Human Rights News: Zapatistas Join Drug War Protest

Until this year, the Zapatistas had been largely silent on the so-called drug war that’s ravaged Mexico during the past few years.

(LAS CRUCES, N.M.) - As momentum builds for the May 8 protest against violence and impunity in Mexico, the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) announced its support for the movement started by poet Javier Sicilia.

In a communiqué dated April 28, the EZLN leadership declared it would wholeheartedly support the struggle by conducting a silent march of Zapatista base communities in the Chiapas highland city of San Cristobal de las Casas on May 7.

In a pronouncement signed by the Zapatistas’ legendary Sub-comandante Marcos, the EZLN said it would terminate the march with readings of statements in Spanish and indigenous languages.

The Zapatistas sharply condemned the Mexican government’s anti-organized crime strategy as a “psychotic military campaign by Felipe Calderon Hinojosa” that has turned into a “totalitarian argument” for spreading fear across the nation.

In response to Sicilia’s earlier call to place name plaques of victims of violence in public plazas, the Zapatista statement mentioned the names of 15 people killed in the Ciudad Juarez neighborhood of Villas de Salvarcar in 2010 and the 40 children who perished in the notorious ABC day care center fire in Hermosillo, Sonora, in 2009.

The EZLN also urged its supporters in Mexico and throughout the world to support the movement launched by Sicilia and supporters last month, which arose after the poet’s son and companions were murdered in Cuernavaca, Morelos, by an apparent organized crime group.

Until this year, the Zapatistas had been largely silent on the so-called drug war that’s ravaged Mexico during the past few years.

Backed by prominent public figures like Eduardo Gallo, former president of Mexico United against Delinquency, and Malu Garcia, persecuted activist with the anti-femicide group Nuestras Hijas de Regreso a Casa of Ciudad Juarez, Sicilia and friends plan to begin a silent march from Cuernavaca on May 5 and then arrive in Mexico City for a massive rally the following Sunday.

In the heart of the Mexican capital, the activists are expected to call for the signing of a national reconstruction pact at an undetermined time in Ciudad Juarez.

In addition to the main protest in Mexico City, similar events are expected to take place May 8 in more than 40 Mexican cities and at least 20 foreign ones.

Father Alejandro Solalinde, well-known Oaxaca migrant advocate, called the May 8 mobilization the best chance Mexico has had to “remake a country that’s going to the pits and put an end to violence, corruption and impunity…”

Additional source: Proceso, April 30, 2011. Article by Jose Gil Olmos.

Frontera NorteSur: on-line, U.S.-Mexico border news
Center for Latin American and Border Studies
New Mexico State University
Las Cruces, New Mexico