Chiapas/National: CNI- CIG “We Are Living through the War of Capital against the Peoples of the World”, Convenes Fourth Assembly

In a communiqué published on November 7th, the National Indigenous Congress (CNI) and the Indigenous Government Council (CIG) convened its Fourth Assembly.

This occurs in the midst of the “war that comes from above and that aims to destroy Mother Earth to make millions of profits from selling minerals, water, forests, rivers, fracking hydrocarbons, building industrial corridors, destroying the territory with supposed clean energy projects, putting volcano villages at risk with the Huexca thermoelectric plant, building the infrastructure that accompanies the dispossession in the south-southeast of the country with its megaprojects, negotiating with death in all its forms.” Added to this “the violence and repression that comes from bad government at all levels and the growing presence of narco-paramilitary groups that serve it.”

The objectives of the assembly include “making the struggle for life great and dismantling this system of death”, “weaving our web of resistance and rebellion” and “taking collective criteria in our commitment that life is for our Mother Earth and for the peoples of the world.”

The event will take place at Caracol Jacinto Canek – CIDECI Unitierra of San Cristobal de Las Casas from December 18th to 20th, another activity in the “Combo for Life: December of Resistance and Rebellion” convened by the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) throughout that month. Apart from December 19th, the date on which a plenary open to observers and the media is scheduled, the event “will be of a closed nature and access will only be allowed to delegates, councilors and representatives of the towns of the CNI- CIG and special guests. The latter will be contacted by the CNI-CIG Coordination and Monitoring Commission.”

For more information in Spanish:

CONVOCATORIA A LA CUARTA ASAMBLEA NACIONAL ENTRE EL CONGRESO NACIONAL INDÍGENA Y EL CONCEJO INDÍGENA DE GOBIERNO (CNI CIG, 7 de noviembre de 2019)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Chiapas/National/International: EZLN Invitation to “Celebration of Life: December of Resistance and Rebellion” (November 10, 2019)

National/International: CNI Mobilizations for Global Day of Struggle in Defense of Life and our Territories – “SAMIR FLORES LIVES” (October 17, 2019)

National: CNI Invitation to “SAMIR FLORES LIVES” Global Day of Struggle, October 12, 2019

(September 29, 2019)

 

Oaxaca: CNI Holds “The Isthmus is Ours” National Assembley in Juchitan (September 22, 2019)

Guerrero: CNI Denounces Kidnapping and Murder of Two Members (May 11, 2019)

National: Third Assembly of National Indigenous Congress and Indigenous Council of Government (CNI-CIG) in Mexico City (March 14, 2019)

Chiapas/National/International: EZLN Invitation to “Celebration of Life: December of Resistance and Rebellion”

In a comminiqué published on November 6th, the Sixth Commission of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) issued an invitation to participate in the “Celebration of Life: December of Resistance and Rebellion”. This event will include:

– the Second Edition of the Ciné Puy Ta Cuxlejaltic Festival (December 7th to 14th);

– the first CompArte of Dance “Dance Another World” (from 15th to 20th);

– the Forum in Defense of Territory and Mother Earth in coordination with the National Indigenous Congress (CNI) to be held on December 21st and 22nd;

– the Second International Meeting of Women who Struggle (December 26th to 29th);

– and, the celebration of the 26th anniversary of the start of the “War against Oblivion) (December 31st, 2019 and January 1st, 2020,

The statement also specifies the places where the different activities will take place as well as emails through which one can register to participate.

For more information in Spanish:

COMBO POR LA VIDA: DICIEMBRE DE RESISTENCIA Y REBELDÍA (EZLN, 6 de noviembre de 2019)

La Comisión Sexta del EZLN convoca a sus actividades de diciembre (La Jornada, 6 de noviembre de 2019)

EZLN anuncia «Combo por la vida: diciembre de resistencia y rebeldía» (Chiapas Paralelo, 6 de noviembre de 2019)

EL EZLN organiza actos para recordar el 26 aniversario del levantamiento indígena (La Jornada, 7 de noviembre de 2019)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Chiapas: EZLN Convenes Second International Encounter of Women who Struggle (September 26, 2019)

Chiapas: EZLN Announces Creation of New Caracoles, Autonomous Municipalities, Centers of Autonomous Resistance and Rebellion and Various Other Initiatives (August 25, 2019)

Chiapas/National: Commission for Concord and Pacification Seeks to Meet Secretariat of Government to Explore Possibiity of Dialogue between Federal Government and EZLN (May 30, 2019)

National: CNI, EZLN and Indigenous Organizations Announce “Zapata Lives, Samir Lives, The Struggle Continues” (March 21, 2019)

National: Controversy between EZLN and AMLO Supporters Floods Social Networks    (January 18, 2019)

Chiapas/National/International: EZLN Invitation to 25th Anniversary of Zapatista Uprising and Meeting of Networks (December 11, 2018)

National: Debate on Proposals for New Constitutional Reform on Rights Of Indigenous Peoples Continues

@MVS Noticias

On November 6th, in the framework of the forum “Challenges and Perspectives of the Constitutional and Legal Reform of the Rights of Indigenous and Afro-Mexican Peoples”, representatives of Indigenous and Afro-Mexican Peoples as well as authorities met at the headquarters of the Ministry of the Interior in Mexico City.

