuel Acosta Villalobos, 22, were gunned down in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. Many alike have felt the effects of the violence unfolding in Juarez the past three years. But like many students, faculty members are significantly impacted by the violence across the border. While much can be said about the counseling efforts given to students dealing with tragedies faced daily in Juarez, little is known about the resources available for faculty to help combat the stresses their students have encountered. “There’s a group of offices that give the professors the support for them to work with students in the classroom,” said Catie McCorry-Andalis, UTEP assistant vice president for student life and associate dean of students.

The killing streets next door

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EL PASO, Texas — Generations of Mexican students have been commuting to the El Paso campus of the University of Texas for almost a hundred years. Two of them were murdered in Juarez last week, riddled by 36 high-powered bullets as they drove home in a residential neighborhood where one of them lived. Manuel Acosta, 22, drove his red Nissan Sentra from UTEP across the line on the early evening of November 2 to Colonia Rincones de Santa Rita where his passenger Eder Diaz, 23, lived only to die four hours later at a hospital. They were gunned down at the intersection of De La Arbolada and Manglares streets in their car near Diaz’ house. Those of us who teach here in this beautiful campus now worry about the safety of every one of the some 1400 students who cross the bridge to study here and then go home late in the day, every day.

More reaction to the killing of two UTEP students

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EL PASO, Texas — The murder of two University of Texas at El Paso students continues to reverberate on campus, eliciting reactions from students, faculty and administration. “It really pains me,” said Dr. Gina Nunez-Mchiri, professor of Anthropology and Sociology at UTEP. “They’re our students… We know people who are losing family members to the violence and it affects us. It takes our sleep away.

Hundreds of Juarez students commute daily to class at UTEP

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EL PASO, Texas — A young man catches a ride with his friend and they make their half hour trip home from school across the international port of entry into the streets of the most dangerous city on the U.S.-Mexico border. Manuel Acosta, 22, drove his red Nissan Sentra from The University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) to the Colonia Rincones de Santa Rita where his friend Eder Diaz, 23, lived with his parents in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. The trip home was routine to both students. Chihuahua State Police reported that a group of masked men armed with .223 caliber rifles similar to the NATO military rifles intercepted them at the intersection of De La Arbolada and Manglares streets in near of Diaz’s house. The assailants fired 36 shots killing Acosta at the scene and fatally injuring Diaz, who died in the early morning hours of November 3 at a hospital in Juarez.

Remembering Eder on a breezy autumn afternoon

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EL PASO, Texas — It was a beautiful autumn day on the UTEP campus on Monday November 8, one that would have been great for just sitting out in the sun and enjoying the weather with Eder Diaz and Manuel Acosta. But instead, this cool breezy afternoon served to gather some 400 friends and family in an unplanned memorial for them.  Both were shot to death in Juarez on November 2. Eder was the one I knew. The first day I met him we were sophomores at Cathedral High School on lunch break. He came up to me and asked if I remembered him.

UTEP mourns two students shot to death in Juarez

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EL PASO, Texas — The University of Texas at El Paso is mourning the death of two students who were gunned down in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico Tuesday evening after they crossed the border on their way home. The UTEP community was invited to a memorial service Monday at 2 p.m. to be held just outside of the College of Business Administration where Manuel Acosta Villalobos, 25, and Eder Diaz Sotero, 23, both studied.  The two students lived in Juarez and commuted to the El Paso campus to attend classes, university officials said. The two were driving at about 8 p.m. when gunmen fired 36 rounds at their car, hitting both men multiple times, Chihuahua state police said. Acosta died at the scene and Diaz at a Juarez hospital Wednesday morning. “Our hearts are heavy today with the news of the deaths of UTEP students Manuel Acosta and Eder Diaz.

Epidemia de secuestros aniquila los negocios de Juárez

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CIUDAD JUÁREZ, México — Los carteles mexicanos están intensificando una nueva modalidad de violencia  —el secuestro de comerciantes de diversas zonas, para obtener fondos. Fuentes advierten que los secuestros son más intensos en lugares con mucha demanda comercial, como en el caso de la zona centro, en donde cada día son menos los negocios que están abiertos al público porque a diario los dueños son amenazados. Según estas fuentes, es más difícil el tráfico de narcóticos, por lo que el elemento criminal ha optado por este nuevo tipo de extorsión. “Varios de nosotros que tenemos negocios aquí en el centro hemos sido amenazados, y por lo cual tenemos que pagar la cuota,” dijo un comerciante de esta zona. Se le pidió cierta cantidad de dinero, la llamada “cuota”, para poder seguir laborando.

