Oaxaca/Guerrero/National: Political Prisoners, Teachers and Activists Freed. Others Awaiting Rulings on their Cases

On December 28th, 12 political prisoners were released, mainly teachers attached to the National Coordination of Education Workers (CNTE in its Spanish acronym) and activists. The spokesperson for Section 22 of Oaxaca, Wilber Santiago, declared that this act signifies a triumph for the CNTE, since the teachers were fighting for more than five years for their freedom.

The people who were released are: Leonel Manzano, Sara Altamirano, Mario Olivera Osorio, Lauro Atilano Grijalbo Villalobos, Luis Gutierrez Saldivar, David Vargas Araujo, Alejandra Chavez Chavez, Alejandro Sandoval Martinez, Faustino Diego, Alberto Sandoval Rodriguez, Jose Ambrosio Martinez and Enrique Warrior Aviña.

“We thank the members of the new Government who knew how to keep the promise given to the democratic teachers’ movement”, the ex-prisoners said. The secretary general of Section 22 of the CNTE, Eloy Lopez, said for his part that, “today is not a celebration, it is a struggle and protest to demand the release of all political prisoners in the country who are still behind bars as hostages of an authoritarian policy that was implemented by Enrique Peña Nieto.”

His release was celebrated by the senator from Morena, Nestora Salgado, who on December 14th gave the Secretariat of the Interior (SEGOB in its Spanish acronym) a list of 199 cases of detainees that she considers “political prisoners” (180 men and 19 women), and who seek to benefit from an eventual amnesty law.

On December 28th, members of the Movement for the Freedom of Political Prisoners from the state of Guerrero demanded the release of 19 members of the Council of Ejidos and Communities Opposed to the La Parota Dam (CECOP in its Spanish acronym) and the Community Police of the Regional Coordinator of Community Authorities (CRAC in its Spanish acronym), who claim they are imprisoned unjustly, without evidence and imputed fabricated crimes. Kenya Hernandez, a member of the movement, said that in meetings with officials of the Ministry of the Interior (SRGOB) they were informed that the process will be slow, as the amnesty law is in progress.

It should be explained that some people do not want to be released through an amnesty law but to be cleared of the crimes that have been imputed to them.

For more information in Spanish:

Agradecen presos políticos de CNTE libertad a AMLO (El Imparcial de Oaxaca, 30 de diciembre de 2018)

Maestros que fueran presos políticos son liberados por AMLO; “Agradecemos a los integrantes del nuevo Gobierno que supieron cumplir la palabra dada al movimiento democrático magisterial”: Leonel Manzano (Revolución 3.0, 30 de diciembre de 2018)

Liberan a 12 presos políticos ligados a la CNTE; aquí algunos casos que se revisarán para amnistía (Animal Político, 29 de diciembre de 2018)

Exigen liberación de 19 presos políticos de Guerrero (Regeneración, 28 de diciembre de 2018)

AMLO va por la liberación de indígenas y maestros: se da a conocer la primera lista con 25 presos políticos que serán sujetos de amnistía (Revolución 3,0, 27 de diciembre de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Guerrero / National: Nestora Salgado announces campaign for the freedom of political prisoners (September 16th, 2018)

 

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Guerrero/National: Caravan 43 “Hope is Reborn”

(@El Sur)

From December 19th to 26th, fathers and mothers of the 43 students of the Normal Rural School of Ayotzinapa in Iguala, Guerrero, missing since September 2014, caravan 43, Hope is Reborn, within the framework of the 51st Global Action, which began in Tixtla, Guerrero, passed through Morelos, and ended at the Basilica of Guadalupe, Mexico City.

They denounced that 51 months have elapsed since the forced disappearance of their relatives without any result being achieved. They asked for justice in their case, in the case of political prisoners, the thousands of disappeared in Mexico, and the constant violations of human rights in the country. Several civil and social organizations also joined these protests.

Caravan 43 “Hope is Reborn” was named in this way because of the possibility that the new government led by Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO) will return the disappeared. “The idea is to continue touring and informing that the former administration of former President of Mexico, Enrique Peña Nieto, tried to bury the Ayotzinapa case and impose the historical truth”, said the spokesman of the parents of the 43 missing teachers, Meliton Ortega. He warned that despite the fact that the “new government has signed a decree, we want to say that it is not enough and it is necessary to go beyond the signing of a simple document; we need them to advance each of the lines [of investigation] until we know the truth and the whereabouts of the 43.”

