Next ICANN meeting in Mexico City should be postponed and moved to a safer location.
The next Internet Corporation For Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) meeting is in Mexico City March 1-6. I’ve never been to an ICANN meeting, but would like to. Mexico City is just a short flight from Austin so it would seem ideal. Except that I don’t carry kidnapping insurance.
ICANN is an international organization. It’s great that it holds meetings all across the world. But security and stabililty must be considered. To be fair, it scheduled next month’s meeting well in advance of the current security meltdown in Mexico. But Mexico City has always been an “at risk” city, and ICANN needs to take that into consideration when planning events.
Mexico City is not safe. The entire country currently has a travel alert from the U.S. Department of State. I have plenty of friends in Austin that travel there on business. They always hire security and avoid No local cabs.
ICANN’s Mexico City meeting web site has a security warning that reads “As in any other big city, it is important to take responsibility for your personal safety and exercise precaution.”
True, but Mexico City is not just any big city.
In the future, ICANN should pick places that don’t have U.S. Department of State travel alerts. Fortunately, the next two meetings are in Sydney and Seoul. Allthough a longer trip for me, I’m more inclined to make one of those than to take the short trip to Mexico.
Scott Hageman-Bailey says
You got ta be kidding me. You are biased. The Department of State has alerts for almost every city and country in the world. they always exaggerate. Furthermore, Bill and Hillary Clinton (the Secretary of State) are several times a year at the home of Mr. Carlos Slim. IN MEXICO CITY. Your comments is like saying don’t fly Continental because they crashed in Buffalo yesterday. Or don’t travel to New York because you can end up on the Hudson River or your money stolen by the biggest thief Madoff. Besides, I don’t know why are you so whiny, even your last name is Spanish, disguised of course. It’s Aleman, you just doubled the LLs and the NNs.
Mexico City is great and they won’t kidnap an American like you, unless you are a billionare, which I don’t think you are. No one will even look at you.
Andrew Allemann says
C’mon, there are only 6 travel alerts. There are a few dozen travel warnings, for places like Zimbabwe and the West Bank.
Trust me, Bill doesn’t take the cab to Carlos’ slim’s house.
The point is, of all the places you could travel, this is one of the least safe.
Kemji says
smell some xenophobia….?
I agree with Scott. Your comments are very typical of an America. If there’s one murder in a town, everyone goes “oh, its sooooooo dangerous”. Yes there’s violence in Mexico, and that occurs everywhere,so i think it will probably be held fine in Mexico. Do i
Mark Fulton says
I predict this meeting takes place with no casualties, unless someone dies of boredom.
Andrew Allemann says
Yes, yes, you’re right. It’s just xenophobia. There’s only been one murder in Mexico City.
I agree that it will probably be find in Mexico. And I hope that’s right.
Johnny says
I don’t know why people are upset with Andrew. It’s true participants of this particular meeting will probably only take safe taxis from hotel to hotel and nothing will happen.
It’s also true that Mexico City is not much more dangerous than other large Latin American cities.
On the other hand, all the articles along the lines of “Mexico is perfectly safe. Come to vacation to Mexico” are complete PR BS.
In Mexico there is currently a complete breakdown with everything related to police and legal system. If a Mexican criminal wants to take something from you including your life, police will not prevent it, and the legal system will do nothing about it after the fact.
Maybe if you live in New Orleans, this situation above is normal and you are used to always thinking of safety first. But if you live in Austin, you basically don’t need to think about safety at all, so I can see how you would not want to travel to places like Mexico City or New Orleans.
Domain Offerings says
The safest approach is not always the right approach. One has to weigh the danger against the right of all people and localities to be included. If a location is war torn then clearly there are extenuating circumstances. But for other locations the distinction is not always so clear-cut.
Andrew Allemann says
Thanks Johnny. For the record, I am going to New Orleans next week.