In a city full of ghosts Juarez newspaper takes a surprising stand

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EL PASO, Texas — A major border news daily published a jaw-dropping front page editorial this week that seems to call on drug cartels, or whichever entities are in control of crime-plagued Ciudad Juarez, to tell them what the newspaper should publish to prevent further attacks against its staff. The September 18 editorial in El Diario de Juarez, prompted by the recent shooting death the paper’s 21-year-old photographer Luis Carlos Santiago Orozco outside a shopping mall, said, in part: “Tell us what you want from us, what you want us to publish or not publish, so we will know what to do?”

In typical knee-jerk fashion, quite a few journalists were quick to condemn the feisty border newspaper for scrapping its journalistic responsibility and caving in to the drug lords, a charge the newspaper denies. It troubles me that the major media, on both sides of the Rio Grande, did not take the time to carefully analyze the fine points of the editorial, but instead focused on the attention grabbing and alarm-raising message to “drug cartels.”

It seems that most missed the point of the long and nuanced editorial statement. Narcos, like ghosts, are unlikely to visit newsrooms or call with an offer to negotiate a public truce. They use subtle tactics instead to get what they want, like threatening to kidnap a Zacatecas editor if she didn’t publish a story about a young man who was killed by the army.

Periodistas mexicanos piden asilo político en Estados Unidos

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EL PASO, Texas — Tres periodistas mexicanos, que esperan recibir asilo político en los Estados Unidos, expusieron los peligros y amenazas sufridas durante el ejercicio de la profesión en su país en una rueda de prensa en esta ciudad el 21 de septiembre. De igual forma condenaron la muerte de alrededor de 68 de sus colegas desde el año 2000 y urgieron al presidente Felipe Calderón Hinojosa para que dimitiera pues su gobierno no garantiza la seguridad de los comunicólogos, ni de los mexicanos. Durante la conferencia, en la que participaron diversos medios internacionales, los expatriados patentizaron la confianza de que el mandatario, Barack Obama, les conceda estatus legal, después de que esta semana en Washington se aprobara el asilo solicitado por el reportero chihuahuense, Jorge Luis Aguirre. “Felipe Calderón es el principal responsable de los actos criminales que ocurren en México; es, sin lugar a dudas, un genocida”, dijo, el ex-reportero de El Diario del Noreste, en Ascensión, Chihuahua, Emilio Gutiérrez Soto. Y agregó: “Debe ser llevado ante los juzgados internacionales para que responda por los crímenes constantes que se dan a diario en mi patria en donde no existe una sola familia que no haya sido tocada”.

Juarez Violence Changing Lives: UTEP Students Affected

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EL PASO, Texas — In May, 2010, UTEP student Alejandro Ruiz Salazar, 19—also an employee of the Graduate School—was the first known UTEP student slain in Juarez since the beginning of the current drug war. The same day, former UTEP student Jorge Pedro Gonzalez Quintero, 21, was murdered. According to Steve McCraw, Director of the Texas Department of Public Safety, the situation in Mexico is worse now than the Colombian drug war of the 1980s and 1990s ever was. “Colombia was never threatened like the government of Mexico is with the level of violence,” McCraw stated at a Capitol hearing. “At first, we all saw the violence and murders as something that would never happen to us but now so many families have been torn apart, and a once prosperous, to some extent happy city, has been destroyed,” Acosta commented.

La violencia ha robado el alma del pueblo

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NOGALES, Ariz. — I remember what it was like all the days when I was ten, mi mama dijo, “Mijo vete a comprar unas tortillas.” So I walked out the door to the Morley Street garita, crossed the line and went to the tortillería. Regresé con una docena. One day, in 1973, mi tia Meli decided to get a job at department store right at the line on the American side. She went to the Morley Street garita and told the U.S. migra man, “I’m just going over to Bracker’s to ask for job.” He said, “OK, go ahead, they have all the papers you’ll need.”

In 1976 we walked from Nogales to Nogales from the movie theater at 12 o’clock at night.

