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RR RUEHCD RUEHGD RUEHHO RUEHMC RUEHNG RUEHNL RUEHRD RUEHRS RUEHTM
DE RUEHME #3093/01 3002238
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
R 272238Z OCT 09
FM AMEMBASSY MEXICO
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 8786
INFO RUEHXC/ALL US CONSULATES IN MEXICO COLLECTIVE
RHMFISS/DEPT OF JUSTICE WASHINGTON DC
RUEHC/DEPT OF LABOR WASHINGTON DC
RUEATRS/DEPT OF TREASURY WASHINGTON DC
RUCPDOC/DEPT OF COMMERCE WASHINGTON DC
RHMFISS/CDR USSOUTHCOM MIAMI FL
RHMFISS/HQS USNORTHCOM
RUEAHLA/DEPT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
RUEABND/DEA HQS WASHINGTON DC
RHEHAAA/NSC WASHINGTON DC

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 MEXICO 003093 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/24/2019 
TAGS: PREL PGOV PINR MX
SUBJECT: SCENESETTER FOR SEPARATE MERIDA-RELATED VISITS: 
MEXICAN SECRETARY FOR PUBLIC SECURITY GARCIA LUNA AND ATTORNEY GENERAL CHAVEZ 
 
REF: A. MEXICO 2463 
     ¶B. 08 MEXICO 3595 
 
Classified By: Ambassador Carlos Pascual. 
Reason: 1.4 (b),(d). 
 
¶1. (C) Summary.  The upcoming visits of Secretary for Public 
Security (SSP) Genaro Garcia Luna and Attorney General (PGR) 
Arturo Chavez Chavez to Washington come at a key moment in 
our bilateral security relationship.  We have made great 
progress on expanding security ties working through the 
Merida Initiative; now we need to broaden the scope of our 
efforts to support their lasting impact. Garcia Luna and 
Chavez, primary players in Mexico's security apparatus, will 
be key players in moving our law enforcement agenda to new 
levels of practical cooperation in two of the country's most 
important institutions.  Washington interlocutors should 
encourage them to cooperate more effectively on issues 
ranging from crime prevention to detention to prosecution and 
conviction.  End Summary. 
 
Working With New Merida Architecture 
------------------------------------ 
 
¶2. (C) We have made great progress on expanding our bilateral 
security and law enforcement relationship through the Merida 
Initiative.  The first phase of Merida focused heavily on 
supporting Mexico's efforts to confront drug trafficking 
organizations.  As we look beyond Merida and begin to 
implement a new architecture, we recognize the limitations on 
confronting criminal groups without the effective 
institutional backing to support the lasting disruption of 
these elements.  We must help Mexico build its key 
institutions with seamless integration of intelligence, 
investigations, operations, prosecutions, and convictions. We 
also need to develop new programs to build an intelligence 
capability, foster the Federal Police's own institutional 
development and training capacity, promote swifter 
implementation of judicial reform, and prompt greater 
inter-institutional coordination and cooperation. Moreover, 
with many of our federal programs well underway, we should 
broaden our focus to include work at the state level. 
 
¶3. (C) We need to be clear with both officials on critical 
next steps: with Garcia Luna on the need to move forward in 
creating a joint operational capability that will allow 
Mexico to operationalize the critical intelligence we can 
provide.  With AG Chavez, we must stress the need to 
implement constitutional legal reforms and address 
long-standing human rights concerns.  Earlier this week, 
President Calderon ordered Garcia Luna and his Defense 
Secretary (SEDENA) counterpart, General Galvan, to establish 
immediately a joint strike force, a key step forward that 
will test the ability of often competing operational arms to 
work together and allow Mexico to operationalize, in real 
time, critical intelligence that we can provide. Calderon's 
decision is well-timed, and we should press Calderon's "top 
cop" on his plans for moving forward on the force, as well as 
explore how we can help with exercises and advice. On the 
human rights front, there are signs that Calderon and 
especially SEDENA consider violations a "price to pay" and 
will not push for the kind of judicial guarantees (e.g., 
effective oversight by civilian courts on allegations of 
violations by the military) and effective training (e.g. of 
senior level and operational units) that are critically 
needed to improve Mexico's record.  Again, we should press 
Chavez on concrete steps on the human rights front.  Chavez 
also needs to hear that we remain engaged on the Brad Will 
case and hope the PGR will move quickly to resolve lingering 
issues concerning the prosecution of the alleged perpetrators 
(ref a and b). 
 