For more information in Spanish:

Finalizan protestas de la 51 Acción Global por los 43 en la Basílica de Guadalupe (La Jornada, 27 de diciembre de 2018)

Padres de los 43 van a la Basílica; el obispo Rangel los recibe y en una misa pide saber la verdad y justicia (El Sur, 27 de diciembre de 2018)

Llega a Iguala la caravana 43 La Esperanza Renace, en el segundo día de actividades (La Jornada Guerrero, 21 de diciembre de 2018)

Llega a Taxco la Caravana 43 La Esperanza Renace, de normalistas (La Jornada Guerrero, 21 de diciembre de 2018)

Llega a Iguala la caravana de lucha por los 43 desaparecidos; demanda castigo a Peña Nieto (El Sur, 21 de diciembre de 2018)

Padres de los 43 inician caravana La Esperanza Renace en Tixtla (Quadratin Guerrero, 19 de diciembre de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Guerrero/National: Decree Establishes Truth Commission for Ayotzinapa Case
(December 19th, 2018)

Guerrero/National/International: CNDH and IACHR Ayotzinapa Reports (December 14th, 2018)

Guerrero/National: Ayotzinapa, Four Years On… (October 1st, 2018)

Guerrero/National: Incoming Government Confirms Creation of Truth Commission for Ayotzinapa Case (Aug. 13th, 12018)

Guerrero/National: Obstruction in Formation of Truth Commission in Ayotzinapa Case Denounced (Aug. 8th, 2018)

Guerrero: Classmates of Ayotzinapa 43 Graduate (Aug. 2nd, 2018)

Guerrero/National: Federal Court Orders Creation Truth Commission to Reopen Investigation of Ayotzinapa Case (July 12th, 2018)

 

National/International: Inter-American Court Rules Mexico Responsible for Sexual Torture of Women in Atenco

(@Centro ProDH)

On December 21st, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR) determined that the Mexican State was responsible for the sexual torture of which 11 women were victims during a 2006 police operation in San Salvador Atenco, Mexico State.

It should be recalled that on May 3rd and 4th, 2006, police forces carried out an operation in San Salvador Atenco supposedly to “re-establish order” during a series of protests by the inhabitants over the construction of an airport. More than 200 people were arrested during the raids. 50 of them were women, 31 of whom later reported sexual assaults by the police.

“The use of force by the police authorities when arresting them was not legitimate or necessary, but it was also excessive and unacceptable due to the sexual and discriminatory nature of the aggressions suffered. The Court concluded that the indiscriminate use of force by the State in this case, as a result of an absence of adequate regulation, a lack of training of the agents, inefficient supervision and monitoring of the operation, and a misconception that violence of some justified the use of force against all”, the Court said.

It should be emphasized that the judgments of the IACHR are binding for Mexico, and therefore the State is obliged to comply with all the measures ordered by the Inter-American Court. The Miguel Agustin Pro Juárez Human Rights Center declared that, “with this historic sentence, the State has the possibility to put an end to impunity in the emblematic case of Atenco and to take concrete measures to prevent such violations of human rights from being reproduced in other contexts. The full and prompt compliance with the sentence announced by the Court today will be a clear sign of the new government’s commitment to human rights. Moreover, in a context in which the security model is under discussion in Mexico, with the intention of creating a militarized National Guard, the sentence issued by the Court in the Atenco case – as with the resolution published yesterday regarding the Alvarado case – obllige the Mexican Legislative Power to review the legislation that it intends to pass in light of the standards set by the Inter-American Court, which reinforce the perspective of citizen security of a civil nature and external supervision of security institutions.”

For more information in Spanish:

Comunicado MÉXICO ES RESPONSABLE POR TORTURA SEXUAL DE MUJERES EN ATENCO (Corte IDH, 21 de diciembre de 2018)

En sentencia histórica, Corte Interamericana ordena al Estado mexicano sancionar represión y tortura en Atenco (Centro ProDH, 21 de diciembre de 2018)

Ilegítimo e innecesario, el uso de la fuerza en Atenco: Corte Interamericana al notificar sentencia al Estado mexicano (Aristegui Noticias, 21 de diciembre de 2018)

Culpa Corte IDH al Estado por tortura de mujeres de Atenco (La Jornada, 21 de diciembre de 2018)

Responsabilidad internacional del Estado mexicano en actos de tortura contra 11 mujeres de Atenco: CoIDH (Proceso, 21 de diciembre de 2018)