The Commissioner for Dialogue with the Indigenous Peoples of Mexico, Josefina Bravo Rangel, endorsed the “commitment and responsibility to continue the path to harmonize and reform the Constitution so that collective rights are recognized, both of indigenous peoples and of the Afro-Mexican population.” “It goes without saying that we have a debt to the indigenous peoples of Mexico by having incorporated their rights in the constitutional reform of 2001, leaving aside the oral issues of the initiative of the Commission of Concord and Pacification (Cocopa).” she stressed. She also expressed that “new airs of hope travel the country, new political circumstances force us to place the incorporation of indigenous rights in the Constitution on the legislative agenda based on the agreements of San Andres Larrainzar (signed between the Zapatista Liberation Army National -EZLN- and the federal government in 1996).”

“On the road for the constitutional recognition of rights, the participation of all the committed voices that constitute the broad multicultural and political mosaic of the country will be necessary, which will allow promoting a new social pact based on the principles of equality, interculturality and with a gender perspective”, she added.

In addition to the National Institute of Indigenous Peoples (INPI in its Spanish acronym) and the National Human Rights Commission CNDH, the president of the Bicameral Commission of Concord and Pacification of the Congress of the Union, Deputy Eduardo Zarzosa Sanchez, as well as the president and secretary of the Committee on Indigenous Affairs in the Senate of the Republic, Maria Leonor Noyola Cervantes and Xochitl Galvez Ruiz, respectively.

For more information in Spanish:

Indígenas y afromexicanos presentan en SG propuestas de integración (La Jornada, 6 de noviembre de 2019)

Incluirán derechos indígenas en Constitución (MVS Noticias, 6 de noviembre de 2019)

Refrenda CDPIM compromiso de impulsar reformas constitucionales en materia de derechos de los pueblos indígenas y afromexicano (Secretaría de Gobierno, 6 de noviembre de 2019)

For more information from SIPAZ:

National/Chiapas: Forums on Process of Free, Prior and Informed Consultation for Constitutional and Legal Reform of Rights of Indigenous and Afro-Mexican Peoples Go Ahead (July 29, 2019)

National: Process of “Free, Prior and Informed Consultation” on Constitutional and Legal Reform of Rights of Indigenous and Afro-Mexican Peoples Begins (June 27, 2019)

National/International: UN Special Rapporteur for Indigenous Peoples Calls on AMLO Government to Comply with International Standards on Indigenous Consultation for Megaprojects in their Territories, March 19th, 2019

Oaxaca/National: Federal Government Presents National Program for Indigenous Peoples December 28th 2018

National/International: UN Special Rapporteur on Rights of Indigenous Peoples Presents Report in Mexico City One Year after her Visit (October 22nd, 2018)

Oaxaca/National: Federal Government Presents National Program for Indigenous Peoples (January 14, 2019)

Chiapas/Mexico: Mexican Offers Public Apology to Indigenous Women Raped and Tortured by Military in Chiapas in 1994

Photo: chiapasparalelo

On October 18th, a public apology was given in the central square of Ocosingo by the Mexican government to the Gonzalez Perez sisters for sexual torture 25 years ago.

On June 4th, 1994, soldiers deprived Ana, Beatriz, and Celia Gonzalez Perez, and their mother Delia Perez of their freedom when they tried to cross a Mexican Army checkpoint in Jalisco ejido, municipality of Altamirano. The military accused them of being members of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN in its Spanish acronym), and punished them for this, raping them.

They were arrested and for two hours, through sexual torture, they tried to force them to declare themselves members of the armed group and to betray other people. They resisted and, when released, criminally denounced the facts, were subjected to examinations showing evidence of gang rape, but the case was taken over by martial law and closed, denying access to justice.

In 2001, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) declared the responsibility of the Mexican State, demanding punishment for those responsible and reparation for the damage to the victims.

After 25 years, in the public square of the municipality of Ocosingo, through the voice of the Secretary of the Interior, Olga Sanchez Cordero, and the undersecretary of Human Rights, Alejandro Encinas, the Mexican government apologized to the Gonzalez Perez sisters, before some five hundred people, including public officials and inhabitants of the region.

