New - March 9, 2010
Archival Evidence of Mexico's Human Rights Crimes / Evidencias en los Archivos de crímenes de Derechos Humanos en México
The Case of Aleida Gallangos / El Caso de Aleida Gallangos
August 20, 2009
Breaking the Silence
The Mexican Army and the 1997 Acteal Massacre
December 2, 2008
NPR Features Archive Analyst in Tlatelolco Massacre Program
Links to Declassified Documents from Archive FOIA Requests and Mexican Archival Research
October 2, 2008
2 DE OCTUBRE DE 1968 - Verdad Bajo Resguardo
On the 40th Anniversary of the Tlatelolco Massacre, Archivos Abiertos offers the most complete account to date of what files exist and what remains hidden bajo resguardo
September 30, 2008
Resources on Mexican Constitutional Reform on Access to Information
To commemorate International Right to Know Day and the beginning of the México Abierto Week, the National Security Archive’s Mexico Project publishes today on its Transparency Web Site new English-text resources on Mexico’s latest developments in the area of access to information, especially related to the new constitutional reform of Article 6.
About
the Project
Since 1994, and intensively since 2000, the National
Security Archive's Mexico Project has sought to identify and obtain
the release of documents from secret government archives on United
States and Mexico since 1960, and to disseminate those records through
publications, conferences and the Archive's Web site. In order to
obtain the declassified documents, we use the Freedom of Information
Act to compel U.S. agencies such as the State Department, CIA, Pentagon,
Treasury Department and Justice Department to review and release records
relevant to the project.
Since 1994, the Mexico project, under the
direction of Kate Doyle, has filed more than 1,600 U.S. Freedom of
Information requests We carry out ongoing research in U.S. government
holdings--including the National Archives, the presidential libraries,
agency oral history collections, military holdings, and more--as well
as search in Mexican archives such as the Acervo Histórico
Diplomático of the Foreign Relations Secretariate. Since
2002, we have been able to consult a newly-released collection of
Mexican documents on la guerra sucia (the "dirty war") open
to the public in the Archivo General de la Nación in
Mexico City.
The Archive directly sparked a national debate about
freedom of information in 1998. On the 30th anniversary of the infamous
Tlatelolco massacre of 1968, the Archive drew press coverage across
Mexico by publishing on the Web and in several major Mexican magazines
a revelatory set of declassified U.S. documents including U.S. embassy
reporting on the massacre and the CIA's analysis of the Mexican security
forces' responsibility. Those newsmaking Tlatelolco documents came
from the Archive's partnership - beginning in July 1994- with the
Mexican newsmagazine Proceso,
to open U.S. files on the past three decades of U.S.-Mexican relations.
Kate Doyle's column in Proceso called Archivos Abiertos (or, Open Archives) was launched in 2003. The series draws from U.S.
and Mexican declassified records on a range of issues that have included,
for example: drug trafficking and counternarcotics policy, Mexican
presidential elections, human rights cases and state repression during
Mexico's "dirty war." Archivos Abiertos was published in
a monthly basis up until April 2004. The column resumed with a
posting on Tlatelolco's Dead (October 1, 2006).
The Mexico Project
is actively involved in the movement for freedom of information rights
in Mexico--a struggle which achieved its first success with the enactment
of a landmark freedom of information statute in June 2002. The new
access to information law passed in 2002 represents a vital element
of Mexico's democratic transition. The project also seeks to join
the debate currently underway in Mexico about the country's transition
to democracy--in particular, to support the work of citizens' groups
promoting greater transparency, openness and accountability in government.
To this end, the Archive works closely with scholars, lawyers, freedom
of information activists, NGOs, human rights groups and the press
to design strategies for advancing the people's right to know in Mexico.
Emilene Martínez Morales coordinates our transparency programs.