Corte IDH: El Estado mexicano violó DDHH de mujeres en Atenco, cuando Peña gobernaba Edomex (Sin Embargo, 21 de diciembre de 2018)

CIDH responsabiliza al Estado por tortura sexual de 11 mujeres en Atenco (Radio Fórmula, 21 de diciembre de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

National: Hearing of Cases of Sexual Torture in San Salvador Atenco at IACHR Court (November 29th, 2017)

Mexico: IACHR Demands Investigation into Case of Female Victims of Sexual Abuse in Atenco in 2006 (October 10th, 2016)

 

 

Chiapas: denunciation of criminalization against environmental activists in San Cristóbal de Las Casas

 

@SIPAZ

On December 27^th, during a press conference that took place at the Human Rights Center Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas, the board of Colonia Maya in the municipality San Cristóbal de Las Casas denounced the existence of arrest warrants against its members and demanded their immediate cancellation.

In June 2016, the construction of a housing estate caused a flooding that affected 20 families in Colonia Maya. As a reaction, various habitants started to organize themselves to defend their rights and the environmental rights.

Since then, the members of Colonia Maya’s board faced various threats and the criminalization of their movement to defend their district.

Three moths ago, the board met with representatives of Manuel Velasco’s government who proposed the construction of a rain drain in the settlement. The board responded that they could not take any decisions without the participation of the the Colonia’s assembly. The arrest warrants were released after that meeting.

In the words of the board about the criminalization: “We are in fear. Fear that justice one more will be bought. During the last days we have affirmed once more that the legal authorities in our country can be bought. We know that some of our members have received arrest warrants without committing any crime. We are being accused of kidnapping, when we only ever acted peacefully, consulting and respecting the settlement’s assembly.”

They solicited “that the hostility and the criminalization against human environmental rights defenders for the land and the territory are eradicated or cease as they are pillars of democracy and with their work they can promote and strengthen the civil participation”.

For more information in Spanish:

Cese la criminalización a defensores de la Madre Tierra (27 de diciembre de 2018, Chiapas Denuncia Publica).

Colonos de la Maya denuncian que les fueron inventados delitos (27 de diciembre de 2018, Noticias Voz e Imagen de Chiapas).

Se defienden activistas demandados (27 de diciembre de 2018, El Heraldo de Chiapas).

Criminalización por la defensa de la Madre Tierra (21 de junio de 2017, Centro de Derechos Humanos Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas).

For more information from SIPAZ :

National: 161 Defenders and 40 Journalists Murdered in Last Presidential Term of Office (December 14th, 2018)

Nacional : Se pospone entrega de concesiones de agua vía Internet por seis meses en medio de protestas. (17 de octubre de 2018).

Oaxaca: Verdict of the Popular Community Trial against the Mexican State and the mining companies

On December 10th, on the International Human Rights Day as part of a political act in front of the Government Palace villages in Oaxaca-City, communities and organizations that participated in the “Popular Community Trial against the State and Mining Companies in Oaxaca” last October publicly presented the final verdict.

It should be remembered that in the Popular Community Trial participated 52 communities who presented 22 cases of affectations caused by mining in 5 of the state’s regions including – says the verdict- “irreversible affectations to the ecosystem, river contamination, fractures in the social structure and generalized insecurity in the regions, where those mining projects operate through mining companies, shock groups and state authorities”.

The verdict put forward the necessity to rescind the 322 concessions and the 41 valid mining projects within the State “as those were imposed without previous, free and informed consent by the communities and while violating our right to self-determination and autonomy to our cultural integrity, to administrate and control our territories and to maintain the collective property of our lands and communal natural goods”.

Equally, it demanded the immediate suspension of the issue of quarrying rights “until a new legal framework has been elaborated that fully and effectively respects the indigenous people’s rights as they were established in international treaties and the Constitution, until the repeal of the current mining law and others that protect the relations with that industry”. Likewise, it urged the authorities to pass laws and public policies which protect the indigenous people’s rights, which recognize them as subjects to public rights and include the in effective mechanisms of integral reparations for the caused damage.

The legal judgment also put forward the necessity to protect those who defend their territories so that they can do so in “conditions of liberty and security” and it demanded that “the politics of criminalization against the social protest are stopped, that the people responsible for assassinations are punished and that the disappeared territorial activists are presented alive immediately as well as the suspension of arrest warrants issued for the same reasons, individual and collective threats”.

The political act ended proclaiming “Yes to life, no to mining!” and “Neither gold nor silver, mining kills!”.