During the event, the great absentee was the Mexican Army, the institution to which the men whom the sisters identified as their torturers belonged. Ana, Beatriz, Celia and their mother Delia, demanded during all these years, that they be military commanders who recognize the facts, who apologize and who are brought to justice. In Ana’s words: “This act of public apology is not really an act of public apology because we clearly said that we wanted representatives of the SEDENA to be present for them to ask us for a public apology, because they were the ones who committed the grievances. This public apology is not complete.”

In the indigenous normative system, it is the person responsible for the crime who must ask for forgiveness, because it is their identification before the community. Ana insisted that they reject the presence of military personnel in indigenous areas. “We do not want the military in our villages, because the government says they are the ones who protect us, but on the contrary, they are the ones who hurt us.”

Among the agreements that Olga Sanchez Cordero, Alejandro Encinas and the indigenous women signed, is to continue the investigation to bring to trial the soldiers involved. However, they insisted that this process not be individualized, and assume that the rape was not an independent or autonomous act committed by the soldiers, but an institutional action that obeyed a war strategy against the EZLN.

For more information in Spanish:

El Estado mexicano ofrece disculpa pública a indígenas torturadas y violadas por militares en Chiapas, Proceso, 18 de octubre de 2019

Ofrece el Estado Mexicano disculpas a indígenas violadas, La Jornada, 18 de octubre de 2019

Gobierno mexicano ofrece disculpa a indígenas violadas por el Ejército en 1994; “¿dónde está Sedena?”, preguntan ellas, Aristegui noticas, 18 de octubre de 2019

Video: Disculpa Publica Y Reconocimiento De Responsabilidad Que Ofrece El Estado Mexicano Ocosingo Chiapas, Youtube, 18 de octubre de 2019

For more information from SIPAZ:

Chiapas: Public Act of Recognition of State Responsibility in Gonzalez Sisters Case Announced (September 2, 2019)

Chiapas: Tzeltal Women Tortured and Raped by Military in 1994 Denounce Total Impunity (June 9, 2019)

Chiapas: Indigenous Tzeltal women raped by the Mexican Army accept “compensation” with conditions (October 25, 2010)

Chiapas: EZLN Convenes Second International Encounter of Women who Struggle

Photo: Tragaluz (First International Encounter of Women who Struggle)

On September 19th, the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN in its Spanish acronym) published a statement in which it convened the Second International Encounter of Women who Struggle, which will take place from December 26th to 29th, 2019 at the Caracol located in Morelia ejido.

The communiqué signed by the coordinators of the Five Zones says that for the Second Meeting “only one issue will be addressed: Violence against Women, in two parts: “One of denunciation and another of what we are going to do to stop that massacre that they are doing to us.” They commented that, “nobody is going to get peace, freedom, justice for us”, but “we have to fight, sister and compañera, fight and take them from the ruler. That is why the invitation on the issue of Violence against Women is not only to denounce, but also to say what is done or what was done or what can be done to stop these crimes.”

They said to women who come from other places: “We want you to come and make your denunciation clear. Not to be heard by a judge or a policeman or a journalist, but to be heard by another woman, several women, many women who fight. And so, compañera and sister, your pain is not alone and it unites with other pains. And from so many pains that come together, not only a very great pain comes out, there is also a rage that is like a seed. And if that seed is grown in organization, then pain and rage become resistance and rebellion, as we say here, and we stop waiting for misfortune to touch us or not, and we start doing something, first to stop that violence against us, then to conquer our freedom as the women we are.”

 

 

For more information in Spansih:

CONVOCATORIA AL SEGUNDO ENCUENTRO INTERNACIONAL DE MUJERES QUE LUCHAN, Enlace Zapatista 19 de septiembre de 2019

EZLN convoca al encuentro internacional “Mujeres que Luchan” La Jornada, 19 de septiembre de 2019

For more information from SIPAZ:

Chiapas: EZLN Announces Creation of New Caracoles, Autonomous Municipalities, Centers of Autonomous Resistance and Rebellion and Various Other Initiatives (August 25, 2019)

International/National/Chiapas: Women of the World Express their Support for Zapatista Women

(March 5, 2019)

Chiapas: Second Encounter in Zapatista Territory of Women who Struggle Cancelled

(February 13th, 2019)

Chiapas: First International Gathering for Politics, Art, Sport and Culture for Women in Struggle (March 27, 2018)

Chiapas: EZLN Announces Creation of New Caracoles, Autonomous Municipalities, Centers of Autonomous Resistance and Rebellion and Various Other Initiatives

New Caracol at CIDECI Unitierra

In a statement published on August 17th, Subcomandante Moises, on behalf of the General Command of the Indigenous Revolutionary Clandestine Committee (CG-CCRI in its Spanish acronym) of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN in its Spanish acronym), announced that, in accordance with what was stated by the National Indigenous Congress (CNI in its Spanish acronym), of “going on the offensive and extending the word and action of resistance and rebellion”, the EZLN decided to “break the fence” forming new Caracoles (autonomous regions that will now be 12) and more autonomous Zapatista rebel municipalities in new areas of southeastern Mexico. He also reported on the creation of Centers of Autonomous Resistance and Zapatista Rebellion (CRAREZ in its Spanish acronym), which in most cases “will also be the headquarters of Caracoles, Good Government Councils and Zapatista Rebel Autonomous Municipalities (MAREZ in its Spanish acronym)”.

