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Lucky Magazine: Issue 21, July 2004, p 30 & 31
By Pheona Donohoe
For over a decade, hundreds of women have been murdered in the frontier town of Ciudad Juárez. Over 370 women have been gang-raped, found savagely mutilated with ritualistic markings, burnt and dumped in the Chihuahua desert. In addition to the murders, the women of Juárez are victim to widespread domestic violence. Juárez is also infamous for its corruption and lays claim to one of the largest drug cartels on the Mexican side of the Rio Grande, using the Texan town of El Paso as a portal to smuggle illegal drugs into the United States. With a new book Harvest of Women by Diana Washington Valdez directly linking the "femicide" to members of the drug cartel, the situation in Juárez is once again international news. Large American corporations are partially to blame for the moral chaos in Juárez. The sprawling industrial district is filled with over 300 factories assembling American products for Mattel, Sony, Hyundai, and other large multi-national companies using cheap, sweat-shop labour. Impoverished workers travel from all over Mexico to work in these maquiladora's for roughly US$24 a week. Juarez is unique as it is a third world factory city relying heavily on a transient workforce. This means many of the two million residents of Juárez have no immediate family or support networks. The shanty-town living conditions offer little security in the case of emergency, with telephone access minimal and police protection questionable. Juárez is also unique in that women make up the majority of the maquiladora workforce. Their desire for independence is straining relations in the home as they struggle to balance employment, home-duties and a social life in a misogynist society. The patriarchal Mexican culture is endemic. Female drinking and partying is condemned by many who claim that women are responsible for creating an environment that attracts unwanted male attention. In February 1999, Chihuahua's former attorney general Arturo Gonzáles Rascón, was quoted in the national newspaper, El Diario as saying that "Women who have a night life, go out late and come into contact with drinkers are at risk. It's hard to go out on the street when it's raining and not get wet." Such misogynist thinking inhibits any constructive action being taken to prevent future deaths or investigating motive. Due to the nature of maquiladora shift work, many women are forced to travel long distances to and from work between dusk and dawn. Although the factories provide limited shuttle bus services, many women still travel between their homes and bus terminals involving unsafe and desolate routes. It is on such journeys that many of the women disappear. For those who have relocated to Juárez from other parts of Mexico, there are no concerned friends to report them missing to authorities. Many murdered women therefore remain unidentified and unclaimed. Family members from remote towns, villages and farms may never learn about the loss of a female relative. This is perhaps the saddest and most frustrating element of the femicide. These unclaimed and anonymous bodies lose their human context and become mere statistics. Despite a large number of murdered women being factory employees, the maquiladora industry refuses to acknowledge the connection between the murders and the victim's employment in the sweatshops. In May 2001, the El Norte newspaper reported that the president of the Maquiladora Association, Juan Carlos Olivares Ramos, dismissed the connection, claiming "a very small - minimal - number" of the missing women can be linked to the Juarez factories. In reality, of the 40% of murdered women of known occupation, over half were maquiladora workers. Applying this fact to the unknown 60% it could be assumed that almost half of these women were also factory workers. Another pattern to the choice of victim is race, age and physical appearance. Almost two thirds of the women were dark skinned, tall and thin, with long, dark hair, aged between 11 and 25. The identity of those responsible for the murders is unknown, although many believe that the government is covering up the truth. For now, at least, the women remain victims of widespread phallic terrorism. Over the years, the method of dumping of the bodies has become as blasé as the governments response to the femicide issue as a whole. Whereas in the past bodies were taken to secluded parts of the Chihuahua desert, more recent cases indicate that the killers are making no effort to hide their kill, dumping them instead in random locations such as along the highway, on the banks of the Rio Grande, in a draining ditch and vacant lots. The local police, State, and Federal Governments are doing little to put a stop to this femicide. The Catholic Church has also done little to help despite its religious stronghold in Juárez. The Mexican police, drug cartels, Los Rebeldes gang and maquiladora bus drivers have all been rumoured to have some involvement in the murders. Yet it is unlikely that their involvement will be formally investigated in a court of law. Some of these suspects, and other innocent civilians, have confessed after allegedly being tortured by the police, but so far only one person has actually been arrested and convicted for their involvement in the killings. Latif Sharif was arrested in 1995, and given a 30-year sentence in 1999 but the murders continued after he was detained. Even FBI profiling experts could not assist in developing any leads, only a suggestion that it was an American, crossing the border to kill. These findings were rejected by Chihuahua state officials. Some also believe that many of the murders are the work of copycats who kill because they can do so with impunity. This lacklustre handling of the murders by Juárez police may change after the release of the controversial new book, Harvest of Women. With over five years of research and leaks from the FBI, an El Paso journalist, Diana Washington Valdez is naming names. In Harvest of Women, she alleges at least 100 women were murdered by a gang of six serial killers. These men are known to the police and are members of the Juárez and Tijuana drug cartels with political ties leading to the Mexican president, Vincente Fox Quesada. Washington is placing herself in a dangerous situation as other journalists, lawyers and aide-workers investigating the Juárez femicide have been murdered. But at a time when the international world is watching and demanding answers, she is not afraid to speak out. The women of Juárez and El Paso have also spoken out by participating in a "V-Day" demonstration march on February 14 2004 drawing thousands of supporters, including Sally Fields and Jane Fonda. In the February 2004 issue of The Human Right's Defender, Amnesty International's Australian President, Russell Thirgood, said their focus over the next two years will be a global campaign to Stop Violence Against Women. Although no specific plans were outlined in the editorial, this pledge combined with the forthcoming book release, and high level of media attention does provide hope that the Mexican government will be forced to resolve this situation. This may encourage the general community to look out for the safety of its women and develop support networks similar to the rape crisis centre Casa Amiga, and Grupo 8 de Marzo, a political group gathering information about the murdered women. Casa Amiga is the only Mexican rape centre along the US/Mexican border, and one of six such centres in the country. The center, run by Esther Chavez Cano, began counseling victims of domestic abuse, rape, and incest in 1999. Casa Amiga educates, not only treats women, and works to prevent reoccurring domestic violence. All of the services are provided free of charge which is crucial to the impoverished women of Juárez. Several fundraising activities are being organised to offer financial assistance and raise global awareness of the violence against women in Mexico. A series of t-shirts by local designers FLIQ, Reuben Stanton, Sara Bowyer and Chantel Camilleri will be released with all proceeds donated to Casa Amiga in Juárez. The shirts have been manufactured locally by BSL following Fairwear's 'No Sweat Shop' guidelines. BSL pass all proceeds to the Brotherhood of St Laurence. There will also be a screening of Lourdes Portillo's chilling documentary about the Juárez murders 'Senorita Extraviada, Missing Young Women' with all proceeds donated to Amigos de las Mujeres de Juarez. These activities will be complimented with a concert at the Corner Hotel in Richmond with Clare Bowditch. [Please Note: Some of the information in the above article has been updated since the article first appeared] |
