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DE RUEHME #0863/01 0521949
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P 211949Z FEB 07
FM AMEMBASSY MEXICO
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 5448
RUEHC/DEPT OF LABOR WASHDC
INFO RUEHXC/ALL US CONSULATES IN MEXICO COLLECTIVE
RUEHXI/LABOR COLLECTIVE
RUEAHLA/DEPT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
RUEAWJA/DEPT OF JUSTICE WASHDC

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 MEXICO 000863 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPT OF DRL/AWH AND ILCSR, WHA/MEX AND PPC, USDOL FOR ILAB 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ELAB ECON PHUM PINR MEX
SUBJECT: STATE GOVERNOR ACCUSES FORMER PRESIDENT OF 
PRESSURING HIM TO MAKE FALSE ALLEGATIONS IN 2006 MINING 
ACCIDENT 
 
REF: (A) 06 MEXICO 6750 (B) 06 MEXICO 6655 
 
 ¶1. SUMMARY: During a recent radio interview the state 
Governor of Coahuila accused the former president of Mexico 
of pressuring him in 2006 to falsely accuse the then head of 
the national miners union of culpability in a mine explosion 
which left 65 workers dead.  The Governor claims the former 
president pressured him because of a desire (ultimately 
achieved) to remove the union leader from his position and to 
protect the then Secretary of Labor (and by extension his 
administration) from responsibility for the deaths of the 65 
miners.  The governor of Coahuila has been less than clear as 
to why he waited a year before going public with his 
accusations.  For their part, neither the former President 
nor his former Secretary of Labor, have yet offered 
convincing rebuttals to the accusations made against them. 
The accusations against former President Fox have generated 
considerable comment and attention from both the media and 
Mexico,s main political parties.  This matter once again 
focuses public attention on a case that could involve not 
just Mexico, but Canada and the US under the terms of 
NAFTA,s North American Agreement on Labor Cooperation.  END 
SUMMARY. 
 
 
A TRAGIC MINING ACCIDENT 
------------------------ 
 
¶2.  On February 19, 2006, a gas explosion at the Pasta de 
Conchos mine in the northern Mexican state of Coahuila left 
65 workers dead.  At the time of the accident the Mexican 
government rushed to provide what assistance it could and 
apparently worked closely with Coahuila state authorities, 
the mine owners (Minera Mexico) and Mexico,s National Union 
of Miners and Metalworkers (SNTMMSRM) to coordinate rescue 
efforts.  Unfortunately the rescue attempts were unsuccessful 
and within a relatively short period of time the close 
cooperation that existed between the state and federal 
government, the mine owners and the union all but faded away. 
 
¶3. During the height of the rescue operation, once it became 
clear than no one survived the accident, the Mexican 
government, under then President Vicente Fox, promised that 
the bodies of the dead miners would be recovered and returned 
to their families.  The Fox government also promised a broad 
range of financial and other assistance to the families of 
the miners and, more importantly, committed itself to 
conducting a full and complete investigation of the accident. 
 As a part of this last commitment the GOM promised it would 
prosecute to the full extent of the law anyone found 
responsible, through either commission or omission, for the 
circumstances leading to the accident at the Pasta de Conchos 
mine. 
 
¶4. Now, almost exactly one year later, most of the promises 
of assistance to the families have not been kept, the 
investigation (while nearing its end) is still ongoing and 
the bodies of the dead miners have not been recovered. 
 
I ACCUSE 
-------- 
 
¶5.  As the investigation into the causes of the accident at 
the Pasta de Conchos mine appears to be nearing its end a 
completely new and previously unknown element was thrown into 
the politics surrounding this event.  During a national radio 
interview on February 18, the Governor of Coahuila, Humberto 
Moreira, made a shocking accusation against former President 
Fox.  According to Governor Moreira, in a meeting at Los 
Pinos (the Mexican White House) shortly after the accident, 
President Fox asked him to falsely accuse the miners, labor 
leader Napoleon Gomez Urrutia, of responsibility for the 
events leading up to deaths of the 65 workers.  The Coahuila 
governor claimed the former president also asked him have 
Gomez arrested as a way to deflect attention away from such 
members of his administration who might otherwise be held 
responsible, such as then Secretary of Labor, Javier Salazar 
Saenz, and of Government (Interior), Carlos Abascal. If true, 
Governor Moreira,s accusations would mean that former 
President Fox and, by extension, his two cabinet members were 
guilty of a crime under two different articles (225 and 400) 
of Mexico,s Federal Criminal Code. 
 
¶6.  Governor Moreira,s accusations have become the subject 
of intense media scrutiny and public commentary.  Moreover, 
 
MEXICO 00000863  002.2 OF 003 
 
 
Mexico,s two main opposition political parties, the Party of 
the Democratic Revolution (PRD) and the former ruling 
Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) have seized upon 
Governor Moreira,s accusations to call for an official 
investigation by Mexico,s equivalent of the US Attorney 
General,s Office and possible congressional hearings. 
Humberto Moreira is a member of the PRI and former President 
Fox is a member of Mexico,s current ruling National Action 
Party (PAN).  The leader of the PAN in the lower house of 
Mexico,s congress has sharply dismissed Governor Moreira,s 
accusation and challenged him to present proof of any of the 
allegations he has made against former President Fox. Several 
PAN Senators have also leaped to the former president,s 
defense. 
 
