Border Blogs: Expressing our Border Culture

http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/poor-female-murdered-march-for-mexicos-forgotten-victims-20100305-poq0.html

Article by Helen Pitt

Bearing the names of the slain, the Sydney Action for Juarez group planned March.

Photo by: Kate Geraghty/The Sydney Morning Herald

March 8 is observed around the world as International Women's Day.

This month, several artists' organizations in Los Angeles, California, are staging events related to the Juarez women's murders. (Details are forthcoming.)

The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, the first investigative book about the Juarez murders by a U.S. journalist.

Help find them

Story in today's El Paso Times

http://www.elpasotimes.com/news/ci_14403118The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, the first investigative book about the Juarez murders by a U.S. journalist.

Help find them

Story in today's El Paso Times

http://www.elpasotimes.com/news/ci_14403118The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, the first investigative book about the Juarez murders by a U.S. journalist.

Juárez mayor plans monument to women slain in border city

Posted: 01/30/2010 12:00:00 AM MST

Diana Washington Valdez/El Paso Times

Juárez Mayor Jose Reyes Ferriz said the city is calling on artists nationwide to submit proposals for a monument to memorialize the city's murdered women.
Such a monument could focus on the eight victims whose bodies were found in 2001 in a cotton field on Ejercito Nacional across from the Association of Maquiladoras.
The Inter-American Court of Human Rights ordered the Mexican government earlier this year to erect a monument to dignify the memory of the victims.
Families of victims had complained that Mexican authorities treated them with contempt and disrespected the victims during the failed investigation to solve the murders.
Early in the investigation, Chihuahua state authorities misidentified several of the eight bodies and accused two innocent men of the killings.
Reyes said that the city would donate land for the monument and that the victims' families would be asked to review and approve the final rendition. The proposed site for the monument is at Ejercito Nacional and Francisco Villareal streets.
"It must be something that represents what we feel about the deaths and that acknowledges our past errors, which were real and caused us pain. It must also demonstrate our commitment to never let this happen again in Juárez," Reyes said.
He said it could take up to nine months to complete the monument.
The mayor also said the city is participating in the Alba alert system (similar to the U.S. Amber alert) to publicize high-risk disappearances.The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, the first investigative book about the Juarez murders by a U.S. journalist.

Link to the Miriam Makeba "Pata Pata" song on the Honda auto commercial

Great song by the late great activist Miriam Makeba
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-VrfadKbco&feature=relatedThe Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, the first investigative book about the Juarez murders by a U.S. journalist.

See link to CNN story

http://www.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/01/20/haitian.womens.movement.mourns/index.html?hpt=C2The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, the first investigative book about the Juarez murders by a U.S. journalist.

http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/world/americas/mexico+missing+children++exclusive+report/3496377

Click on link above for the Channel 4 of London report by Nick Martin

http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/world/americas/mexico+missing+links+to+organ+trafficking/3497537

Special to Channel 4 by Diana Washington ValdezThe Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, the first investigative book about the Juarez murders by a U.S. journalist.

Fallo de Corte Interamericana por feminicidios en Juarez, Mexico

Diana Washington ValdezEl Paso Times(Copyright 2009)

Las autoridades mexicanas fracasaron en investigar adecuadamente los asesinatos cometidos en contra de tres jovencitas en Juárez, Mexico, en franco desacato a los tratados internacionales suscritos por México, coincidieron jueces de la Corte Interamericana de los Derechos Humanos.
El tribunal emitió un informe de 167 páginas el jueves pasado, en donde establece sus conclusiones y la sentencia correspondiente. Con base a tales tratados, el gobierno de la República Mexicana tiene obligación de acatar las sanciones y no puede apelar el dictamen.
Igualmente, los jueces de la Corte consideraron que México omitió el proteger a las víctimas Claudia Ivette González, Esmeralda Monreal Herrera y Laura Berenice Ramos, tres de las ocho víctimas cuyos cadáveres fueron descubiertos en un campo algodonero en noviembre del 2001, frente a la sede de la Asociación de Maquiladoras, al norte de Juárez.
Entre otros aspectos, la Corte dictaminó que el gobierno mexicano debe aceptar públicamente su responsabilidad en tales acontecimientos, publicar la sentencia correspondiente en los expedientes oficiales y erigir un monumento en memoria de las víctimas. Asimismo, las autoridades deben investigar los asesinatos y presentar ante la justicia a los autores materiales e intelectuales de esos homicidios.
Desde el principio, se cometieron innumerables anomalías en el campo algodonero, señaló Óscar Máynez, en ese entonces jefe de los Servicios Periciales de la Sub Procuraduría de Justicia de Chihuahua en Juárez, quien dimitió a su cargo cuando sus superiores le ordenaron “sembrar” evidencias en contra de dos hombres inocentes, acusados de los ocho homicidios.
Este caso no tiene precedente alguno. Se trata de la primera vez donde un tribunal de talle internacional falla en contra de México en lo concerniente a denuncias por violación a los derechos humanos y, además, se trata del primer dictamen judicial de esa instancia en donde se reconocen los asesinatos por género, en donde las mujeres son asesinadas precisamente por ser del sexo femenino.
La Corte Interamericana por los Derechos Humanos, con sede en San José, Costa Rica, es una institución judicial autónoma de la Organización de los Estados Americanos y cuyos objetivos consiste en aplicar e interpretar la Convención Americana de los Derechos Humanos y otros tratados. Diana Washington Valdez puede ser localizada en dvaldez@elpasotimes.com; 546-6140.Libros: Cosecha de Mujeres (en castellano), The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women (en ingles).Documental: Border Echoes/Ecos de una Frontera de Lorena Mendez QuirogaThe Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, the first investigative book about the Juarez murders by a U.S. journalist.

See story in the El Paso Times about the court ruling and violence against women in Juarez, Mexico

http://www.elpasotimes.com/news/ci_13981319The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, the first investigative book about the Juarez murders by a U.S. journalist.

Takes on Mexico's spreading violence

http://www.thetakeaway.org/stories/2009/nov/18/drug-violence-on-rise-in-mexico/The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, the first investigative book about the Juarez murders by a U.S. journalist.

Discussion on the Juarez killing fields book

The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women - Feminista (Washington, DC ...Join us to discuss the book The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women written byEl Paso Times journalist Diana Washington Valdez. It exposes the Mexicankilling ...<http://www.meetup.com/Feminista/calendar/11701759/The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, the first investigative book about the Juarez murders by a U.S. journalist.