AMLO ally, human rights official spied on
May 24, 2023
Alejandro Encinas, Mexico’s under secretary for human rights, was targeted with Pegasus, the world’s most notorious spyware, while investigating abuses by the nation’s military, revealed the New York Times this week.
“This is the first confirmed case of such a senior member of an administration — let alone someone so close to the president — being surveilled by Pegasus in more than a decade of the spy tool’s use in the country.” (New York Times)
Encinas and López Obrador have been close allies for decades. Upon becoming president, AMLO tasked Encinas with investigating one of Mexico’s most emblematic human rights scandals. “This seems like the most dangerous chapter of the Pegasus story in Mexico,” Kate Doyle, a senior analyst at the National Security Archive, told the Washington Post. “If the Mexican military is spying on one of the president’s top aides without his knowledge, then the Mexican military is operating outside of civilian control.”
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador admitted, yesterday, that he had been informed that Encinas was being spied on, and “I told him not to give it any importance because there was no intention of spying on anybody,” reports the New York Times.
Citizen Lab, a digital research center at the University of Toronto, confirmed the presence of the malware on Encinas’s phone via a forensic audit last year.
There is no definitive proof of who was behind the hacks of Encinas’s phone, but in Mexico, the only entity that has access to Pegasus is the military, according to the New York Times.
Investigations have repeatedly found that Mexico’s military deployed Israeli spyware against critical voices. An investigation by R3D revealed last October that the Army bought the Pegasus software in 2019 to spy on activists and journalists under the López Obrador Administration. According to R3D's investigations, at least one activist and two journalists have found evidence of their personal information being traced on their phones. (El País)
In April, another investigation by Citizen Lab, R3D, Social TIC, and Article 19 revealed that a Mexican governmental agency infected the phones of two of the lawyers for the families of the 43 disappeared students from Ayotzinapa. (Citizen Lab)
Peru
The many deaths at Peruvian protests since last December, many at hands of security forces repressing demonstrations, has raised questions about the traditional impunity of past killings of unarmed civilians at protests where security forces were deployed, reports the New York Times.
Ecuador
Ecuador’s National Electoral Council announced that early presidential elections will be held on Aug. 20. If there is no outright winner a runoff vote will be held in October. Lasso can choose to run in the presidential election. In the meantime, he can rule by decree for up to six months. (Associated Press)
Ecuadorean President Guillermo Lasso signed a decree that would create regions with special customs, tax and foreign trade regimes, as well as tax exemptions, aimed at attracting private investment and creating new jobs. (Reuters)
Guyana
Authorities say a fire, which killed 19 children a girls’ boarding school in Guyana, was started intentionally, but critics said that the dorms were burglar proofed without providing a fire escape route. (Global Voices)
Stabroek News’ editorial board points to a history of failed safety systems in Guyana’s schools, and concludes that “Those in authority at various levels should have had systems in place to preempt the loss of life. They have failed. Abysmally”.
Guyanese Appeal Court Justice Rishi Persaud refused to overturn Justice Sandil Kissoon’s ruling ordering ExxonMobil Corporation to provide an unlimited parent company guarantee for its oil operations in the Stabroek Block, last week. (See today’s Just Caribbean Updates.)
Regional Relations
The U.S. State Department said that Cuba is not fully cooperating with the United States in combating terrorism, signaling that the Biden administration will keep the island on the list of states sponsors of terrorism, reports the Miami Herald.
Migration
The U.S. seasonal-worker visa program appears to be informally shut to Haitians, leaving them with one less legal pathway to work in the U.S., reports the Miami Herald. “Those who closely follow visa issuance say that while the low number of guest worker visas granted to Haitians raises questions about the U.S. government’s commitment, it’s part of a larger, disturbing pattern about the U.S.’s broken immigration system and how individuals in poor countries like Haiti are treated.”
Brazil
Brazil could face losses of $317 billion per year as well as biodiversity depletion and severe social setbacks for millions of people if Amazon deforestation continues, according to a new World Bank report. (Mongabay)
The new Amazon FACE project in Brazil will probe the the rainforest’s ability to sequester carbon dioxide — which will help scientists understand whether the region has a tipping point that could push it into irreversible decline, reports the Associated Press.
The UK pledged new funding for the landmark scientific experiment, yesterday, reports Reuters.
Regional
The ongoing battle between Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and the country's central bank over interest rates is just the highest profile example of tensions between governments and central banks over economic growth and controlling inflation, reports Bloomberg.
Europe’s diplomatic efforts to win support for Ukraine in Latin America have been largely rebuffed so far, reports Politico.
Chile
“This coming December the Chilean electorate faces an impossible conundrum: to reject the new proposal, and in doing so legitimize the constitution enacted under Pinochet’s reign of terror, or enact a potentially even more authoritarian text that will likely restrict women’s and LGBTQIA+ rights, strip away existing labor and environmental protections, and further entrench neoliberalism, impunity, and inequality,” writes Carole Concha Bell in NACLA.
Jamaica
An apparent threat of sexual violence at a Jamaican political protest — caught on audio tape and first thought to be against a female journalist — has caused outrage, partisan bickering on social media, and national embarrassment, writes Emma Lewis in Global Voices.
Mexico
Mexico’s second-tallest volcano, Popocatépetl , spewed towers of ash and smoke yesterday, and millions of residents may be ordered to evacuate. (Washington Post)
Mexico has become a regional leader in creating a sargassum industry, with other Caribbean nations seeking to learn from its trajectory, reports Mongabay.
Colombia
Testimony before the Colombian transitional justice tribunal by Salvatore Mancuso, one of the most important commanders of the AUC, outlined the former paramilitary group's ties to high-profile politicians, businesses, and military commanders. During the hearings, Mancuso claimed that the AUC directly intervened in Colombia’s 1998 and 2002 presidential elections, reports InSight Crime.
Former Colombian President Álvaro Uribe could be tried on allegations of witness tampering. A judge dismissed a prosecutor’s request to shelve the investigation, yesterday, reviving a long-running and deeply polarizing case, reports Reuters.
Colombia’s Barranquilla region is thought to house the second largest extended family with Huntington’s disease — researchers supported by the government are now carrying out broad studies, hoping to better understand the disease and support those affected. But they must convince a population wearied by past failures from the scientific community, reports the New York Times.
Argentina
Argentina’s government is asking China for an expansion of its bilateral currency swap in yuan as it seeks to build up central bank reserves in a bid to contain another peso selloff, reports Bloomberg.
Politicians across the political spectrum in Argentina — from Javier Milei to Cristina Kirchner — have invoked Chile as a success story, reports Americas Quarterly.
Right-wing presidential candidates in Argentina say they don’t support the government’s bid to join the BRICS coalition — but “whoever prevails in this October’s presidential election may not have the luxury of pursuing their political convictions in an increasingly multipolar world” and in the midst of a crushing economic crisis, report Al Jazeera.