Zapatista Army for the National Liberation

To: Professor Jacqueline Nolan-Haley

From: Julia Amanda Garza Benitez

Course: International and Interethnic Conflict Resolution

Date: April 26, 2010

Subject: Zapatista Army for the National Liberation

INTRODUCTION

The Zapatista Army for the National Liberation (Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional, hereinafter “EZLN” or “Zapatistas”), surprised Mexico and the world on the wake of January 1, 1994. On that date, “a group of 300 Indian men and women “slipped out of the Lacandon jungle” of eastern Chiapas and “marched into the center of San Cristóbal de las Casas… In a matter of hours, close to 2,000 rebels took over more than 500 ranches and six more towns in eastern and central Chiapas...”[1] The EZLN was in fact calling for a national war against the government and actually identified itself as a belligerent group under the Geneva Conventions on the Law of War[2]. Two days later, the Mexican government responded by sending the army to fight the insurrection.

Despite that episode of violence, however, both the EZLN and the Government, for their own, separate motives and interests[3], soon realized that the best course of action was to bring the conflict to the negotiation table.

Due to restrictions on length, this short paper will discuss the events in the conflict in very general terms and will later attempt to point to some of the legal, political and negotiation issues that the conflict raises.

War on Drugs

To: Professor Eric Talbot Jensen

Course: National Security Law

From: Julia Amanda Garza Benitez

Date: May 5, 2010

Subject: War on Drugs

INTRODUCTION

Much has been said in recent years about the Drug Trafficking Organizations (hereinafter “DTOs”) in Mexico whose presence and activities have become more and more evident. It would appear as if though it was an endogenous problem unique to Mexico and threatening the order and national security of only that country. This short paper, although focusing on the current situation in Mexico, will also attempt to put the issue in perspective and show how the situation in Mexico in fact represents a threat to the national security of several other countries in the continent as well (including the United States, Colombia, the Central American and the Caribbean countries), and how it will not be possible to contain it or even less destroy it, with the participation of Mexico alone.

First, this paper will examine the recent history of DTOs in the continent. In particular, it will review the situation experienced in what has been denominated “the Caribbean Corridor”. It will later review the changes that DTOs have experienced in Colombia, particularly how they have lost control over the trafficking into the United States, apparently to Mexican DTOs.

In second place, this paper will review the current situation in Mexico. Particularly, it will examine whether Mexico has become or is becoming a “failed State” as some have claimed; it will review the policies and strategies undertaken by the administration of Felipe Calderon and the main criticisms to his approach to the issue.

It will later explore the ways in which the United States has circumstantially contributed to worsening the situation in Mexico and how it has contributed and is deliberately contributing to solve the problem.

Finally, this paper will propose strategies for tackling the issue. Those strategies would ideally be undertaken simultaneously and in concert by the different countries involved.