TRACY WILKINSON

MEXICO CITY — A dramatic rupture in Mexico’s main opposition political party has aired the group’s dirty laundry and also could trip up President Enrique Peña Nieto’s ambitious agenda of reform.

The political fireworks riveted Mexicans on Monday, dominating airwaves and social media as leaders of the National Action Party, or PAN, bickered openly.

On one level, citizens were viewing another chapter in the agony of a party that ruled for the last 12 years but has been corroded by infighting and a bitter power struggle. Also at stake, potentially, was the ease with which Peña Nieto has been getting legislation through a fairly compliant Congress.

PAN chair Gustavo Madero over the weekend unceremoniously fired his party’s caucus leader in the Senate, Ernesto Cordero. Cordero will remain in the Senate, even continuing to hold his title of Senate president, but will no longer be the party’s go-to man.

Analysts quickly saw in this a slap ... Read More

CHRISTOPHER SHERMAN

MATAMOROS, Mexico – Just across the Rio Grande from Brownsville, Texas, stands a dormitory-style shelter filled with people recently deported from the U.S. and other migrants waiting to cross the border.

The long rows of bunk beds offer immigrants a place to rest on their long journey. But the shelter is no safe haven in a town controlled by the Gulf cartel. Armed men once showed up and took away 15 men, who were probably put to work as gunmen, lookouts or human mules hauling bales of marijuana into the United States.

As Congress takes up immigration reform, lawmakers may have to confront the reality of this place and others like it, where people say the current system of immigration enforcement and deportation produces a constant flow of people north and south that provides the cartel with a vulnerable labor pool and steady source of revenue.

“This vicious circle favors organized crime because ... Read More

Chilean finance minister Felipe Larraín has called it “the most exciting thing going on today in Latin America.” Colombian president Juan Manuel Santos believes it is “perhaps the most significant and profound integration process in the history of Latin America.” A recent headline said it has created “a new Latin American superpower.” It has also been hailed as a “bridge to Asia” and “a promising yardstick of Latin America’s prosperity.”

“It” is the so-called Pacific Alliance, a free-trade bloc that was first outlined in the April 2011 Lima Declaration and was officially established in June 2012. Its four members are Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru — four countries with a long record of supporting free markets and open commerce. Over the past year, these countries have abolished tariffs on 90 percent of all goods they trade with each other, and have also taken many other steps (such as eliminating visa requirements, merging stock exchanges, and launching a scholarship program) to integrate their economies. ... Read More

By Scott Stewart Vice President of Analysis

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto’s approach to combating Mexican drug cartels has been a much-discussed topic since well before he was elected. Indeed, in June 2011 — more than a year before the July 2012 Mexican presidential election — I wrote an analysis discussing rumors that, if elected, Pena Nieto was going to attempt to reach some sort of accommodation with Mexico’s drug cartels in order to bring down the level of violence.

Such rumors were certainly understandable, given the arrangement that had existed for many years between some senior members of Pena Nieto’s Institutional Revolutionary Party and some powerful cartel figures during the Institutional Revolutionary Party’s long reign in Mexico prior to the election of Vicente Fox of the National Action Party in 2000. However, as we argued in 2011 and repeated in March 2013, much has changed in Mexico since 2000, and the new reality in Mexico means ... Read More

BY ADAM THOMPSON

In 1976, Rudesindo Cantarell arrived at Pemex’s offices in the Mexican Gulf city of Coatzacoalcos demanding compensation for damage that crude oil seepage had caused to his fishing nets.

His complaint alerted officials of the state oil company to what would become one of the world’s five biggest oil finds. For Mexico, it promised energy security and tens of billions of dollars a year for the state.

Today, the discovery is a distant memory. Production, which topped 2m barrels a day in the early 2000s, is now about 400,000 barrels.

Against this backdrop, Enrique Peña Nieto, Mexico’s reform-minded president, has proposed what could be the biggest shake-up of his country’s energy industry since the government nationalised the sector in the 1930s. Before he assumed power in December last year, Mr Peña Nieto said Mexico had been a hostage to ideology and it was time to open up oil to private investment.

