Tag Archives: Mexico

Environmentalists accuse Mexico of lying about the origins of the Gulf oil spill

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MEXICO CITY – Environmentalists accused Mexico’s government of lying about the cause of a large oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, which officials quickly disputed.The spill off the coast of southern Veracruz state has expanded over 373 miles and into seven natural areas. It has delivered a blow to the region’s nature, with turtles and other marine creatures discovered on oil-covered seashores, as well as fisherman who have been unable to operate in the oceans they have fished for decades.The Mexican authorities announced that 800 tons of hydrocarbon-laden garbage had poured into the ocean.

The spill began in March, according to the government, and was caused by a ship anchored off the coast of Veracruz, as well as two spots where oil naturally seeps.On Monday, a group of 17 organizations, including Greenpeace Mexico, the Mexican Alliance Against Fracking, and the Mexican Center for Environmental Rights, or CEMDA, refuted that claim, claiming that satellite images they captured showed that the source of the spill was a pipeline from Mexico’s state-run oil company, Pemex, and that a large oil slick appeared in early February.”The absence of information is inflicting enormous economic and environmental damage. “So far, no one has been held accountable,” CEMDA spokesperson Margarita Campuzano said on Tuesday.

Environmentalists accuse Mexico of lying about the origins of the Gulf oil spill

The activists’ photographs from February match those acquired by The Associated Press on Tuesday from Copernicus, the European climate agency. The photographs show a boat floating over a sea clouded with what the groups describe as oil, which looks to be spilling from a platform.According to the groups, the boat in the photographs is Árbol Grande, which specializes in pipeline repair. This suggests that the government knew about the spill before reporting it and “hid it.”Pemex deemed the information and photographs circulated by the groups “inaccurate” and stated that the Árbol Grande boat is permanently traversing the Gulf of Mexico, carrying out preventive inspections of platforms and specialized spill response operations.

Campuzano advocated for increased transparency and vigorous probes by authorities

During her morning press briefing on Tuesday, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum refuted the accusations, saying that “no leak has been reported” in state oil infrastructure up to this point and that such natural seeps in the Gulf have occurred before.She stated that the government was working with scientists to determine if the spill was “due to these natural seeps in the area, which have been reported on many occasions and are well-documented in scientific literature, or a leak from one of the facilities.”

Sheinbaum stated that the spill was most likely caused by natural seeps and that crews were working hard to clean up and mitigate the effects.While government officials acknowledged the effects on turtles, birds, and fish, as well as the spread to protected environments, they maintained that there had been no “severe environmental damage.”The accusations come as environmental groups in the United States have expressed concern after the Trump administration exempted oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico from the Endangered Species Act, claiming that environmentalist lawsuits threatened to disrupt domestic energy supplies during the US-Israeli war with Iran.Critics claimed the measure would hurt marine life and endanger a unique whale species. 

Although violence rates in Mexico have sharply decreased, experts advise caution

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MEXICO CITY The Mexican government celebrated a dramatic drop in homicide rates on Thursday, citing the data as proof that its security measures are effective. However, experts warned that the figures might not accurately reflect the nation’s level of violence.Mexico had 17.5 homicides per 100,000 people in 2025, the lowest figure since 2016, according to officials during President Claudia Sheinbaum’s regular press briefing.In contrast, in 2018, when homicide rates hit their highest point in 20 years, there were 29 killings per 100,000 inhabitants.

Sheinbaum, a member of the Marxist Morena party, claimed that between September 2024, the month before she assumed office, and December 2025, the number of killings decreased by 40%.She ascribed the decrease to a policy built on cooperation between state governors, prosecutors’ offices, security forces, and justice institutions.However, neither the Statistics Institute, which distributes data every year that is thought to be more credible because it is based on death certificates but is published after a month-long delay, nor Mexico’s public security ministry has yet to reveal statistics on the entire 2025 homicide figures.

Although violence rates in Mexico have sharply decreased, experts advise caution

After then-President Felipe Calderón of the conservative PAN party launched a military-led war against drug gangs in 2006, Mexico’s homicide rate started to rise dramatically.From that point on, the number of killings increased, reaching a high under Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s presidency (2018–2024), who supported Sheinbaum’s campaign.In response to pressure from the United States, Sheinbaum strengthened the government’s security strategy after entering office on October 1, 2024, shifting away from López Obrador’s “hugs, not bullets” policy and giving intelligence work and interagency coordination top priority.Homicides have decreased, according to Lisa Sánchez, director of Mexico United Against Crime, a nongovernmental organization, but she warned that not all the data needed to make meaningful comparisons is currently accessible.

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The official number of missing persons has increased to more than 133,000. There are often new hidden graves discovered across the nation.According to Sánchez, certain killings may be underreported because some violent deaths are classified under other categories, including accidents, rather than homicides, or because some missing people may have passed away.According to security analyst David Saucedo, researchers are also debating other possible answers. According to him, there may be less violence in some regions as a result of criminal groups consolidating their power and eliminating rivals, which reduces open fighting. In certain states, like Sinaloa, Michoacan, Jalisco, and Guanajuato, where several drug gangs operate, violence associated with organized crime persists despite the stated drop.