Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity Responds to the EZLN

México D.F. on January 3, 2013.

 

Our struggle is for life, and the evil government offers death as the future.

Our struggle is for justice, and the evil government is filled with criminals and assassins.

Our struggle is for peace, and the evil government announces war and destruction.

CCRI-CG of the EZLN

To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation

Brothers and sisters

First, we send you a fraternal embrace for your 29 years as EZLN and for the 19 years since you appeared publically. We congratulate you because we, in our short existence as a movement, know full well how difficult it is to build and sustain an organization. And above all, for your steadfastness, for showing us that morals, ethics and truth are the most powerful tools to build a world with peace, justice, dignity and democracy.

We also use this letter to thank you for the many lessons you have given to Mexican society and the solidarity you gave to the victims of May 7, 2011, when, making our cry yours, We’ve Had It Up to Here! [¡Estamos hasta la madre!], you came out to march in silence to demand an end to the war and justice for the victims. We will never forget that great mobilization and message as well as the fraternal reception that the Good Government of Oventic gave to the Caravan to the South.

Since then, the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity diagnosed the national emergency that you had already foreseen. With our walk in sorrow, we confirmed that this world is indeed crumbling and, facing this, we recuperated the fundamental elements of our humanness and life to begin building another world.

Just like you, we have taken on the struggle in the terrain of the symbolic to show the breadth of the transcendence of our causes. That’s why we have put the testimony of the victims before the discourse of politics. However, the deafening system – in which the political class and organized crime have satiated their ambition for power and wealth, imposing a criminal economy where life and death are interchangeable products – has blocked all understanding of the gravity of the situation in which we are submerged: 80,000 dead, 20,000 disappeared, hundreds of thousands displaced and families and bodies destroyed. This new face of war is nothing more than the extension of the long night of the 500 years, which the dictatorship of the State party has taken charge of redressing in paramilitarism and repression against the people and social movements.

In spite of the foregoing, we walked to raise up the voice and testimony of the victims throughout the width and breadth of the country, as well as across the United States of North America, publically calling for accountability from those above, all political parties and all the powers that be, exposing the ethical and moral degradation of the political class, the criminals and the institutions. In our walk we have also seen dignified peoples and persons who are confronting this reality, breaking with the dynamics of the system and putting down the bases for the construction of other worlds, almost always with youth, victims and indigenous peoples as the main social subjects. We also identify as the indigenous peoples those who can be found heading up the construction of alternatives: Cherán, Santa María Ostula and Tiripetío in Michoacán; the peoples of the mountain and coast of Guerrero who bringing to life the Community Police; the defense of the sacred lands of the Wirrárikas and hundreds of communities that resist the megaprojects, the extraction economy and the accumulation of wealth by plunder.

Since May 8, 2011, before thousands of people in main plaza of Mexico City, we proposed the necessity of setting the minimum bases needed to begin the reconstruction of the country. In that sense, we believe that one of the first necessary minimum measures is the signing and fulfillment of the San Andrés Larráinzar Accords, a project that would be the first step, not only to begin to pay off the historic debt that the Mexican nation has with her first peoples but so that the State keeps its word and, above all, to begin the construction of a model of democracy and justice through which true peace with dignity can be consolidated. That’s why, and responding to your most recent communiqués, we want to let you know that we are ready to begin walking at your side and at the side of all Mexicans who are committed to this demand. That we believe that a Mexico with Peace, Justice and Dignity is only possible with Democracy and Liberty. That Mexico cannot be a complete nation with her peoples.

Dear Zapatista sisters and brothers,

We say from our hearts, which have been hurt by war and that struggle so that other families don’t have to live the sorrow of losing or having a family member disappeared: we embrace your struggle the way you have embraced ours. We will struggle for a Mexico for all, a country that truly includes and recognizes her indigenous peoples, for a country where there are no dead or disappeared due to the ambition and opulence of a few and one in which, as your communities have already begun doing so, life that has been violently taken away can begin to flower again.

In the construction of a Mexico with Peace, Justice, Democracy and Dignity. All together!

Yours,

Movimiento por la Paz con Justicia y Dignidad

(Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity)

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http://movimientoporlapaz.mx/es/2013/01/03/carta-al-ejercito-zapatista-de-liberacion-nacional/

Zapatista News Summary – December 2012

DECEMBER 2012 ZAPATISTA NEWS SUMMARY

In Chiapas

1. More Than 40,000 Zapatistas March in Chiapas – On December 21, at the end of the Mayan Long Count Calendar (13 Baktún) and the beginning of a new calendar, more than 40,000 Zapatista support bases marched silently into 5 Chiapas cities (Ocosingo, Palenque, San Cristóbal, Las Margaritas and Altamirano). They set up platforms in the central plazas of each city and then filed onto the platform, raised their fists, came down off the platform and returned to the Caracoles from which they came. Zapatista commanders (the CCRI-CG) sent a communiqué signed by Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos to the media. It read in part: “DID YOU HEAR? It’s the sound of your world crumbling and ours re-emerging…” This sent a brief, but pointed message to the new government: We’re still here. We have resisted your counterinsurgency and we’re stronger for having learned how to resist and construct our autonomy. Our world is re-emerging. This show of force sent a few shock waves through those above and waves of hope through those below. Check out the video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5K_z_ceSlwE&feature=youtu.be

2. EZLN Issues 3 More Communiqués – On December 30, the EZLN released 1 new communique and 2 letters. The communiqué is about the EZLN’s next steps. One letter is addressed to members of the new government (“those above”) and the other letter to Luis H. Alvarez, the former “Indigenous Commissioner” that went around Chiapas giving money to non-Zapatistas and anti-Zapatistas in order to buy their consciences. We’ll have more on these recent EZLN communications shortly.

