The permanent mission of the Mexican government before the Organization of American States (OAS) presented a proposal for a joint declaration to condemn the terrorist attack of last August 3rd in El Paso, Texas , in which a white supremacist killed 22 people, 8 Mexicans among them.
The proposal, dated August 20th , asks the Permanent Council of the OAS to declare “its strongest condemn to the terrorist attack that took place in the city of El Paso, Texas on August 3rd, 2019.”
The project, which was analyzed today by the Permanent Council, includes a “condemn and rejection of racial discrimination and the crimes moved by hate, racism, xenophobia, and intolerance , including racial superiority speech , wherever they happen,” by alluding to the alleged motives that made Patrick Crusius , of 21 years of age, to go into the Walmart close Cielo Vista mall and shoot on sight as “ an answer to Hispanic invasion in Texas ,” as he exposed in a manifest published online.
Later on, Crusius would tell the police that his objective was to kill as many “Mexicans” as he could .
The declaration urges the States member of the OAS to make “the firm commitment to adopt all necessary measures , so as to fight all ways of discrimination , intolerance , and xenophobia ; and prevent , investigate , process , and, given the case, punish all crimes perpetrated with those motives.”
The document, titled “Declaration condemning to the terrorist attack perpetrated in the city of El Paso, Texas, United States of America, on August 3rd, 2019 ,” expresses the “deepest sympathy” to all the victims of the shooting.
Consulted by EL UNIVERSAL about the text, the Mexican mission merely responded: “No comments.” Nonetheless, the permanent representative of Mexico before the OAS, Luz Elena Baños Rivas , published a tweet last night in which she highlighted: “Mexico has stood out for the protection of its Mexicans living abroad as the cornerstone of its foreign policy. The OAS is the main political forum of the hemisphere and has a strong legal mechanism to make a condemn about the events.
Mexico, she emphasized, “does not accept the persecution, damage, and victimization of its co-nationals because of their origin, culture, or skin color. Mexico strongly rejects any kind of terrorism based on racism, intolerance or racial supremacy.”
On Wednesday, the Permanent Council of the OAS approved by acclamation the declaration of condemning proposed by Mexico to c ategorically reject the terrorist attack of El Paso, Texas.
The Mexican government is leading diplomatic actions so that the case be an example of hate crimes against Mexicans and other Hispanic communities in the United States. Mexico’s minister of Foreign Affairs, Marcelo Ebrard , expressed a couple of weeks ago the interest of the country to classify the shooting in El Paso as “what it is, an act of terrorism to take the lives of Mexicans … There must be proportional consequences to the measure of this.”
The meeting between both governments regarding this affair are still taking place to the maximum level, with the main objective of classifying the attack as a hate crime , “to classify it as such.” Mexican authorities are also working to see how to manage a possible compensation to the victims , which would only happen if it is processed under the federal law , and not by the state of Texas. Likewise, the possibility to require the extradition of Crusius is being evaluated.
Mexico presented a diplomatic note to the American government expressing the “ condemn and absolute rejection for the killing against Mexicans ” and asking for the collaboration between authorities from both countries in “international legal assistance” matters. Likewise, it seeks to establish if there are more people or groups involved.
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