Aparece narco mensaje en Anthony, Nuevo México

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ANTHONY, N.M. — La Oficina del Sheriff convocó, ayer, a la comunidad de El Paso a mantener la calma luego de que cadenas locales de televisión advirtieran sobre la presencia de un “narco mensaje” en la comunidad de Anthony, Nuevo México. De igual forma solicitó la cooperación de los medios para no infundir el terror, “ni querer conectar cada incidente aquí con lo que sucede en México”. El hecho, también desató sentimientos encontrados entre los citadinos, quienes por un lado confesaron temor, y por el otro, ignoraron la narco-advertencia. Y es que, según versiones de KFOX (canal 14), varias agencias policiales neomexiquenses investigan un paquete sospechoso que apareció el pasado miércoles, 25 de agosto, en la localidad de Anthony. De acuerdo a la televisora, el jefe de la Policía (de aquella demarcación) Ed Miranda, confirmó que una bolsa negra de basura fue encontrada en un estacionamiento con carne animal en su interior y con una nota adjunta tipo “narco”.

La presidenta de UTEP afirma que la bala no frenará la educación

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EL PASO, Texas — La presidenta de UTEP, Diana Natalicio, recomendó ayer, a sus trabajadores y estudiantes, inscribirse en un sistema de alerta para situaciones emergentes que ya se tiene implementado en la universidad. También llamó a mantener la calma. Insistió en que la Universidad de Texas en El Paso (UTEP) continuará sus labores constructivas y de crecimiento docente. “Tenemos 22 mil estudiantes y tres mil profesores… tenemos funciones muy importantes que realizar”, dijo.

Juarez residents continue to have faith in future

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CIUDAD JUÁREZ, México — Last January the state of Chihuahua claimed through a statewide press release with different statistics of seizures and arrests to be working hard to fight the “war against organized crime.”

Yet the 6,022 killings (645 this July, 2010 and rising) have led the people, the press and other media outlets to a different conclusion—that the Operativo Conjunto Chihuahua is a failure and the people have lost faith in the political and judiciary system in Mexico. But even in these dire circumstances, there is still a sense of hope that lingers deep within the fibers of the Mexican population. To many, these extreme circumstances have been a vehicle in the search for truth and reason and understanding, and it has been a way to grow in faith and to reconnect with family and friends. The people want to make things better from within the country, which usually means that the private sector steps in to help. For example, the Iniciativa México project is a joint effort between the private sector and the two biggest media outlets form México: Televisa and TV Azteca.

Juarez devastated by violence

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CIUDAD JUÁREZ, México.- Nearly every day,  news reports record at least two to three deaths in Juarez. “In 2007 we counted 353 deaths, in 2008 1067, in 2009 2620 and in 2010 until Monday 19, 1611” says Fernando Quintana, a broadcast journalist with Channel 44 TV. “El Norte, every night reports eight to fifteen deaths on its website” adds Ismael Ruvalcaba, a reporter with El Norte newspaper. President Calderón arrived in Juárez on March 16, 2010, to attend a conference entitled Todos somos Juárez. Reconstruyamos nuestra ciudad.

El Paso has a front row seat on the unending killing in Juarez

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EL PASO, Texas — About a century ago, El Pasoans lined themselves up near the border for a good view of the revolutionary war raging just across the river as gunshots and war cries echoed from the brush and dirty water. A hundred yeas later, El Paso once more holds a ringside seat to the bloodshed of Mexican souls. Last week, shots fired from Mexico hit the windows of El Paso’s City Hall. Although no one can be sure how or when the bulk of the violence will die down, many students at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) have their opinions. “A lot of people have told me that maybe if they legalize marijuana in Juárez it would be better because then the drug lords would loose some of their power,” said Lindsy Gutierrez, a music major.  She sat in the shade outside the Fox Fine Arts building of UTEP reading a book on poetry.

Juarez Drug War Criminals Even Shake Down the Street Vendors

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CIUDAD JUÁREZ, México — Daytime here displays a busy city, alive and full of productive energy. Street vendors hawk their products, restaurants await the rush hour crowds and mechanics do tune-ups out of their homes. These images of a normalcy, however, are deceptive. More than 5,000 of Juarez businesses have closed their doors permanently during the past four years of drug war violence, according to Cámara de Comercio de Juárez, which has infected every aspect of Juarenses’ life. Nighttime is a different creature altogether, according to Martín, the owner of a few very profitable food stands in Juárez and no stranger to the cartels.

