Since the conclusion of the REN’05 Program, I have been working on a Sister Cities Agreement Project between Fukushima, Japan and Coahuila, Mexico, which was proposed to the Prefecture Authorities during that year’s Local Trip. A very interesting part of the work done towards the proposal of the Agreement is the research in order to find the coincidences and historical past between the people of both places. It has been really exiting to find that Japan and Mexico have a great past of cultural, political and trade relations. I want to share with you a brief summary of what I have found out.
Mexico (not yet an independent country, but a Spanish virreinato, known as the New Spain) had the first documented contact with Japan in 1609. This year, Rodrigo de Vivero, the General Governor of the Philippines (which belonged to the New Spain) shipwrecked near the Onjuku coast, and was received by the Shogun Ieyasu Tokugawa who, later, helped the Governor to come back to the New Spain in a 120 ton ship built under the Shogun’s instructions.
After the Mexican Independence in 1821, Japan and Mexico signed a Friendship and Trade Treaty in 1888, the first one signed with a Latin-American country, and also the first treaty signed by Japan with an occidental country in equality terms. Later, in 1897, still under the Government of President Porfirio Diaz and with the organization of the Ex-Councilor Takeaki Enomoto, thirty five Japanese citizens arrived to the southern Mexican State of Chiapas; the first Japanese immigration to a Latin-American country.
One of the most memorable episodes in the History of the Japanese-Mexican relations is when, in 1913, the Japanese Diplomat, Kumaichi Horiguchi, in charge of Business Affairs in the Japanese Legation in Mexico, provides shelter and protection to the family of President Francisco I. Madero, during the Decena Tragica, when he and other functionaries were cowardly assassinated by detractors of the democratic government. Almost forty years later, and after a small period of suspension of the diplomatic relations because of World War II, Mexico is the second country -just after the United Kingdom- to ratify the 1952 San Francisco Peace Treaty. Almost immediately, in April of 1952, Mexico reactivates diplomatic relations with Japan, being in charge of this important duty, the Second Secretary of the Mexican Foreign Service, Octavio Paz, who later became the second Mexican Nobel Price winner.
I’d like to add another episode in this rich history: The invitation of the Japanese Government to Mexico for its participation with 25 delegates in the first edition of the Ship for World Youth Program in 1989, as well as to be the first Port of Call of that year’s batch (Port of Acapulco).
The most recent episode in the History of Japanese-Mexican relations is the signature of the Free Trade Agreement between both countries, taking effect April 1st, 2005.
Some of the most outstanding Japanese-Mexican personalities, emblems of these countries' historical past are:
- Luis Nishizawa. First line artist with an important artistic production, such as a ceramic mural in Ueno Station, Keio line.
- Jesus Kumate. Doctor in Sciences who became Sanity Minister in 1988.
- Maria Yui: Mexican Olympic Delegate in Helsinki 1952.
Happy to know that we are part of this bicultural past, it’s our duty to keep working on the construction of new episodes between our countries… Who knows? Maybe the next Japanese Prime Minister and the next Mexican President happen to be ExPYs and shipmates of the same Batch!
Hasta pronto amigos!