Even with the ... Read More

BY NICK MIROFF

MEXICO CITY — The recent changes ordered by new President Enrique Peña Nieto to Mexico’s anti-narcotics partnership with the United States have produced markedly different reactions here and in Washington, underscoring what appear to be diverging perceptions of the drug war’s goals and the costs of fighting it.

Peña Nieto’s decision to limit the ability of American agents to operate in Mexico has been met with dismay by U.S. law enforcement agencies, which left a heavy footprint under the previous administration of Felipe Calderon. They warn that intelligence sharing will suffer if they can no longer choose which Mexican force — the army, navy or federal police — to give sensitive information to; they’ve been instructed to now funnel everything through Mexico’s Interior Ministry instead.

The agents also caution that the personal relationships developed under Calderon will fray if they are no longer welcome to work side by side with trusted partners ... Read More

LITTLE ROCK (Arkansas), 15 de mayo.- Una integrante de alto rango de un cártel mexicano de las drogas fue acusada en un caso de confabulación en Arkansas, después de que su hijo supuestamente reclutó a reos en prisiones federales en ese estado para distribuir la cocaína de la organización cuando salieran de la cárcel, informaron el martes los fiscales.

Idalia Ramos Rangel, su hijo Mohammed “Mo” Martínez y otras 14 personas vinculadas con Arkansas, Texas y México fueron acusadas de confabularse para poseer cocaína con intención de distribuirla, según el encausamiento de un jurado de instrucción dado a conocer el martes.

Los fiscales federales afirman que Ramos Rangel, de 57 años, es una “teniente y capitán” en el cártel del Golfo que opera una organización responsable del tráfico de cientos de kilogramos de cocaína en Arkansas y otros lugares de Estados Unidos.

“La mayoría de las drogas en Arkansas llegan de México, específicamente (a través) del cártel del Golfo”, dijo Christopher Thyer, fiscal federal del Distrito Este ... Read More

BY JAIME DAREMBLUM

During his trip to Mexico and Costa Rica last week, President Obama tried to highlight the positive and downplay the negative. Thus, he spoke at length about the growth of trade, commerce, and economic partnerships, arguing that security issues should not be allowed to dominate all discussions of U.S. policy in the region. (Of course, Obama voted against the Central America Free Trade Agreement when he was a senator, and he canceled a U.S.-Mexico pilot trucking program during his first months as president, but never mind.) His remarks were surely welcomed by Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto, who has taken great pains to transform his country’s image abroad. Whereas many Americans and others have come to associate Mexico with drug trafficking and brutal cartel violence, Peña Nieto wants them to learn more about Mexico’s emergence as a manufacturing powerhouse, its increasingly important role in the global economy, and the expansion of its middle class.

His desire to emphasize ... Read More

BY ANDRES OPPENHEIMER

I’ve read with great attention President Barack Obama’s article in The Miami Herald earlier this week on how to improve U.S. relations with Latin America. It was pretty disappointing.

The article, headlined “Improving our Partnership” and published after Obama’s return from a trip to Mexico and Costa Rica, says that “this is a moment of great promise for our hemisphere” and is full of feel-good talk about the future of the Americas.

But, sadly, it showed the absence of any U.S. plans to drastically expand trade ties with Latin America — like the Obama administration has done with Asia and Europe — or any sign that, in his second term, Obama will pay greater attention to this hemisphere.

Before we get into what Obama should do, let’s take a quick look at the facts. In his article, Obama stated that about 40 percent of U.S. exports are currently going to Latin ... Read More

BY RICHARD FAUSSET

GUADALAJARA, Mexico — Guadalajara police commander Juan Carlos Martinez took Mexico’s national police vetting exam in April 2012. He failed. But no one in government would tell him why.

A few months later, he received a phone call from a man identifying himself as a member of a drug cartel. Why don’t you think about joining us, he said the man on the phone asked. You won’t go hungry.

Martinez, 38, declined the offer and maintains that he had been an honorable cop.

But the phone call was not an anomaly. Here in the state of Jalisco, the cartels have tried to lure ex-cops with online recruitment ads. In the northern state of Coahuila, they put up posters.