The report about the civil trial details that until 2017 there haven been registered 42 mining projects by 38 companies from Canada, the United States, Peru, Australia and Mexico. 36 of them in stage of exploration, 2 in development, one was postponed and 2 are already in the phase of commercial exploitation.

For more information in Spanish:

“Oaxaca territorio prohibido para la minería”: exigencia de pueblos, comunidades y organizaciones frente al nuevo gobierno federal (Pronunciamiento e Informe, 10 de diciembre de 2018)

Juicio Popular Comunitario contra el Estado y las Empresas Mineras (Vídeo, 10 de diciembre de 2018)

Comunidades indígenas de Oaxaca exigen la prohibición total de la minería en el estado (Animal Político, 10 de diciembre de 2018)

Demandan pueblos que Oaxaca sea territorio libre de minería (NVI Noticias, 12 de diciembre de 2018)

“Oaxaca, territorio prohibido para la minería”: exigencia de comunidades al nuevo gobierno (Desinformémonos, 10 de diciembre de 2018)

Repudian proyectos de mineras en Oaxaca (La Jornada, 11 de diciembre de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ :

Oaxaca: Popular Community Trial against the State and the Mining Companies Held (October 16th, 2018)

Oaxaca: Popular Community Trial against the State and the Mining Companies Held

Oaxaca: Anuncian juicio popular contra empresas mineras. (9 de agosto de 2018)

National/International: UNHCHR Asks Congress for Civil Controlled National Guard and that it Last Five Years Maximum

Jan Jarab, UNHCHR (@Ibero.mx)

On December 11th, in a meeting with members of the Constitutional Points Commission of the Chamber of Deputies, the Representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) in Mexico, Jan Jarab, requested the Congress of the Union to adhere to the international commitments that Mexico has in the area of ​​Human Rights when carrying out the legislative reforms that create to the National Guard, “proposed by the new Mexican President, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, to address the security, violence and crime problems in the country.”

Jan Jarab reiterated his concern about the continuity of the militarized public security model, stating that, “today we have no doubt about the disastrous effect of the militarization of public security in Mexico in terms of human rights.” He stressed that, “there is a very high rate of lethality derived from supposed ‘confrontations’ between the armed forces and criminals, an index close to ‘perfect lethality’ (which never appears even in contexts of real armed conflicts), which can only be explained by the use of extrajudicial executions.” He also warned of the fact that “a decision to replace the federal civil body with a new body of a military nature, and in addition through a constitutional change, could be practically irreversible.”

Jan Jarab acknowledged that, “the security paradigm change promised by the current President of the Republic in his election campaign was a source of hope. We want to preserve that meaning” and stressed that they coincide with Lopez Obrador in “the desire to materialize peace, overcome the logic of ‘war’, fight corruption, prioritize prevention through social programs for young people, reduce economic inequality and move to a less repressive approach of regulation as regards drug policy.”

Among the considerations that UNHCHR requested to be taken into account are, among others: “ensuring that the immediate line of authority is of civil order”; “That the constitutional transformation that is intended to be carried out is temporary and therefore be reflected in transitory articles that lose their validity in a period no longer than five years”; and “that the constitutional design contemplates the main lines of a program for the strengthening of civil bodies and that a series of safeguards be introduced, such as the subjection of the use of force to a legal framework, the national registry of detention, the impossibility of depriving a person of freedom in military installations, the unconditional recognition of the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court and the design of plans and strategies in matters of security.”

For more information in Spanish:

ONU pide a Congreso mexicano tener en cuenta los Derechos Humanos en creación de Guardia Nacional (ONU-DH, 11 de diciembre de 2018)

Palabras de Jan Jarab, Representante en México de la ONU-DH, durante la Audiencia sobre Estrategia de Seguridad (ONU DH, 11 de diciembre de 2018)

ONU-DH pide que Guardia Nacional sea temporal y con mando civil (El Universal, 11 de diciembre de 2018)

La Guardia Nacional “podría ser la repetición del mismo error” cometido por Calderón y Peña: ONU (Proceso, 11 de diciembre de 2018)

Comisionado de la ONU reprocha en San Lázaro plan de crear la Guardia Nacional (La Jornada, 12 de diciembre de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

National: Faced with Rejection of National Guard, AMLO Proposes New Consultation (December 12th, 2018)

National: Supreme Court Invalidates Security Law; AMLO Announces National Peace and Security Plan 2018-2024  (November 27th, 2018)

National: CNDH Asks SCJN to Declare Interior Security Law Unconstitutional (November 7th, 2018)

National: Reactions to Minister for Supreme Court’s Proposal on Interior Security Law (November 7th, 2018)

 

Guerrero/National: Decree Establishes Truth Commission for Ayotzinapa Case

(@SIPAZ)

On November 3rd, in one of his first actions as new president, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO) signed a decree that establishes the creation of a truth commission to resolve the case of the forced disappearance of 43 students from the Ayotzinapa Normal Rural School, in Iguala, Guerrero, in September 2014.