¶7.  Although Governor Moreira was not specific as to the 
exact date of his meeting with then President Fox, media 
outlets have sharply highlighted the fact that the Pasta de 
Concha incident occurred just days after the Fox 
administration had removed Napoleon Gomez as head of the 
SNTMMSRM union under highly controversial circumstances. 
According to statements made by the Fox administration at the 
time, it removed Gomez as union leader at the request of the 
appropriate union authorities themselves after he had been 
accused of misappropriating some USD 55 million in SNTMMSRN 
pension funds.  (Note: The funds in question have yet to be 
recovered and were last known to be in an account in a 
Mexican branch of Canadian owned Scotiabank Inverlat.) 
 
¶8.  The GOM has filed embezzlement charges against Napoleon 
Gomez in federal courts but, in every case, the courts have 
thrown them out. There are charges pending against Gomez in 
several state courts but Coahuila is not one of them. 
Governor Moreira firmly stated that there were never any 
charges pending against Gomez in his state and he claims he 
unequivocally told then President Fox that he would not 
falsely accuse Gomez when there was no proof that he had 
committed any crime. Although Gomez himself has firmly denied 
wrongdoing of any kind, he quietly moved to Canada shortly 
after the Fox government stripped him of his post as SNTMMSRN 
leader.  The Canadian government has twice refused GOM 
requests to extradite Gomez stating that the Mexican 
Government has yet to present firm evidence of the deposed 
labor leader,s alleged crimes. 
 
HE SAID; HE SAID 
---------------- 
 
¶9.  At present, Governor Moreira has presented no firm proof 
of his accusation against former President Fox; nor is he 
likely to do so since there are no known recordings of the 
conversation that took place at Los Pinos.  He has however, 
sought out numerous opportunities to repeat and otherwise 
reaffirm his accusations against the former president.  His 
affirmations have been unequivocal but they have not added 
anything more in the way of proof or done much to persuade 
those who doubt his version of events. 
 
¶10.  In one detailed press event, the Governor Moreira was 
specifically asked why anyone should believe him and why he 
waited a full year before making his allegations against the 
former president. According to Moreira he did make timely 
public statements concerning his allegations but that no one 
paid attention to him. Moreira claimed that he was renewing 
his allegations because: (1) of his concerns that those 
responsible be held accountable for the deaths of the 65 
miners; (2) of his desire to have the GOM live up to the 
promises of assistance it made to the families of the 
accident victims and; (3) to make sure that the GOM provided 
the necessary resources to ensure that the accident at Pasta 
de Conchos would not happen again elsewhere. 
 
 
¶11. Although the senior PAN Federal Deputy in the Mexican 
congress and several PAN Senators have been extremely vocal 
in dismissing Governor Moreira,s accusations, the office of 
former President Fox has been somewhat evasive in response to 
the allegations.  Former Labor Secretary Francisco Javier 
Salazar, who now works in the national headquarters of the 
PAN, declined to make any substantive rebuttal to Moreira,s 
allegations claiming he did not want to interfere in any way 
with the ongoing investigation. 
 
¶12.  Initially, the strongest defenders of former President 
Fox were his former Secretary of Government Carlos Abascal 
 
MEXICO 00000863  003.2 OF 003 
 
 
and an unnamed media source.   Absacal has been firm in 
denying all allegations made by the Coahuila governor.  His 
denials are now being picked up an amplified by other senior 
figures in the PAN. As for the unnamed source, he confirmed 
that the meeting between Fox and Moreira did take place in 
Los Pinos but that the only thing the former President asked 
was that the Governor help his administration with the 
investigation discovering what happened to the USD 55 million 
that was now missing from the union pension fund. 
 
 
COMMENT 
------- 
 
¶13. It is not clear why Governor Moreira waited a year to 
make his allegations against former President Fox and his 
administration. Some of the Governor,s supporters claim that 
only a fool would have openly attacked a sitting president. 
They also point out that, at the time of the accident, the 
only government official at any level who openly acknowledged 
that the 65 miners were dead was Governor Moreira.  Initially 
following the accident, then Secretary of Labor Francisco 
Javier Salazar, repeatedly denied the miners were dead.  The 
defenders of President Fox accuse Moreira of making 
unsupported allegations that are impossible to prove in order 
to shift blame to others.  The state that Moreira suspects 
that he will be blamed for negligence once the ongoing 
investigation of the mining accident is finally complete. 
 
¶14. There is no way to know if the allegations by either side 
are true since no one hope participated in or who may have 
observed the meeting between Fox and Moreira can prove 
anything. It is perhaps a measure of the former president,s 
unpopularity that so many Mexican citizens are prepared to 
believe that he knowingly committed a crime by attempting to 
have false charges brought against a major labor leader. 
Should the issue be pursued, the seriousness of the 
accusation could present a significant problem because it is 
unclear whether Mexico,s legal system has the tools to 
conduct an investigation against a former president in the 
absence of any clear and objective evidence of a crime. 
 
¶15. It is also possible that this entire matter could also 
involve both Canada and the US.  It could involve Canada 
because Gomez Urrutia is currently believed to be residing in 
Vancouver. The US may become involved because the Pasta de 
Conchos mining accident is a part of the submission submitted 
to the US Department of Labor by the United Steelworkers 
Union on behalf of the SNTMMSRN under the terms of NAFTA,s 
North American Agreement on Labor Cooperation. 
 
 
Visit Mexico City's Classified Web Site at 
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/wha/mexicocity 
GARZA