Perceived subservience to the United States has become a major obstacle for Mexico President Enrique Peña Nieto’s administration, particularly after it was revealed by Germany’s Der Spiegel that both he and his predecessor’s e-mail accounts were hacked by the U.S. National Security Agency. This editorial from Mexico’s La Jornada warns Nieto that failure to stand up to Washington this time will rob him of credibility, and mean that ‘the institutions and citizens of Mexico will remain subject to the unpunished theft of their data by government agencies of the United States.’
The La Jornada editorial says in part:
WikiLeaks documents showed, for example, that in January 2007, Calderon’s Public Security Secretary Genaro García Luna, offered Michael Chertoff – who at the time was responsible for U.S. Homeland Security, “free access to our intelligence on public safety” (La Jornada, 05/25/11, p. 2). Other revelations include the U.S. Embassy’s participation in the formulation and implementation of police and military strategies (see, for example, La Jornada, 03/05/11, p.4).
Even before that exasperating submission to the authorities of the neighboring country, the NSA maintained illegal monitoring over the electronic communications of Los Pinos [the presidential residence]. This gives an idea of the damage done to national sovereignty, not only by the docility of Calderón himself to the U.S. government, but by the regular espionage that was maintained at all times against Mexico’s presidential entourage.
The above provides added incentive for the present government to adopt a more assertive and forceful attitude toward the neighboring country, and to demand the immediate cessation of spying, an exhaustive explanation of the ways and means with which it has been practiced, and proof that all information obtained through these illicit channels has been destroyed. Without such an attitude, any attempt by the present administration to differentiate itself from the previous one in terms of sovereignty and public security will lack credibility, and the institutions and citizens of Mexico will remain subject to the unpunished theft of their data by government agencies of the United States.
READ ON IN ENGLISH OR SPANISH, OR READ MORE TRANSLATED and English-language foreign press coverage as the NSA surveillance scandal continues to unfold at Worldmeets.US, your most trusted translator and aggregator of foreign news and views about our nation.
Founder and Managing Editor of Worldmeets.US