3.  Las Abejas (The Bees) Commemorate the 15th Anniversary of the Acteal Massacre - Between December 20 and 22, Las Abejas held ceremonies to commemorate the 15th anniversary of the Acteal Massacre. Among the many speeches they gave, the Bees criticized the new government for the violent repression in Mexico City on December 1 and for appointing Emilio Chuayffet to the cabinet position of Secretary of Education. He was the Interior Minister at the time of the massacre and Las Abejas consider him to be one of the unpunished intellectual authors of the massacre. Las Abejas also pointed out that they were stronger for their struggle and resistance. The Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity’s Indigenous Commission attended the ceremonies in Acteal and, while in Chiapas, visited Zapatista and Other Campaign prisoners in the San Cristóbal prison.

4. New Chiapas Governor Takes Office – On December 8, 2012, Manuel Velasco Coello took the oath of office as Governor of Chiapas. He is a member of the Partido Verde Ecologista de México (Green Ecologist Party of Mexico, PVEM). Upon taking office, Velasco Coello greeted the EZLN and the Good Government Juntas, saying he recognized their contributions and that he wanted good relations with them and also wanted to cool down the conflict. We’ll see! In a good will gesture, Velasco Coello released the 2 Zapatista Lopez Monzon brothers and their 2 non-Zapatista brothers from prison in Motozintla and withdrew the arrest warrant issued for Alfonso Cruz Espinoza, a Zapatista support base and the property owner of private land adjacent to the Toniná archaeological site. When a collective from the Caracol of Morelia built a roadside artesianía stand with a sign saying it was a Zapatista stand, the previous state government issued an arrest warrant for Cruz Espinoza. Apparently, the old Sabinas government anticipated tourism around the end of the Mayan Long Count and wanted no evidence of the Zapatistas in front of tourists.

In Other Parts of Mexico

1. Injuries and Detentions in December 1 Protests - As we reported last month, Enrique Peña Nieto took the oath of office as president of Mexico on December 1, amid protests that turned violent and in which many people were injured, apparently by rubber bullets fired by police or tear gas cannisters. Several people suffered serious injuries. A young man affiliated with #YoSoy 132 lost an eye. Another man, an adherent to the EZLN’s Other Campaign, suffered severe brain damage and remains in a medically induced coma. Some of the demonstrators were arbitrarily detained, many of them young and from the #YoSoy 132 Movement, and 70 were sent to prison. Most were released shortly thereafter, however 14 remained in prison facing charges for which bail was denied. Video footage of arbitrary detentions and inappropriate charges is alleged to exist. There were more demonstrations for the release of the 14. The latest news on this front is that the Mexico City Congress passed legislation that changed the severity of the crime of “attacks on the public peace” (disturbing the peace?) so that the 14 could make bail. And, on December 27, as soon as the new legislation was officially published, all 14 were released on bond. They still face court cases for those charges and there are now more protest actions asking that the charges be dropped. Notwithstanding Mexico City’s legislation, the violent repression and detentions have only solidified opposition to the new PRI government of Enrique Peña Nieto.

2. Death Toll Due to Drug War Reaches 116,100! – An Italian civic organization, Libera, reports that it calculated 136,000 malicious deaths between 2006 and December 1, 2012. Of those, 116,000 are attributed to the “Drug War.” Libera is a grouping of more than one thousand human rights organizations and activists from Europe and America. Its figures were compiled from Inegi (Mexico’s government statistics agency) and from human rights defenders. Prior to this report, the Chiapas Support Committee had confirmed a figure close to that from sources in Chiapas.

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Compiled monthly by the Chiapas Support Committee.The primary sources for our information are: La Jornada, Enlace Zapatista and the Fray Bartolome de las Casas Human Rights Center (Frayba).

We encourage folks to distribute this information widely, but please include our name and contact information in the distribution. Gracias/Thanks.

Click on the Donate button of  www.chiapas-support.org to support indigenous autonomy.

_______________________________________________________

Chiapas Support Committee/Comité de Apoyo a Chiapas

P.O. Box  3421, Oakland, CA  94609

Tel: (510) 654-9587

Email: cezmat@igc.org

www.chiapas-support.org

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Chiapas-Support-Committee-Oakland/86234490686

http://compamanuel.wordpress.com

 

The Zapatista Maya World: Collapse and Rebirth

Women in the EZLN March

Collapse and Rebirth in the Zapatista Maya World

By: Luis Hernández Navarro

What has never gone away cannot reappear. What made the rebel Zapatista Mayas to occupy peacefully and in silence five Chiapas cities this December 21 was not to reappear, but rather to reaffirm their force.

