A major hack targeting the Mexican Ministry of Defense has shed light on the country’s most secretive and powerful institution, noting its ever-expanding influence over the civilian government, attempting to evade cooperation in a landmark human rights investigation and tracking of journalists using spyware known as Pegasus.
Details in the data breach include internal probes by the military and suspicions that powerful government officials have links to organized crime networks, including drug cartels. , involving state governors and incumbent interior ministers.
As journalists in Mexico search for information on the massive hack, the information revealed in articles to date has shed light on the military’s growing hold on civilian institutions and the relationship between the two countries. their close relationship with President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
The Mexican military has a history of human rights abuses and massacre of civilians, and has long resisted scrutiny and accountability. The leaked emails show – in the words of military officials – how this institution maneuvers to bypass the government, empower itself and protect its own members, even subordinates.
The leaks were released by a group of hackers known as Guacamaya, or macaw in Spanish, and included about six terabytes of data from more than four million emails. In a manifesto released online, the hackers claimed they were an anti-imperialist group seeking to protect the environment. It is not clear which country they operate from, but they communicated in Spanish.
This week, Mr. López Obrador acknowledged the hack and said there was “nothing to hide.”
The Army did not respond to a request for comment.
Despite warnings from politicians and analysts that the military is becoming too powerful under López Obrador, the senate voted this week to renew the military’s role as the leading agency. Mexico’s head in charge of public safety. The bill is now forwarded to the president’s desk for his signature.
“The Mexican armed forces are known to be the least transparent organization, and these leaks come at a critical time when the Mexican government is in crisis,” said Stephanie Brewer, Mexico Director at the Washington Office for Latin America. increase military involvement in civilian life and institutions”. , a research organization.
Leaked emails reveal that the military is using Pegasus, an Israeli spyware, to infect the phones of journalists and an activist, despite López Obrador’s promise that the government his company will not use this malware to spy on Mexican citizens. The New York Times first revealed that the previous administration used Pegasus to spy on journalists, activists and politicians, a scandal that rocked the government.
“The strength of the military relative to institutions is a very concerning issue, as it is getting more funding from the government,” Ms. Brewer said.
The military also opened investigations and profiled current and former government officials and their connections to organized crime and Mexico’s powerful drug cartels. The governor of Veracruz state, Cuitláhuac García, is said to have links to a powerful gang, a accusations he denied this week.
In the hacked emails, Defense Department officials accused the current Interior Minister, Adán Augusto López, of giving top security positions for officials involved in organized crime when he served as governor of Tabasco state. A ministry spokesman declined to comment.
The leaks also revealed widespread sexual assault in the armed forces, with more than 300 service members accused of harassment and other rights violations, which top allies kept secret for years.
López Obrador won a major legislative victory when the senate voted in September to move the National Guard – Mexico’s federal public security force – under the control of the Department of Defense.
The military’s expansion of power also came after a government truth commission in August Officially said the military was involved in the disappearance of 43 students from a rural town called Ayotzinapa.
The email hack shows for the first time the extent to which the military used its power and connections to shield itself from surveillance in the Ayotzinapa affair.
One email detailing the call from the current defense minister to President López Obrador, pleading for the innocence of a low-ranking captain who is a suspect in the student’s disappearance. The defense minister expressed support for the captain’s refusal to cooperate in the government probe.
Again leaked email sent in 2015 also detailed a top general’s request to the defense minister at the time to “prevent excavations” inside the army barracks, where some of the 43 students may have been killed. start. What happened to all the students in the end is a mystery, but they are presumed dead, the whereabouts of their bodies are unknown.
“What the emails make clear is the military’s deliberate action to avoid surveillance by civilians, even in the immediate vicinity of the civilian population,” said Cecilia Farfán Méndez, a Mexican security researcher at the University of California, San Diego. even for a low-ranking captain. “They fear if they open the door and allow civilian surveillance on a case, that it will open the floodgates in the future.”
A series of hacked emails also detail the military’s expansion into the economy.
Since coming to power in 2018, Mr. López Obrador has relied on the military to build most of the huge infrastructure projects, totaling about 45 billion dollarsand announced plans to hand over their operations and revenues to the armed forces upon completion.
The government paid the armed forces to build a railway line nearly 1,000 miles long, one international Airport and an oil refinery, in contracts that have yet to be made public.
But the Department of Defense’s business ambitions appear to be larger than previously known. The data breach revealed that the ministry plans to create a national tourism agency, with hotels, parks, museums and even a national airline on which the armed forces will operate. .
“The profits of that company will be used to pay pensions to members of the armed forces,” the president said this week, confirming the Defense Department’s move into the tourism sector. “It will protect the nation’s assets.”
The military’s growing power has worried many politicians and analysts, who warn that it could lead to more human rights abuses. Instead, they called for the creation of a national police force overseen by the civilian government.
By expanding into the country’s economy, politicians and analysts say, the military could be further shielded from government surveillance as it would no longer have to rely on officials. elected to adopt an annual budget to keep it afloat.
Mexico has been a relatively stable country for decades thanks to its civilian government’s military control, which has allowed it to avoid the military-led coups that have plagued much of the Americas. Latin during that time.
But the military was given an overwhelming role in public safety in 2006, under President Felipe Calderón, when he deployed armed forces across the country to fight drug cartels. The military’s role and deployment is temporary, as Mr. Calderón’s administration established and developed Mexico’s first federal police force, which is supposed to eventually take over public security. add.
The Federal Police was formed in 2010 and faced a rough start, including allegations of human rights abuses and corruption. However, analysts say that the nascent force is gradually improving.
In 2019, Mr. López Obrador disbanded the Federal Police and established the National Guard, which will now be enlisted in the army.
Ms Farfán said: “Although each government grapples with how to improve the police, its real concern is that it has abandoned its goal of developing a public security force. Civil.
“Instead, a lot of things are being supplied to the military, and the militarization of Mexico is working its way up.”
Oscar López contributed reporting from Mexico City.
