mexico
In this video, former Mexican Ambassador to the U.S. Arturo Sarukhan discusses his own history and path to becoming a diplomat. He also offers advice to aspiring public diplomats on perseverance and what may lie ahead for them.
Mexicans don’t trust law enforcement agencies, which creates a toxic environment for combating cartel violence, according to research released on Thursday. Roughly 90 percent of Mexicans have little or no confidence in municipal police.
Mexican food has suffered an image problem. When people say they want Mexican food they think fajitas, or hard shell tacos, or chile con queso. These “Tex Mex” fast food interpretations discredit a cuisine that has arose from ancient civilizations that pre-date the arrival of the Spaniards.
Juan Manuel Contreras, a church singer and laid-off electrical supply worker, had been honking his car horn and shouting through a megaphone out of the window for half an hour when he turned to me with a question one might only address to a newly arrived foreigner in Mexico.
The sidewalks are empty on Alvaro Obregon Avenue. Restaurants and souvenir shops lining the once popular thoroughfare are gutted and shuttered. The sign in front of an abandoned karaoke bar is now ripped and dilapidated, riddled underneath with three spray-painted tombstones. The thousands of spring breakers who flooded over each March from the nearby Texas resorts are gone. The drug war drove them off, leaving a void of tourism in a city that years ago gave up trying to cater to such crowds.
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While successful people-to-people diplomacy always requires hard work and creativity, a little star power never hurts. So when recently-retired Major League Baseball great Ken Griffey, Jr. joined 2004 Olympic softball gold medalist Natasha Watley to serve as State Department sports envoys for “Diamond Diplomacy” activities in Mexico City from February 28 to March 4, the program was destined to sparkle.
Let's agree that the arrest of Mexican drug lord Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman is not going to have an impact on the flow of drugs through Mexico into the rest of North America. That flow is driven by demand, and the demand for drugs in the U.S. and Canada will continue whether Guzman is in prison or out, alive or dead.
Ex-presidents Felipe Calderon of Mexico, Alan Garcia of Peru and Cesar Gaviria of Colombia brought to Bogota the fad for selfies that has overtaken Hollywood and US President Barack Obama. In charge of posting the dignitaries' picture on the social network Twitter was Calderon, and judging by the look of concentration on his face, he seems to have been the photographer as well.