The EZLN has been here for more than 28 years. It has never gone away. For ten years it grew under the radar; it announced itself publically more than 18 years ago. Since then it has spoken and guarded silence intermittently, but has never stopped. At one time or another its disappearance or irrelevance has been decreed, but it has always re-emerged with force and with a message.

This start of the new Maya cycle was no exception. More than 40, 000 Zapatista support bases marched in the rain in five Chiapas cities: 20, 000 in San Cristóbal, 8, 000 in Palenque, 8, 000 in Las Margaritas, 6, 000 in Ocosingo, and at least 5, 000 more in Altamirano. We’re dealing with the most numerous mobilization since the emergence of the rebels from the Mexican southeast.

The magnitude of the protest is a signal that their internal strength, far from diminishing with the passage of years, has grown. It is an indicator that the counterinsurgency against them, carried out by the different governments, has failed. It is sign that their project is a genuine expression of the Maya world, but also of a whole lot of poor Mestizo campesinos in Chiapas.

The EZLN never abandoned the national scene. Guided by their own political calendar, loyal to their ethical congruence and with the force of the State against them, it strengthened its forms of autonomous government, it kept alive its political authority among the country’s indigenous peoples and kept the international solidarity networks active. The fact that it has not appeared publically does not mean that it is not present in many significant struggles in the country.

In the five Good Government Juntas that exist in Chiapas and in the autonomous municipalities the authorities of the Zapatista support bases govern themselves, exercise justice and resolve agrarian conflicts. Within their territories, the rebels have made their health and education systems function at the margin of the state and federal governments, organized production and commercialization and kept its military structure standing. They successfully resolved the challenge of the generational relief of their commanders. As if it were nothing, they efficiently dodged threats from drug traffickers, public insecurity and migration. The book Luchas “muy otras” Zapatismo y autonomía en las comunidades indígenas de Chiapas is an extraordinary window for looking at some of these experiences.

The Zapatistas marched this December 21 in order, with dignity, with discipline and cohesion, and in silence, a silence that was loudly heard. In the same way in which they had to cover their face in order to be seen, they now interrupted the word in order to be heard. We’re dealing with a silence that expresses a fertile generative capacity for other horizons of social transformation, a great potency. A silence that communicates the will of resistance in front of power: “He who stays in silence is ungovernable,” Ivan Illich said.

A cycle of the political struggle closed in Mexico this December 1, at the time that another opened. The EZLN has a lot to say in the nascent map of social struggles that begins to be drawn within the country. Their mobilization can impact them in a relevant way.

Among the contours that define the new stage of social struggles are: the return to Los Pinos of the old PRI dinosaur, manned by Salinismo and its authoritarian ways of exercising state command; the pretension of managing social conflict starting from a pact among elites that excludes the subordinate sectors; the crisis, decomposition and reorganization of the partisan left, and the emergence of new social movements.

The EZLN is a new player that, without invitation, sits down at the table of the party that recently came out in national politics.

The Pact for Mexico, subscribed to by the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), the National Action Party (PAN) and, individually, by the president of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) seeks to agree on a program of reforms at the margin of broad social sectors. The EZLN’s mobilization makes evident that a very broad part of Mexican society is not included in that agreement, and that what its subscribers agree to does not necessarily have the endorsement of the citizens.

The party of the Aztec Sun (the PRD) is locked in an internal struggle that can provoke its rupture. The New Left’s pretension of yoking its destiny to the Peña Nieto government mortgages any possibility of a critical distance from power.

The National Regeneration Movement (Morena, its Spanish acronym) has been occupied with the organizational tasks for obtaining its registry. It is probable that the Workers Popular Organization (OPT, its initials in Spanish) continues the same path. It exists because there is a broad political and social territory that the partisan left is not occupying. The Zapatistas enjoy an indubitable political authority among those who people those latitudes.

In the last year and a half social movements have emerged that question power at the margin of the political parties. They don’t feel represented by any of them. The Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity, #YoSoy132, the community struggles against public insecurity and ecological devastation, the student protests in defense of public education, among others, walk along different paths than those of institutional politics. The sympathies toward Zapatismo within those forces are real.

But, beyond the conjuncture, the marches of the Maya 13 Baktún are a novel “¡Ya basta!” similar to what they enunciated in January 1994, and a renewed version of “Never more a Mexico without us!” formulated in October 1996, which opens other horizons. They don’t ask for anything, don’t demand anything. They demonstrate the power of silence. They announce that a world is crumbling and another is reborn.

Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada

English translation: Chiapas Support Committee

Saturday, December 22, 2012

En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2012/12/22/opinion/004a1pol

Resumen de Noticias sobre los Zapatistas – Septiembre del 2012

[Por favor, disculpe el retraso. Estábamos muy ocupad@s por la celebración el 14 de octubre.]