It is just one of the challenges Mexico faces as it struggles to deep-clean its troubled police forces, relying on an ambitious control de confianza, or confidence control, test that aims to ensure every officer’s aptitude and ... Read More

WASHINGTON — Keeping a keen eye south of the border, the Obama administration is intensifying its engagement with Latin America, hosting leaders from a pair of presidents at the White House and sending Vice President Joe Biden to visit two others.

Peru’s President Ollanta Humala and Chile’s President Sebastian Pinera will travel to Washington in June to meet with President Barack Obama, the White House said Wednesday. And next week, Biden will make stops in Brazil and Colombia, plus the Caribbean nation of Trinidad and Tobago.

Dovetailing on Obama’s trip last week to Mexico and Costa Rica, the visits reflect the administration’s desire to show the U.S. relationship with its neighbors to the south is about much more than drugs, crime and illegal immigration. The need for closer economic ties topped Obama’s agenda during the three-day trip.

“All told, we will have the most active stretch of high-level engagement on Latin America in ... Read More

BY RAYMOND COLITT & RANDALL WOODS

Latin America’s two largest nations are vying for economic and diplomatic clout as their candidates face off as finalists to head the World Trade Organization.

The WTO is scheduled to name by May 8 the first director- general from Latin America in its 18-year history. It will choose between Roberto Azevedo, Brazil (BZGDGDP4)’s representative to the Geneva-based group, and Herminio Blanco, a former Mexico trade minister who led the nation’s negotiations for the North American Free Trade Agreement with the U.S. and Canada. The winner will replace the outgoing WTO chief, France’s Pascal Lamy, in September.

The race is a contest for diplomatic prowess as Mexico draws on its faster growth and more open economy to fortify its candidate, said Michael Shifter, president of Inter-American Dialogue in Washington. Analysts polled by Bloomberg forecast Mexico will outgrow its southern peer for the third straight year in 2013, reversing a trend that allowed Brazil to pull ahead as ... Read More

BY NICK MIROFF & WILLIAM BOOTH

MEXICO CITY — It has been 75 years since President Lázaro Cárdenas seized the country’s foreign-dominated petroleum industry and placed every drop of oil under the everlasting domain of the Mexican people.

But while it once was a source of national pride, the state-run monopoly he created — known as Pemex — has become a dinosaur, sapped by debt, sagging output and dated technology. The Mexican government siphons off the company’s revenue to cover about one-third of the federal budget, leaving insufficient funds for what has become a critical task: finding more oil.

Mexico remains the third-largest source of foreign oil for the United States after Canada and Saudi Arabia. But the country’s easy-pump crude is quickly running dry, and the company lacks the technology and know-how to drill for the vast stores of tougher-to-reach deposits that are thought to exist beneath Mexico’s deserts and seas.

Fixing the company, ... Read More

BY GIRISH GUPTA

CARACAS, Venezuela — Venezuela’s new president, Nicolás Maduro, echoes his former boss in a continued tough stance toward the “imperialist” United States. But he is not getting the same reception that Hugo Chávez did.

Maduro’s government recently arrested a U.S. filmmaker doing a documentary on the recent elections on charges of “spying” for the United States. On state television, he called President Obama the “chief of devils” for suggesting Venezuela’s elections may not have been fair.

Some Latin American neighbors are not playing along.

Peruvian Foreign Minister Rafael Roncagliolo called on the Union of South American Nations, of which his country is acting president, to issue a statement urging Maduro to exercise tolerance.

Former Colombian president Alvaro Uribe says he is taking Maduro to the Inter-American Commission for Human Rights over “immature” accusations that Uribe plotted to assassinate Maduro.

“As the facts behind Nicolás Maduro’s fabricated electoral ‘victory’ on April 14 are disclosed, his ... Read More

BY MICHAEL D. SHEAR & RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD

SAN JOSÉ, Costa Rica — In February 2009, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. declared that international drug trafficking posed “a sustained, serious threat” to Americans. Two months later, President Obama, in his first visit as president to Mexico, made it clear that no issue dominated relations between the two countries more, saying drug cartels there were “sowing chaos in our communities.”

Last week, Mr. Obama returned to capitals in Latin America with a vastly different message. Relationships with countries racked by drug violence and organized crime should focus more on economic development and less on the endless battles against drug traffickers and organized crime capos that have left few clear victors. The countries, Mexico in particular, need to set their own course on security, with the United States playing more of a backing role.