Bad City and Good City — The Border Twins are Conjoined at the Hip

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EL PASO, Texas — Many consider them sister cities.  With a combined population of more than 2 million persons, El Paso and Ciudad Juárez form one of the largest international metropolitan areas in the world. El Paso is the 6th largest city in Texas while Ciudad Juárez has experienced a higher population growth rate than the country as a whole. Together they interact and even share citizens. Recently though, most of what is heard about this urban area has to do with the Mexican drug cartels. Still, while Ciudad Juárez is ranked as one of the most dangerous places in the world, El Paso remains one of the safest cities in the United States.  In my curiosity to find how it is that this city is viewed, I talked to five students living here but originating from different cities, states, and countries to see what they think of the Sun City.

Latin Americans Need Security to Enjoy Peace and Prosperity

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EL PASO, Texas — Despite the decay of democratic institutions in Latin America, democracy is on the rise in the region because citizens are demanding better government. “Challenges are big for the Western Hemisphere, but the principal idea behind solving those challenges is that governments should act responsibly to resolve them,” said Ambassador Jeffrey Davidow president of Institute of the Americas in San Diego, California speaking in the Millennium Lecture Series at the University of Texas at El Paso. The maintenance of democracy is a pressing issue in many Latin American countries. Many promises that governments there have made to their citizens have been broken, but the most important failure is to provide security for their citizens. “Safety is a big issue in every country.

Hundreds Mourn Pregnant Mother and Husband Murdered in Juárez

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EL PASO, Texas — More than 800 persons attended funeral services for the U.S. consular employee and her husband gunned down March 14 in Ciudad Juárez, México. Family, friends, and co-workers paid their last respects to Lesley Enriquez, 35, and Arthur Redelfs, 34, a detention officer in the El Paso County Sheriff’s Department, to the solemn lament of a trumpet playing Taps on a windy afternoon at Memorial Pines Cemetery in Sunland Park on March 20th. The couple was murdered after a car chase through Juárez after leaving a children’s birthday party with their baby daughter. “When they were brutally murdered, seven-month-old Rebecca was left in the back seat orphaned but thankfully unharmed. Also tragically, Lesley was pregnant at the time and we just now found out that baby Rebecca will never get to know her little brother,” said Michael Redelfs, Arthur’s uncle.

New Trend in Mexican Immigration Appears on the U.S. Border

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By Billie Greenwood

Seeking safety by immigrating to the United States, thousands of Mexicans are fleeing the violence of Juárez. They represent a new trend in Mexican immigration. Making the most of legal immigration visas available to middle and upper economic classes, some may push those visas beyond legal usage. Recent estimates of the increased numbers of new immigrants in El Paso range from 5,000 to 60,000. It is clear to see why they flee.

Ambassador Rozental: NAFTA Needs an Update to Fit Twenty First Century Demands

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EL PASO — Mexico and the U.S. are cooperating more than ever before on trade and immigration issues, but the North America Free Trade Agreement needs to be spruced up to deal with 21st Century problems.

Both countries and Canada have changed since 1994 when NAFTA was signed but the policies they agreed to have remained virtually static according to Andrés Rozental, former Mexican Deputy Foreign Minister and Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution. “Today there is an unprecedented degree of cooperation between Mexico and the U.S.,” Rozental said, “They have a greater degree of trust, but people change and federal policies stay them same. “

The relationship is slowly evolving and filtering into three very important areas, trade, immigration and security, he said. Rozental, a career diplomat for Mexico, told faculty and students at the University of Texas at El Paso recently that even with the improved degree of collaboration between the U.S. and Mexico “there’s always more that can be done, especially on the trading issue.”

The “mutual finger pointing” of the past is the cause of today’s bilateral political problems, he said. Both countries are at fault, he said.  “Mexico’s take has always been what I call the ostrich policy.  They hid and it was the U.S.’s problem to solve,” Rozental said.