SEPTIEMBRE DEL 2012 RESUMEN DE NOTICIAS SOBRE LOS ZAPATISTAS

En Chiapas

1. Paramilitares causan desalojo de 2 comunidades Zapatistas: Comandante Abel y Unión Hidalgo – El 7 de septiembre, la Junta de Buen Gobierno en el Caracol de Roberto Barrios denunció que paramilitares invadieron y dispararon contra la comunidad Comandante Abel, una nueva comunidad de zapatistas que habían sido forzados a dejar la comunidad de San Patricio debido a ataques paramilitares por parte de miembros de Paz y Justicia. 73 personas huyeron de Comandante Abel hacia el bosque el 7 de septiembre cuando continuaban los disparos que empezaron el 6 de septiembre.  Llegaron a San Marcos, una comunidad zapatista, el 9 de septiembre, donde se les dió refugio.  Actualmente hay 27 zapatistas que todavía quedan en la comunidad Comandante Abel.  Están rodeados por un grupo agresor armado de Unión Hidalgo y miembros de la policía preventiva del estado.  El 8 de septiembre, 10 zapatistas fueron desplazados de Unión Hidalgo debido al constante hostigamiento y amenazas de muerte por miembros del PRI y PVEM. Están refugiados actualmente en la comunidad Zaquitel Ojo de Agua.  ¡El resurgimiento de paramilitares miembros de Paz y Justicia es más que preocupante!  Se debe en parte a la victoria del PRI y PVEM en las elecciones del primero de julio. El PRI ganó la presidencia de la república y el PVEM ganó la gubernatura de Chiapas. La Junta de Roberto Barrios publicó un comunicado de prensa el 30 de septiembre acusando al gobierno estatal de equipar a los paramilitares y la policía estatal para poder mantener el asedio contra los zapatistas.

2. Eco Mundial en Apoyo a los zapatista se expande y continua – En solo dos meses, desde la elección de un nuevo presidente de la república y nuevo gobernador de Chiapas, los ataques y amenazas contra comunidades zapatistas se han incrementado dramáticamente.   La Campaña del Eco Mundial se ha expandido para incluir muchas comunidades zapatistas ahora bajo agresión, además del preso político zapatista Francisco Santiz López. Se puede encontrar información sobre la segunda fase de esta campaña, la cual consiste de acción directa, en la pagina web de la campaña:

http://sanmarcosavilesen.wordpress.com/

3. A Alberto Patishtan le diagnosticaron un tumor cerebral mientras la Corte Suprema aplaza su decisión – Está en marcha un esfuerzo para obtener una audiencia con la Corte Suprema para que Alberto Patishtan Gómez (o sus abogados) puedan demostrar su inocencia.  El abogado de Patishtan logró una reunión con el presidente de la Corte Suprema Mexicana. El propósito de la reunión era presentar una petición para la creación de un mecanismo legal nuevo que abra un espacio para que Patishtan pueda demostrar su inocencia. La Corte Suprema tiene que decidir si se abrirá ó no este nuevo espacio. Su decisión ha sido pospuesta. Mientras tanto, Patishtan está en un hospital en la capital del estado donde le han diagnosticado un tumor cerebral que requiere cirugía.

4. Liberan de prisión a otro hombre involucrado en la masacre de Acteal – El 26 de septiembre, la Corte Suprema de México ordenó la libertad del preso Manuel Santiz Pérez, encontrado culpable de participar en la masacre de Acteal de 45 mujeres, niños y hombres el 22 de diciembre de 1997. La Corte usó el mismo razonamiento que utilizó en los casos anteriores: el álbum de fotos mostrado a los sobrevivientes y testigos era perjudicial y violó los derechos legales y el procedimiento criminal.  Según un artículo publicado en La Jornada, este es el último de los casos apelado por parte de los que participaron en la masacre de Acteal. Vale notar que la Corte encontró el tiempo para liberar a un asesino confeso, pero no tiene tiempo para decidir si se oirá el caso de Alberto Patishtan o el caso de los miembros de la Otra Campaña en Tila.

En la frontera de Chiapas

1. Bases militares nuevas y 200 marinos de EEUU en Guatemala – El presidente de Guatemala, Otto Pérez Molina, anunció que  Guatemala construirá tres bases militares nuevas para redoblar la lucha contra el crímen organizado (el tráfico de drogas, armas y personas). Dos de estas bases estarán cerca de la frontera con Chiapas; una en el Departamento del Petén (al otro lado del río Usumacinta de Chiapas) y otra en el Departamento de San Marcos. San Marcos colinda con la región sudoeste de Chiapas. Una tercera base estará localizada en Puerto Barrios (cerca de Honduras). Se ha reportado ampliamente que unos 200 marinos estadounidenses ya están patrullando la costa pacífica de Guatemala para interceptar el narcotráfico por mar. Las y los guatemaltecos están reportando que el país se está militarizando bajo el lema de la guerra contra las drogas; pero la militarización también está siendo usada contra los movimientos sociales.

En otras partes de México

1. Investigaciones del ataque contra dos agentes de la CIA sugiere conexión al cartel Beltran Levya – En septiembre, continuaron las investigaciones sobre el caso Tres Marías, el ataque contra un vehículo blindado de la embajada de los EUA en México. La procuraduría federal mexicana requirió que la detención sin cargos (arraigo) de 12 polícias federales continúe por 40 días más. La Jornada reportó que el FBI está llevando a cabo una investigación paralela de lo ocurrido, y  ha ofrecido a los 12 agentes la “oportunidad” de convertirse de colaboradores en el ataque a testigos protegidos del gobierno estadounidense. Sus abogados dicen que han rechazado esta “propuesta.” Aunque no se ha publicado ningún informe final al respecto, parece ser que los oficiales estadounidenses ahora creen que el ataque lo perpetraron integrantes del cartel Beltran Levya como venganza por el asesinato de Arturo Beltran Leyva, ocurrido en diciembre del 2009.