That approach runs the risk of being seen as kowtowing to governments more concerned ... Read More

BY KATHLEEN HENNESSEY & TRACY WILKINSON

SAN JOSE, Costa Rica — President Obama capped a three-day visit to Latin America on Saturday by urging the region’s leaders to fight the drug war not with more guns or military aid but with greater investment in infrastructure, education and energy.

Communicating that message, delivered Friday night to a group of Central American leaders and again Saturday at a development conference in San Jose, was the chief aim of Obama’s brief visit south, which also included a stop in Mexico City. As he zipped through the two capitals, Obama sought to change stereotypes about a troubled region by touting the possibilities in trade, energy development and democratic reforms.

“We shouldn’t lose sight of the critical importance of trade, commerce, business for Costa Rica, the United States and the entire hemisphere,” Obama said Saturday.

The message was a shift from years of tough talk on U.S. plans to help governments crack down on ... Read More

US President Barack Obama vowed Friday to work with Central America to improve the drug fight as he met with regional leaders, conceding that US addiction was partly fueling violence roiling their nations.

Arriving in Costa Rica after visiting Mexico, Obama sought to turn the spotlight on trade ties but the drug war was at the center of his talks with the seven leaders of Central America, plus the Dominican Republic.

“The important thing that I have tried to emphasize throughout is that this is a common problem, this is one where we will only solve it when we are working together. It has adverse effects in all our countries,” he told a news conference alongside Costa Rican President Laura Chinchilla.

“But … I think its’ very important to make sure that our bilateral relationship and the United States relationship with the region as a whole is not solely defined by this problem, because when it is we’re missing all the ... Read More

BY COLLEEN MCCAIN NELSON

SAN JOSE, Costa Rica—President Barack Obama said Saturday that he considers trade relationships with Central American countries and Mexico enormously important, telling Costa Ricans that the U.S. wants to be their partner.

The U.S. and Costa Rica both would benefit from broadening economic ties and collaborating on challenge as varied as improving education and developing renewable energy, Mr. Obama said at an economic forum. As he wrapped up a three-day trip to Costa Rica and Mexico, the president hit upon many of the same themes he emphasized in Mexico City, where he worked to push the conversation beyond drugs and security concerns.

“The U.S. recognizes our fates are tied up with your success,” Mr. Obama told a crowd of entrepreneurs and other leaders in San Jose. “If you are doing well, we will do better. And if we’re doing well, we think your situation improves.”

In Costa Rica and in Mexico, Mr. ... Read More

BY TIM ROGERS

MANAGUA, NICARAGUA

Latin America’s least popular president finally has something to cheer about. Costa Rican President Laura Chinchilla, whose approval ratings barely register in double digits, could receive an “Obama bounce” in the polls after the US president traveled to the capital city of San José and heralded her country as an exemplary leader for Central America.

In just his second visit to Central America and his first trip to Costa Rica, President Barack Obama this weekend called for new partnerships and increased integration with the region – especially in the areas of trade, innovation, and energy. Mr. Obama, who arrived in San José Friday afternoon to a rock star’s welcome of people lining the streets to cheer his motorcade, lauded Costa Rica for its historic commitments to democracy, peace, human rights, education and socio-economic development.

Costa Rican government officials and local pundits are proudly interpreting Obama’s visit as first-world recognition of their country’s new standing as an international ... Read More

BY KORI SCHULMAN

President Obama arrived in Costa Rica on Friday — his first visit to the country — and participated in a bilateral meeting and joint press conference with Costa Rican President Chincilla, as well as a working dinner. During the press conference, the President spoke about the friendship and economic ties between our two countries:

Costa Rica shows the benefits of trade that is free and fair. Over the last few years, under the Central America Free Trade Agreement, our trade with Costa Rica has doubled, creating more jobs for people in both of our countries. Our partnerships are creating more opportunities for small businesses and entrepreneurs, including young people and women. As I told President Chinchilla, the United States will continue to be your partner as Costa Rica modernizes its economy so that you’re attracting more investment and creating even more trade and more jobs.

President Obama today attended a forum on Inclusive ... Read More