But for those that say no one will bother you unless you are a millionaire, that’s silly. Here’s an article explaining how this happens:
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-kidnap1-2008sep01,0,4003595.story
Second, if your *family* are millionaires, it’s just the same as you.
Look, I’m not trying to sensationalize things. The U.S. State Dept puts out very few alerts and warnings.
Andrew Allemann says
Michael Berkens explains how to participate without going to Mexico:
http://www.thedomains.com/2009/02/13/ask-icann-a-question-without-risking-your-life/
Ricardo says
I was a consultant to global companies for many years. I traveled to some questionable places around the globe. But, the only place I was overly concerned/cautious was Mexico City.
I traveled to Seoul many times. I never felt unsafe there. However, Seoul’s airport is slightly intimidating. I leave it there. The DMZ is only a few miles away.
As the point was made, there are good and bad sections in every city. You just need to use some common sense.
Are you kidding me? says
So Europeans should be writing the same nonsense about the US, which has murder rates 4 and 5 times greater than Europe?:
“ICANN Should only hold conferences in safe countries, not in crime infested places like Texas, where any lunatic can carry a gun”.
I’ve been to Mexico City on a business trip for a week, and had a wonderful time. I was careful, of course, but just as careful as when I’ve visited Detroit, Atlanta or Dallas (not the safest places on earth).
Johnny says
@Scott……”Aleman”? Well, in Spanish Aleman means “German”, and in Portuguese Alemão” also means “German”…..so is he German or of some Latin origin, or does it even matter? 🙂
I’ve been to many of the big Latin cites and Mexico City IS dangerous. Things really started to get bad there in the 90’s and it has gotten more violent ever since. Rio is pretty bad too.
True….if you watch yourself you can navigate more or less safely through any city. However, I think the point Andrew is making here is why even have it in a city where odds are higher of an incident occurring.
It’s not xenophobia….it’s common sense.
.
M. Menius says
“Except that I don’t carry kidnapping insurance”
The U.S., Canada, and certain parts of Europe. Otherwise, it’s beautiful North Carolina and the world through my computer.
jp says
@Andrew, thanks for writing this one. I started laughing as soon as I read the headline. I know its probably not funny in reality, maybe just funny for me being I live so close to Tijuana, or my twisted sense of humor.
The rumor I heard about a week ago was that there have been 210 murders so far this year in TJ. “This Year!!” I heard this rumor on February 2nd I think! It had only been like 33 days so far.
To Mexico City’s defense, from what I understand the safety issues are mainly associated with the border towns, especially TJ and Juarez. I’ll tell you what though, not a good place to be a gringo right now.
At least once a week on my local news they find a storage locker full of dead bodies down there, or a dumpster full, etc…
Johnny says
I don’t know why people here keep arguing that Mexico should not be criticized on safety issues. Mexico City presents unique safety concerns – you can potentially become a crime victim even in a nice area, during the day, surrounded by lots of people. Police will do nothing about it even if they watch the crime in progress.
You can really minimize the risk by keeping the low profile and using lots of common sense, but the unique safety risk is still there.
John says
Jeez guys, Andrew just made a comment about safety in Mexico, probably with a little pun intended, what’s with all the political BS here…
Take your political shi* elsewhere, this is forum for the domain industry not for you to voice your political issues.
Gazzip says
I think the OP is spot on, there is a HUGE problem with kidnappings in Mexico and there has been for a VERY long time, yeah things do happen all over the world but some places are FAR WORSE than others…so why go there if you don’t really need to?
…its not like ICANN really give a toss what you think anyway or they would have changed their behaviour years ago, how many years have they been aware of peoples opinion on domain wharehousing and speculation by registrars ? 6 ?…7 ?
Time article on Mexico…there are hundreads of other similar articles
“There is a collusion of the criminals with the police, and what is the worst is that there is impunity — 99% of the cases go unsolved. So there is only a 1% chance of being caught, and even then, probably remaining free, because the local prosecutors are also corrupt.”