D.C. Scholars to Propose Solutions for U.S.-Mexico Cooperation on Organized Crime

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EL PASO — A team of experts sent by the Mexico Institute in Washington, D.C. spent three days interviewing persons in Juarez to see if a lack of cross-border cooperation between U.S. and Mexican government agencies hinders efforts to quell the out-of-control consumption of illegal narcotics by Americans and the drug-cartel wars in Mexico. Andrew Selee, director of the Institute and an adjunct professor of government at John Hopkins University said the drug violence goes beyond the normal definitions of terrorism. “Seeing how some of these murders have played out in recent years has made us pay close attention to the growing violence along the borderland.”

The group of 16 scholars spent three days in February interviewing various Juarez officials including the Aduana, military commanders, the different levels of law enforcement, and others to get a real sense of how to combat the organized crime that plagues the borderland. “We recognize that the problem [bilateral cooperation] is not just in one part of the borderland, but all across it,” Selee said. The group has traveled to various drug violence hot spots such as Tijuana/San Diego, San Luis Potosi, and to El Paso/Juarez.

Esther Chávez Cano’s Columns in El DIario

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Rape, an Act of Extreme Sadism by Esther Chávez Cano

El Diario, September 13, 1995

Rape is an act of extreme cruelty, a reflection of an accumulation of hate that the man carries inside of himself. It is the most brutal aggression that a human being can receive from another; it causes severe injury to the person’s liberty, physical integrity, mental health and sometimes to life itself. In this border city, several young women have recently died at the hands of one or several individuals who, making use of their physical strength, have raped and murdered them. It could have been you, your sister or your daughter, but this time it was other innocents who paid too high of a price for the hatred that the society, the family or others had planted in the hearts of these individuals. Despite the fact that we are about to enter the 21st century, there are still many who believe that the victim is guilty of inciting the rapist, without considering that a high number of infants and very old women also suffer this aggression.

Reporters’ Lives — and Deaths — on the Mexican Border

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EL PASO, Texas — With the constant violence in Mexico has come an increase in reporting about the ongoing drug war in Ciudad Juárez, the neighboring metropolis across the border. In 2009, more than 2,600 people were killed there. El Paso Times Editor, Chris López, has dedicated himself to following the turmoil ever since he joined the paper in 2009. “This is one of the most dynamic stories on the border — and in the country,” he insists. El Diario de El Paso, the sole Spanish-language newspaper here, also sees the importance of reporting on it because readers often have direct ties to Juárez and other parts of Mexico.

Nos quedaron a deber

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CIUDAD JUÁREZ, México — Si hay alguien que admiro por su inteligencia es Yolanda. Una mujer interesada por la comunidad, la sociedad y todo lo que sucede a nuestro alrededor. A pesar de ser madre de tiempo completo y de que toda su vida ha trabajado, siempre tiene tiempo para ver los noticieros tanto de Ciudad Juárez como de otras ciudades. No hay día que no se siente cómodamente a leer el periódico enterito. Su parte favorita son las columnas de escritores, periodistas y políticos.

Voces del narcotráfico salen de las sombras en el libro Drug War Zone

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EL PASO — Las voces humanas y los elementos insólitos del narcotráfico se entretejen en las historias del libro Drug War Zone, el más reciente proyecto literario de Howard Campbell, profesor de antropología de la Universidad de Texas en El Paso (UTEP). El proyecto literario comenzó en el 2005 antes de que comenzara la conocida guerra entre carteles en Ciudad Juárez — “Si vi venir la situación de Juárez porque varios conocidos me advirtieron de ella. Creo que lo más impactante de esto es ver que esta guerra parece no tener fin, yo solía creer en la idea de Vicente Fox, pero ahora ¿cuál es la solución” dijo Campbell. Las escenas presentadas introducen al lector con testimonios y sus historias personales en el sórdido mundo del narcotráfico, escenas que muestran la cara oculta y desapercibida: la cara humana de las drogas. “Seis aviones más arribaron, de uno de ellos emergió El Chapo, vestido en sus tradicionales jeans, chaleco, gorra de baseball, un rifle cuerno de chivo AK-47 pegado a su pecho  y una pistola que le combinaba a su atuendo en su cinto”  (Campbell).

Reporting on the Drug War, a Dangerous Business

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EL PASO — As the drug cartel violence in Ciudad Juárez continues to escalate, the news media on both sides of the border has continued to cover it. But now, the violence has spread to the newsrooms —getting the story is a job and a danger.