“With this agreement, we began the search process for the youths of Ayotzinapa. With this decree the whole government is ordered, in what corresponds to the Executive Power, so that all the support is given to you, to the commission, to arrive at the truth. The whole government is going to help in this purpose”, AMLO told the parents of the missing students. He promised that, “there will be no impunity neither in this so sad, painful, case nor any other.”

The Commission which will start working within a maximum of 30 working days will be made up of the relatives of the disappeared students or their representatives, their lawyers, a representative of the Secretariats of the Interior, Foreign Affairs and Finance, as well as professional and technical experts who are required.

Alejandro Encinas, the new undersecretary of Human Rights of the Interior and who will lead the new Commission, said the Commission will resume the investigations carried out by the Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts (IGIE), the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), as well as the “truncated” investigation of the PGR. “To clarify the case is the beginning of a state policy that places the victims at the center,” assured Encinas.

At the end of the event, family members of the students expressed that the decree gives them hope, although “confidence will be gained as the search for the truth advances”. For his part, Vidulfo Rosales, a member of the Tlachinollan Mountain Human Rights Center and a lawyer for the relatives of the victims, welcomed the inauguration of a “new stage in the struggle and the search for the 43 compañeros, but this is only the the beginning, all the invstigation lines that the Peña Nieto government did not want to promote and which remained stagnant will be retaken.” Santiago Aguirre, deputy director of the Pro Center, stressed that the decree instructs the entire federal administration to collaborate in the clarification of the facts, “given that in the past, the federal government obstructed the process.”

Outside the National Palace, some parents of missing persons protested because they were not allowed to enter the event and demanded that immediate mechanisms of search and investigation be applied in all cases of disappearance, not only Ayotzinapa.

According to Alberto Solis Castro, director of Services and Consultancy for Peace (SERAPAZ), resolving this emblematic case “can be a spearhead and hope for all of the over 30,000 disappeared in the country. It is a first effort of that must be turned into something structural to address the serious human rights crisis we are in.”

For more information in Spanish:

AMLO presidente: ¿qué cambia con la Comisión de la Verdad creada por López Obrador para aclarar el caso de los 43 estudiantes desaparecidos de Ayotzinapa? (BBC Mundo, 3 de diciembre de 2018)

Decreto de AMLO, ¿nueva esperanza para padres de los 43 de Ayotzinapa? (CNN, 3 de diciembre de 2018)

Crea AMLO Comisión de la Verdad por caso Ayotzinapa (La Jornada, 3 de diciembre de 2018)

López Obrador formaliza comisión para la verdad y justicia del caso Ayotzinapa (Proceso, 3 de diciembre de 2018)

AMLO firma decreto de creación de la comisión para el caso Ayotzinapa; retomará investigación de PGR (Animal Político, 3 de diciembre de 2018)

¿Qué implica el decreto para la Comisión de la Verdad en el caso Ayotzinapa? (ADN Político, 4 de diciembre de 2018)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Guerrero/National/International: CNDH and IACHR Ayotzinapa Reports  (December 14th, 2018)

Guerrero/National: Ayotzinapa, Four Years On…  (October 1st, 2018)

Guerrero/National: Incoming Government Confirms Creation of Truth Commission for Ayotzinapa Case (Aug. 13th, 12018)

Guerrero/National: Obstruction in Formation of Truth Commission in Ayotzinapa Case Denounced (Aug. 8th, 2018)Guerrero: Classmates of Ayotzinapa 43 Graduate

Guerrero: Classmates of Ayotzinapa 43 Graduate (Aug. 2nd, 2018)

Guerrero/National: Federal Court Orders Creation Truth Commission to Reopen Investigation of Ayotzinapa Case (July 12th, 2018)

Guerrero/Nacional : CNDH informa que se tiene a un preso inocente por el caso Ayotzinapa (22 de junio de 2018)

Guerrero/Nacional/Internacional : Llamados a redigirir investigación en el caso Ayotzinapa (14 de junio de 2018)