“For wealthier Mexicans, and even those not so wealthy, kidnapping has become an everyday reality. According to sources monitoring the situation, there are currently dozens of families negotiating for the return of kidnapped loved ones.”
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1830649,00.html
or maybe one for 2005
Kidnappers in Mexico are three times more likely to kill their victims than are their counterparts in Colombia – One out of every seven victims are killed, group says – http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10546934/
…and on and on
.
Eric Rice says
I used to travel to parts of Mexico quite often. I will not step foot in the country now. TJ’s tourists used to be 5000 per day, at last count it is 50. They beheaded the Mayor of Rosarita, have kidnapped or killed US college students. Over 10,000 people are missing in Baja area alone. The drug cartel in Mexico is more powerful than the government.
I am sure the newspaper headlines are touting that some of the worlds biggest Internet Moguls will be in Mexico City.
I made the decision to pass up this Icann long ago. Ask that chick from France what it was like to be held hostage for 7 years in Columbia. Just not worth the risk in my opinion even if it is a small risk.
Eric Rice says
ps. Legalize drugs and collect all that tax revenue would end all this violence.
Andrew Allemann says
Crap…now it’s even hitting tourist areas like Cancun. Never good when your chief of police is detained:
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-mexico-police10-2009feb10,0,3556328.story
Steve M says
Sorry guys, but Andrew’s right.
I’m live in So Cal myself, and the LA Times reports regularly on kidnappings, robberies, rapes, and murders throughout Mexico; border areas, Baja (where American tourists are regularly “high-jacked”, raped, etc), the capital…and now kidnappings, robberies, and murders in US border cities and states, including San Diego.
Like it or not; and it is a terrible state of affairs for a largely wonderful people; Mexico is about this | | close to a complete govt breakdown.
John Berryhill says
ICANN meetings take place in their own little bubble. If you aren’t staying in the venue hotel, ICANN runs its own shuttles among the other hotels. Despite the perception of these meetings taking place in “exotic” locales, there is no reason for any participant to venture outside the bubble of the homogenized international business hotel experience.
Johnny says
The new favorite thing to do these days in Latin American is call you on the phone and tell you that they have either your wife or child and you have 20 minutes to bring $50,000 Pesos, for example, to a certain street corner or park or they will kill them.
However, it is a scam most of the time….the thieves just pick up the telephone book and start calling numbers and see if anyone bites and furiously rushes the money to the meeting spot.
I know many folks this has happened to and they called their relative and found out they had not been kidnapped, but instead were just doing their daily business.
.
Andrew Allemann says
@ John – that’s good to hear. The ICANN page makes it sound like there will be a need to travel between venues.
Domainer says
“ICANN meetings take place in their own little bubble.”
We are suppose to accept the opinion that it is safe from the guy that stopped on the side of the road, dropped his pants and p*ssed into the wind. Not caring if it was safe.
🙂
(Just teasing.)
Andrew Allemann says
So this evening I was at an event talking to a couple friends. One moved from Mexico to Texas a couple years ago, the other one grew up here but has family in Mexico. One of them was lamenting how bad it’s gotten down there. I told them about this article I wrote about holding a meeting in Mexico City and how some people said I was xenophobic.
They said not at all — it’s crazy to have an event like this in Mexico City. In fact, one of them recently received a phone call that their dad was about to be kidnapped and they needed to drop off money right away. Other family members have similar stories, including the “virtual” kidnappings that you’ve been reading about. Much of the time the ransom is only $1,000 or so.
jp says
I don’t think you are being xenophobic, or if you are it is at least justfied. I’d think something was wrong with you if you wanted to go to Mex with no concearns for your safety.
I have several Mexican friends here in San Diego whose family still live in Tijuana. Betwen all of them, none of them are willing to go south of the border to visit their families anymore. They all say the same thing “I’ve got kids, I can’t go down there, it’s too risky”.
Eric Rice says
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/americas/02/18/mexico.drug.violence/index.html
Mexico heads toward civil war. CNN article.