2. El Departamento de Estado de los EUA recomienda inmunidad para Zedillo – El 7 de septiembre, el Departamento de Estado estadounidense anunció que recomendará inmunidad para el ex-presidente Ernesto Zedillo ante una Corte de Connecticut, en donde fue demandado por daños en el asesinato  de 45 mujeres, hombres y niños el 22 de diciembre de 1997 en Acteal, Chiapas. El Departamento de Estado anadió que esta decisión se tomó con el fin de mantener las buenas relaciones con el gobierno mexicano.

3. 25.000 – 30.000 desplazad@s por narcoviolencia en Sinaloa – La Comisión para la Defensa de Derechos Humanos del estado de Sinaloa informó que entre 25,000 y 30,000 personas han tenido que huir de sus comunidades tras actos criminales relacionados con el tráfico de drogas durante estos nueve meses. La Comisión dió a conocer que 12 de los 18 municipios del estado están siendo muy afectados por esta violencia, con un promedio aproximado de 2,000 desplazados por municipio.

En los Estados Unidos

1. La Caravana por la paz concluye – El Movimiento por la paz con Justicia y Dignidad (MPJD), encabezado por el poeta y periodista mexicano Javier Sicilia, terminó su caravana por los estados unidos en Washington, DC el 12 de septiembre. La caravana de un mes viajó por 27 ciudades estadounidenses y recorrió 6,210 millas, tratando asuntos politicos estadounidenses en su ruta hacia Washington DC: 1) financiamiento estadounidense de una guerra contra las drogas en México a través de la Iniciativa Mérida; 2) tratamiento humano a los inmigrantes; 3) tráfico de armas hacia México; 4) blanqueo de dinero de la droga por bancos estadounidenses; y 5) la militarización de la política exterior norteamericana. Al concluir la caravana, Sicilia dió a conocer que se retirará del MPJD por dos meses para reflexionar sobre la pérdida de su hijo.

 

Javier Sicilia and the Caravan for Peace – US Schedule

Javier Sicilia to Head Peace Caravan Through United States

 Mexico City, June 15, 2012 – As the number of innocent people that continue dying in Mexico, due to the failed war against drugs, rises to 71,000, the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity (MPJD) announces that it will lead a month-long “Caravan for Peace” through the United States to call attention to the misguided policies of the war against drugs that have provoked a crisis of violence and impunity. The MPJD and dozens of organizations of both countries are joining together to coordinate the Caravan with more than a 6, 000-mile trajectory, which will depart from San Diego, California on August 12 to arrive in Washington, D.C. on September 10. [1]

______________________________________

 The above quote from an invitation by the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity (MPJD) to a June 18 press conference in Mexico City was shocking in that it used the number of 71,000 people dying from the Drug War. Previously announced estimates of the number of dead have been: “more than 50,000” by the Mexican government, or by the MPJD “60,000 dead.”

The MPJD announced a Caravan for Peace through the United States to create awareness and dialogue about the US role in Mexico’s current violence. Present with Javier Sicilia, the MPJD’s founder and well-known poet and journalist, were representatives of the various civil society organizations on both sides of the border working with him. Some of the representatives included: Sergio Aguayo from Alianza Cívica in Mexico; Ted Lewis from Global Exchange; Enrique Morones of Border Angels; Maureen Meyer of WOLA (Washington Office on Latin America); and Daniel Robelo of the Drug Policy Alliance. [2]

The Caravan for Peace is scheduled to begin in San Diego, California on August 12 and end in Washington D.C. a month later. Among the issues the Caravan for Peace is expected to address are: 1) US funding of the “Drug War” in Mexico through the Mérida Initiative; 2) an alternative to prohibition of drugs by criminalizing drug use; 3) the illegal sale of weapons manufactured in the US to organized crime groups in Mexico; and 4) the safety and protection of migrants. Local grass roots participation in the Caravan is encouraged. The proposed route is as follows:

Proposed Route: August 12 – September 13

San Diego, CA – Aug 12 SUN

 Los Angeles, CA – Aug 13- Aug 14 MON/TUES

Phoenix, AZ – Aug 15 WED

Tucson, AZ – Aug 16 THURS

Las Cruces, NM – Aug 17 FRI

Albuquerque/Santa Fe, NM – Aug 18 SAT

Santa Fe, NM – Aug 19 SUN

(Rest Day, Santa Fe, NM   Aug 20 MON)

El Paso, TX – Aug 21 TUES

Laredo, TX- Aug 22, WED

Harlingen/Brownsville, TX – Aug 23 THURS

McAllen/San Antonio, TX – Aug 24 FRI

Austin, TX – Aug 25 SAT

Houston, TX – Aug 26 SUN

New Orleans, LA – Aug 27 MON

(Rest Day – Aug 28 TUES)

Montgomery, AL – Aug 29 WED

Atlanta, GA – Aug 30 – 31 THURS/FRI

Charlotte, NC – Sept 1 SAT

(Travel Night to Chicago, IL & Rest Day – Sept 2 SUN)