SSP and PGR's Progress and Promise 
---------------------------------- 
 
¶4. (C) SSP and PGR are key players in this new framework and 
are willing partners as we move forward.  Both are critical 
components of two objectives -- disrupt capacity of organized 
crime to operate and institutionalize capacity to sustain 
rule of law -- with SSP also engaged on creating a 21st 
century border and PGR crucial to building strong and 
resilient communities.  Fortunately, the United States and 
Mexico have already laid some of the groundwork to serve as a 
base for collaborative institution building.  We have a 
strong program for internal controls and vetting of personnel 
in special units that includes a polygraph program at the 
federal level and are increasingly engaged on supporting 
judicial reform efforts.  The most successful capacity 
building program to date has been the recently completed 
training of 1,500 new Federal Police investigators who will 
take on the core role of directly dismantling the cartels and 
extending the presence of the federal police in all of 
Mexico's states. 
 
¶5. (C) SSP and PGR have made great strides toward modernizing 
and improving their institutions.  Garcia Luna's SSP and its 
32,000 strong Federal Police (with plans for an additional 
8,000 to be trained and operational shortly, according to the 
Secretary), have sought to raise the standards of the Federal 
Police through improved hiring, training, and vetting 
practices.  With new authorities granted under federal police 
reform legislation passed earlier this year, including a 
broadened wire-tapping mandate, the SSP is well-placed to 
significantly expand its investigative and 
intelligence-collection capabilities.  SSP is also the 
caretaker of one of the GOM's flagship projects, Plataforma 
Mexico, a major criminal database intended to provide easy 
access by security officials across the country to various 
kinds of criminal information collected by different law 
enforcement entities.  With the bulk of the law enforcement 
budget, the largest single policing force, and new powers, 
the SSP is transitioning to become the major player on 
internal security matters. 
 
¶6. (C) Recently appointed Attorney General Arturo Chavez 
Chavez inherits a PGR somewhat improved under his 
predecessor, Eduardo Medina Mora's, stewardship.  Medina Mora 
took unprecedented steps to fight corruption within PGR, the 
police, and local governments, even when such efforts led to 
the arrest of several embarrassingly high-ranking officials. 
Mexico also made record cash and cocaine seizures during his 
tenure, and he also achieved a ban on the importation of 
pseudoephedrine and ephedrine, the drug used to manufacture 
methamphetamine, into Mexico.  PGR is looking to modernize as 
an institution and has created the Constanza Project 
(Justicial Para Todos), a $200 million dollar initiative 
designed to transform PGR's culture in part by promoting 
transparency, training attorneys to build stronger cases, and 
digitizing files in order to incorporate a paperless system 
less susceptible to corruption. Assuming Chavez's continued 
backing, the program, which includes Merida Initiative 
support, may be operational by next year.  Medina Mora was 
also directly involved in taking our extradition relationship 
to new heights.  In meetings with the Ambassador, Chavez has 
pledged to continue this important cooperation.  Washington 
policymakers should recognize and encourage this excellent 
extradition relationship. 
 
Challenges Still to Address 
--------------------------- 
 
¶7. (C) Nevertheless, we face along with Mexico significant 
challenges -- political, institutional, and even 
personality-driven -- to achieving the kind of lasting change 
that will allow for the country's continued success against 
organized criminal groups.  Levels of violence show no signs 
of decreasing, with organized crime-related homicides and 
casualties suffered by security forces in the counterdrug 
fight likely to surpass 2008's record figures.  Allegations 
of human rights abuses by soldiers and police officers 
deployed on counterdrug missions threaten to undermine 
continued public support.  While there is general support for 
and consensus on President Calderon's frontal assault 
strategy, the new political environment following the July 5 
midterm elections, in which his rivals made significant 
gains, has emboldened his opponents. 
 
