PULSE NEWS MEXICO

The Mexican Chamber of Deputies’ National Defense Commission is preparing this week to approve an initiative to make military service compulsory for women.

The proposal, presented by Deputy Laura Imelda Pérez on Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s (SMLO) leftist National Regeneration Movement (Morena) party, is almost certain to pass approval in the Morena-dominated Congress during the Chamber of Deputies’ ordinary plenary session in September.

The new legislation would modify Mexico’s Military Service Law to include women in the military draft in order “to strengthen inclusion, gender equality and women’s rights.”

Currently, all males reaching the age of 18 years in Mexico are obliged to service in the military.

Selection is made by a government lottery system.

Conscripts must service one entire year until they receive a discharge card.

In 2003, former Mexican President Vicente Fox reformed the law to allow for voluntary military service to be performed by females of military age.