Chicago, IL – Sep 3-4 MON/TUES

Cleveland, OH -Sept 5 WED

New York, NY – Sept 6-7 THURS/FRI

Baltimore, MD – Sept 8-9 SAT/ SUN

Washington, D.C. – Sept 10-12 MON-WED – FINAL CITY

__________________________________________________________________

1. http://movimientoporlapaz.mx/es/2012/06/15/invitacion-a-conferencia-de-prensa-presentacion-de-la-caravana-por-la-paz-mexico-usa/

2. Daniel Robelo is a confirmed speaker at the July 12 Community Forum on Mexico. For more information about the Community Forum, check out the flyer below at: http://compamanuel.wordpress.com/2012/06/19/community-forum-on-mexico-2/

Community Forum on Mexico

Community Forum on Mexico

Immigration * The Border            Drug War * Merida Initiative

Mexico Peace Movement * Zapatistas

*

Thursday, July 12, 2012, 7:30 pm (Doors Open at 7 pm)

Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists

1924 Cedar Street, Berkeley, CA  94709

*

Speakers: Laura Rivas, National Network for Immigrant & Refugee Rights; Francisco & María Cristina Herrera, Trabajo Cultural Caminante; Daniel Robelo, Drug Policy Alliance; Chiapas Support Committee Members

Music By Francisco Herrera

Suggested Donation $5 – $10 (Sliding Scale, No one turned away)

Sponsored by: Chiapas Support Committee (CSC)

Co-Sponsors: BFUU Social Justice Committee, Task Force on the Americas (MITF)

.************************* 

For more information, please contact: Chiapas Support Committee

Tel: (510) 654-9587 * Email: cezmat@igc.org

www.chiapas-support.org * http://compamanuel.wordpress.com

 

Sicilia Movement Shows Support for Zapatistas

Para leer en español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2011/10/09/politica/017n1pol

Sicilia Movement Shows Support For Zapatista Bases

** He demands guarantying the life and integrity of said communities

** Indigenous install occupation demanding the liberation of prisoners

By: Hermann Bellinghausen, Envoy

San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, October 8, 2011

Javier Sicilia showed “moral and political backing to each and every one of the Zapatista support bases” by the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity (MPJD), headed by him.

In a message read this morning by the MPJD’s Resistance Actions Commission, in a press conference, Sicilia expounds: “During the time that we were in the state of Chiapas, with the Southern Caravan (in September), we were informed about the threats and attacks the Zapatista support bases suffer, particularly in San Patricio community, La Dignidad autonomous municipality, corresponding to the official municipality of Sabanilla.”

Similarly, the civilian movement demands that the federal and state governments “immediately guaranty the life and integrity of all the EZLN’s support bases” in the autonomous community of San Patricio. That, continues Sicilia, “besides that free access is guaranteed and respect for the said community’s lands since we consider that said aggression is an attack, not just against the Zapatista support bases, but on a new hope for the nation’s reconstruction: the autonomies.”

Sicilia emphasizes that in the MPJD: “different indigenous peoples participate with the hope that we may construct ‘a world where many worlds fit;’ therefore, any attack on any of the country’s indigenous communities, we consider an attack on our Movement.”

The MPJD’s delegation also announced a message to the Good Government Juntas in the Los Caracols, of Roberto Barrios and Oventic, announcing to them that it will meet in Chiapas to “be informed directly in your voice what is happening here, we are here to demonstrate our support.”

The movement “has given punctual follow up about what happens in the Zapatista towns, and we observe with concern what happens in different villages inside their autonomous municipalities.” He also observes: “how the autonomous education projects developed by the Zapatista peoples in different population centers receive attacks in Los Altos, the jungle and the Northern Zone of the state.”

In two more messages, directed to Las Abejas of Acteal and to the prisoners on a hunger strike and fast in the San Cristóbal prison, the MPJD reiterates its peaceful vocation. To the latter he says: “We fully recognize the fast and hunger strike as two forms of struggle of great moral and physical radical [nature], which seek to bring afloat the truth and touch the conscience of those who do them and of their adversary. We trust fully that this hunger strike and fast that they have started may bear the fruits that everyone hopes as soon as possible, and that we will be able to meet in a solidarity embrace of freedom.”

Also this morning, the family members of these indigenous prisoners, in the majority women, installed themselves in an occupation at one side of the Cathedral, demanding the liberation of members of the Voice of El Amate, Innocent Voices, Solidarity with the Voice of El Amate and the organized community of Mitzitón.

In the same atrium of what’s called the Cathedral of Peace the World Summit of Adventure Tourism will be celebrated next weekend, to which the hotel and restaurant owners expect a large number of visitors that come to evaluate the state’s beauties. Authorities already installed a big pavilion of plastic for the event, a few meters from where the indigenous occupation demanding justice is found.

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Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada

Saturday, October 8, 2011

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2011/10/09/politica/017n1pol

Sicilia Caravan Leaves Chiapas

Para leer en español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2011/09/18/politica/007n2pol

Sicilia Caravan Ends Visit to Chiapas; They Ask That the INM (Migra) Disappear

** They demand that “Felipe Calderón’s war end”

By: Hermann Bellinghausen, Envoy

Palenque, Chiapas, September 17, 2011.

The Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity’s “Caravan to the South,” culminated its tour through Chiapas with a caravan of hundreds of lighted candles through the central avenue and a generalized cry of sympathy and generosity for the Central American migrants that enter the country through the borders of this state and of Tabasco with Guatemala.

“We ask for the disappearance of the National Institute of Migration (INM, its initials in Spanish) because of its anomalies and abuses against migrants,” exposed a collective of Chol women from Palenque.

The agreed reception for the caravan that Javier Sicilia heads, along with a group of victims of the violence from different parts of the country through which it already passed (from Ciudad Juárez and Torreón to Cuernavaca and Oaxaca), was the responsibility of the Xi’Nich organization, civil organisms Sadec, parishes from the Northern Zone and base communities of the church, among others; also of migrants (undocumented, but here in the public plaza covered by the citizen mobilization), natives from Honduras and Guatemala, who were called “brothers” by all the speakers.

Women from Palenque denounced that in the Pakalná barrio (now almost another city), a scarce three kilometers from here, “the migrants encounter a market of crime, and the women are easy prey.” They demanded that “the competent authorities take notice of the issue” and they denounced that INM agents, “which ought to protect the migrants,” con are frequently responsible or remiss faced with the extortion, kidnapping, rape and murder.

The Xi’Nich Committee in Defense of Indigenous Freedom said it is against drug trafficking, which has had a presence in the region for a long time. But also, “from our communities, we point out that the policy of Calderón is one of death and poverty, and more migration.” In other words, it is also a problem for indigenous Mexicans: “Nothing else remains for us than to emigrate to the tourist centers or beyond the northern border. Calderón converted Mexico into a place of war, not into a place for living well. What he has constructed is the live image of the lie and of death.”

Xi’Nich, the organization that almost 20 years ago, before the Zapatista Uprising, walked for more than 50 days to Mexico City to demand an end to the repression and better living conditions, demanded a “stop to Calderón’s war, health and education, no militarization, respect for the migrant brothers and no more discrimination against indigenous peoples and migrants.”

On the extremes of the plaza there were two surprising installations. One, taking advantage of the intricate roots of a big tree, was displaying dozens of lighted candles and the names of dozens of the dead and disappeared in the North. At the other [extreme], Honduran migrants sheltered in the Migrant’s House in Tenosique, Tabasco, were drawing cardboard signs asking for respect and peace with all the colors of the world.

“Father Alberto,” parish priest of Palenque, denounced the widespread criminal extortion in the Chol Zone and pronounced himself in favor of “Christian hope that the violence ends.”

In a more dramatic way, Friar Tomás González, from Tenosique, who finds himself threatened, referred to the “mined field” that Mexico is for the Central Americans ever since cross our borders. Here, where organized crime operates, “their condition becomes a nightmare.” He asserted that: “the clandestine graves are not only in the North, but also in the South.”

And about the INM, he said: “We are witnesses to the fact that its agents operate like organized crime, and in Chiapas and Tabasco they are responsible for the journey of the brothers being so terrible. They pursue them, oblige them to go into the swamps, and put them in danger.” Besides, “the authorities are responsible for concealment” in this region, which has become “ungovernable.”

It was reported later in the evening that the religious man [Friar Tomás] was apprehended in Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz.

Also was Alejandro Solalinde, of the Migrants’ House in Ixtepec (Oaxaca), who in referring to the national holidays said that: “today we have more dependency than ever,” and that without freedom “one cannot have democracy.”

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Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada

Sunday, September 18, 2011

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2011/09/18/politica/007n2pol

More Than 20 NGOs Join Caravan for Peace and Demand Attention to the Southern Border

Para leer en español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2011/09/13/politica/012n1pol

More than 20 NGOs Join the Caravan for Peace and Demand Attention to the Southern Border

** Since three presidential terms ago the region confronts repression as a system, they denounce

** Civil organizations strongly urge sharing experiences about situations of violence

[Foto of Monte Alban by Xinhua]

By: Hermann Bellinghausen, Envoy

San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, September 12

Upon announcing their incorporation into the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity’s caravan, which will arrive in Chiapas this Wednesday, activists, academics, citizens and more than 20 civilian organisms admitted that, “understandably,” in the country the attention is “on the war against organized crime, particularly, but not exclusively in the North.” Nevertheless, they remembered, “we are living a war here of grave and profound consequences since for at least three presidential terms [18 years], a counterinsurgency strategy with a strong military occupation of the territory, the formation of paramilitary groups, and the repression and criminalization of social protest and human rights defenders.”

Starting with the 1994 Zapatista Uprising, they point out in a document, “tens of thousands of soldiers and marines have been installed in Chiapas territory, to which one would have to add those that recently arrived to reinforce the southern border.”

This “counterinsurgency war” seeks “the plunder of the territory of indigenous peoples for its exploitation in favor of transnational interests.” That brings “depredation and destruction of the natural wealth, cultural riches and the social fabric of the original peoples.” The document, presented today at a press conference, enumerates the “badly named ecotourist” projects, mining concessions, construction of dams, looting of biodiversity, and productive reconversion projects.