¶8. (C) Moreover, the GOM must oversee a cultural shift in 
institutions at both the federal and local level that rewards 
information sharing and collaboration on joint operations. 
PGR and SSP are amongst the greatest offenders when it comes 
to jealously guarding information and resources.  Garcia 
Luna, widely understood as closest to President Calderon on 
security issues, is not broadly trusted among other GOM 
institutions, and has been a target of attack by opposing 
political parties for lack of progress on violence reduction. 
 Furthermore, the personal animosity between him and former 
Attorney General Medina Mora did little to help bridge the 
historic gap between the institutions.  He and General Galvan 
are distant collaborators at best; more often, they are open 
competitors.  New AG Chavez may be able to better manage the 
relationship, but he almost certainly will also confront a 
Garcia Luna keen on expanding SSP's role with the influence 
and resources to do it. 
 
¶9. (C) It is not yet clear whether or not Chavez's 
appointment, which was beset by allegations of incompetence 
and lack of attention to human rights issues while Attorney 
General of Chihuahua State, will in fact lead to a weaker PGR 
and a freer hand for Garcia Luna.  The new federal police 
legislation granting the Federal Police greater investigative 
and intelligence authorities has the potential to exacerbate 
tensions.  The law is vague on when the federal police -- 
nominally a purely 'preventative force' -- should turn over 
its investigation to the PGR for prosecution.  The Federal 
Police's ability to bypass PGR and request its own wiretap 
warrants -- and to conduct more wiretaps itself -- may reduce 
its incentive to work with PGR prosecutors and investigators. 
 
¶10. (C) Mistrust between government institutions and between 
federal, state, and the (often highly corrupt) municipal 
security services also complicates the much needed process of 
decentralizing security efforts.  Security operators in the 
field need the authority to act quickly and with greater 
agility when necessary without having to rely on Mexico City 
for guidance or support.  This requires fostering trust both 
within institutions -- who often see state outposts as 
corrupt -- and between them.  Moreover, we have seen in 
Ciudad Juarez what happens when federal entities try to 
accomplish their mission alone.  Without locally-based 
intelligence sources, SEDENA and SSP operations led and 
conducted from a centralized and compartmentalized command 
structure in Mexico City often result in blunt force 
confrontations with cartels that augment the brutal violence 
statistics in Juarez.  The GOM is wary of devolving resources 
and information to the state level, but there is a growing 
and clear understanding of the key role states play in 
security in Mexico, and an understanding among many officials 
that without good state institutions, the federal government 
has nowhere to land when it deploys. 
 
 
Human Rights 
------------ 
 
¶11. (C) We should continue to address the sensitive topics of 
human rights and the importance of maintaining high vetting 
standards.  Human rights remains a particularly thorny topic 
for the Mexican security forces.  Dialogue emphasizing 
efforts to train the military -- and all law enforcement 
agencies -- on human rights, as well as encouraging 
transparency in cases of abuse, will play an important role 
in our efforts here.  The Ambassador has undertaken 
aggressive outreach to the human rights community, 
establishing his own dialogue with numerous groups and 
plugging the Mission into the SRE-SEGOB dialogue.  We should 
take steps to encourage PGR to more efficiently and rapidly 
prosecute HR cases, as detainees often languish in prison 
without being sentenced for lengthy periods of time.  We also 
must encouraged greater dialogue with civil society, in which 
PGR will play a major role.  A number of mid to senior level 
PGR and SSP officials have not passed vetting or polygraph 
tests, and over a quarter of the 60 individuals selected for 
the senior-level SSP training course did not pass their 
exams.  We expect this to be an increasingly difficult and 
politically sensitive topic as we move forward with larger 
numbers of program participants, but this is a good time to 
indicate our continued commitment to maintaining high 
standards on integrity issues. 
 
Implementation 
-------------- 
 
¶12. (C) Finally, the speed of implementation of Merida 
programs is improving but still slow, due to delays in moving 
money between USG agencies, a sluggish contracting process, 
and the highly complex nature of the projects at hand. The 
GOM remains suspicious of anything that smacks of 
conditionality, and is at times reluctant to make changes it 
sees as USG-mandated. Nevertheless, we have made a strong 
start.  Implementation is well underway, and a developed 
bilateral framework -- and funding -- is in place to guide 
future program efforts.  Through this, strong government to 
government planning and execution will afford us continued 
successes. 
Visit Mexico City's Classified Web Site at 
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/wha/mexicocity and the North American 
Partnership Blog at http://www.intelink.gov/communities/state/nap / 
FEELEY