Besides, it goes on, “in Chiapas we begin to live through the first phases of the war against organized crime, as a consequence of the Mexican government’s submission to the United States’ desire” to open “another front” against organized crime at the southern border. “The conditions of violence that Mexico is living in have reached Guatemala and other Central American countries, in great measure because in Chiapas, principally in the border region, conditions of great violence exist that have repeatedly been made invisible.

“One must not forget that everything passes through the Chiapas border: migrants, drugs, arms and all kinds of illegal traffic. Here in the South we share with the Northern border kidnapping, the disappearance of migrants, executions and the murder of women.”

The civil organisms demonstrated that the arrival in the state of the caravan that Javier Sicilia heads “means the opportunity to meet together as peoples, communities and individuals, to share our experiences in relation to the situation of violence and death” provoked by the government of Felipe Calderón “with the pretext of the fight against organized crime.” They warned that: “the objective of the caravan is meeting with civil society and those who have been affected by the war, and therefore we condemn any attempt by the authorities and the political parties to capitalize on the mobilization for political-electoral purposes.”

The organisms expressed their solidarity and sympathy with the causes of the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity, as well as its rejection of the projected national security law and “the militarist focus.”

For Chiapas in particular they demanded an end to the counterinsurgency war and to the harassment of Zapatista communities or those of adherent to the Other Campaign, “and to all the peoples that defend their territory and their autonomy,” as well as “the liberation of political prisoners, free and safe transit for our migrant brothers, and that they fulfill the San Andrés Accords.”

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Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2011/09/13/politica/012n1pol

Sicilia to Meet with Legislature; plans to head for Chiapas in September

Sicilia: In Spite of the Betrayals, We Will Renew Dialogue with the Legislature on Wednesday

 Para leer en español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2011/08/15/politica/010n1pol

* “The lords of death must ask the nation and the victims for pardon,” points out the poet

By: Víctor Ballinas and Alonso Urrutia

In front of the new seat of the Senate of the Republic, the poet Javier Sicilia assured yesterday that “our movement is for peace, and peace is not possible without dialogue.” Therefore, he announced that despite “the betrayals, early morning assaults and simulations” of the legislators, on Wednesday, August 17, “we will renew the dialogue” with the Legislative Power. Sicilia explained that: “the signs of sensitivity that the Legislature has sent in recent days have led to initiate a process of linking with it to establish the conditions in which we will renew the dialogue.”

Nevertheless, he assured, “our position with respect to the National Security Law, on hold for approval or rejection as an act of good will by citizen demand, is not only obstinate, but we will fight for, like we already did in Chapultepec Castle, and as we have done throughout this march, a national law of citizen and human security, that takes into account the people for the reconstruction of the nation’s social fabric.”

Before around 3, 000 people that marched with him from the National Museum of Anthropology and History to the official residence of Los Pinos, and from there to the new seat of the Senate, the poet emphasized: “the national security law must be entirely restated and with a disposition by part of the Legislature to listen to and assume other proposals, other approaches, other readings that will help us find the necessary balances where the security of the citizens and peace are the principal axes. The proposal presented by the National Autonomous University Mexico (UNAM) goes in that direction,” he underscored.

He remembered that the dialogue in en Chapultepec Castle started with the Republic’s two powers: the Executive and the Legislative. “In those firm, strong, real, but respectful meetings encuentros –as true dialogues must be–, we were witnesses to the blow of the hand of the President of the Republic, but also to the opening of the heart for seeking together, in work groups, attention to victims, and although in a barely enunciated way, the will to change the tragic direction of this war.”

With the legislators “we were also witnesses to an opening of the heart that led them to accept with six contusions our substantive demands: yes to a law for victims, yes to a truth commission, yes to a substantive increase so that none of our young men stop having access to education, yes to the approval of political reform, and two ambiguous silences.

“The first was to our rejection of the national security law, whose roots want to legitimize the horror of the war and open the way to the country’s militarization; the second, with regard to the pending matter that we have had since 17 years ago with the indigenous peoples, and whose ominous face is treason to the San Andrés Accords and the systematic destruction of their cultures.”

Sicilia made a call, in the name of the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignidad, “to this nation’s powers that together, without betraying the word, putting our eyes on the country’s wounded heart, let us construct peace. We also call on the Lords of Death that in the name of that beautiful word they turn their eyes to their heart and stop their cruelty, their hate and eagerness for power. Nothing, nothing of what they desire is worth more than a life… ask the nation for pardon, for yourselves and ask the victims to whom you have caused so much damage.”

He indicated that the asymmetric relationship between the United States and Mexico is submitting our country’s national security to their military manuals and logic.

He announced that the second week of September they will begin a caravan to the country’s south: “we remember that there, more than 17 years ago, in the Chiapas mountains, was established one of the highest and most profound examples of dignity that continues illuminating the country’s darkness. The faces and names denied to the Indian peoples appeared, which shook up the nation and reminded us of the profound roots of the injustice that are of long standing in Mexico.

“The Zapatistas, with respect, independence and brotherhood, have not stopped accompanying us since the first hours of our walking. The desolate experiences of our Central American brothers that pound our consciences and add their sorrows to our hearts also live there.”

Sicilia was the last speaker, after more than a dozen stories from family members of victims of the drug war.

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Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada

Monday, August 15, 2011

http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2011/08/15/politica/010n1pol