He stressed that, “who thought that with their counterinsurgency policy of alms, he would divide Zapatismo and buy the loyalty of non-Zapatistas, encouraging confrontation and discouragement, gave the reasons that were needed to convince those brothers and sisters that it is necessary to defend the earth and nature.”

He invited “the Sixth, the Networks, the CNI and the honest people to come and, together with the Zapatista peoples, participate in the construction of the CRAREZ, be it obtaining materials and economic support, be it hammering, cutting, loading, orienting and living with us or in the way and manner that they see that suits them.”

He also summoned a Forum in defense of territory and Mother Earth be held in a Zapatista Caracol on dates to be defined in October “to meet and know the work we have committed to, share problems, difficulties, blows, headaches, but also the seeds that serve to harvest better from the struggle.”

He called the Sixth and the Networks “to begin the analysis and discussion for the formation of an International Network of Resistance and Rebellion, Polo, Nucleus, Federation, Confederation, or whatever it is called, based on the independence and autonomy of those who form it, explicitly renouncing to hegemonize and homogenize, in which mutual solidarity and support are unconditional, share the good and bad experiences of each other’s struggle, and work on the dissemination of the stories from below and to the left.” He announced that “bilateral meetings with groups, collectives and organizations that are working in their geographies” will be convened.

He said that they will invite “THOSE WHO MAKE ART, SCIENCE AND CRITICAL THOUGHT THEIR VOCATION AND LIFE” “to festivals, meetings, seedbeds, parties, exchanges, or whatever those sharings are going to be called”; that they will convene “meetings of relatives of murdered, disappeared and imprisoned, as well as organizations, groups and collectives that accompany [them in] their pain, their anger and their search for truth and justice”, that “a new meeting of Women who fight, in the times, places and modalities that they decide” will be held, possibly “a meeting of otroas” as well as a “meeting of groups, collectives and organizations defending Human Rights, in the form and modality they decide.”

Given this announcement, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador declared that “yesterday there was a Zapatista statement, saying that they were going to expand, that they will create more autonomous municipalities. Welcome. Because this means working for the benefit of communities and peoples.” “More actions, less talk, that is, theory and practice, thought and action. That is what we are sponsoring and we recommend, respectfully”, he said.

In previous days and through three communiqués, Subcomandante Galeano presented a political analysis of the current moment. He stated among other things that, “it rains everywhere and on everyone. At least here below. Perhaps some, just begin to feel the cold drops stinging their body; but for others, and not only for native peoples, it rains on the wet: pillage, robbery, threats, persecution, jail, disappearance, rape, blows, death … and, yes, sometimes alms.” He stressed that “up there they declare that everything is going well, and down here that everything is going wrong, and that it is going to get worse” and that in the present it is sought to cancel “any criticism, pointing out, observation that have as a basis a rigorous and documented analysis.”

He also warned that, “a world economic crisis is coming” recognizing that “anyone who would have stayed (Meade, Anaya, El Bronco or Miss Xerox) would have had to face that “adverse global environment” (this is what Think Tanks of big capital say) and get defeated and look guilty. And everyone would have done and would be doing what the current government does: lie and cover up.” “They would have started celebrating themselves; they would have solemnly declared that a new cycle of hope, work and bonanza began for the territory that is south of the Rio Grande and west of Guatemala and Belize: they would have distributed the same alms although with another name; they would have taken care more than a few things they had promised in the campaign; they would have blamed resentment and envy, the criticisms made of them; would have made calls to unity and patriotism, would have prostrated the same before the designs, bravado and insults of the foreman who, in the troubled and brutal north, drools; and they would have attributed their mistakes to the “adverse international environment,” “he said.

The statement addressed among other issues: the treatment of migrants; the “manner and servile tone and crawling in front of the US government”; “The defeat of secularism”; “The impulse and acceleration of megaprojects and the destruction of territories of the original peoples”; and finally “the encouragement of individualism and the confrontation with the community with the delivery of support [programmes] such as Sowing Life.”

For more information in Spanish:

Enter el telonero (EZLN, 10 de agosto de 2019)

“Reaparecen los pueblos zapatistas para desafiar muro en el Istmo”, anuncia EZLN (El Universal, 10 de agosto de 2019)

Obertura: La realidad como enemiga. (EZLN, 11 de agosto de 2019)

Arriba declaran que todo va bien y aquí abajo todo va mal, acusa EZLN (La Jornada, 11 de agosto de 2019)

“Allá arriba declaran que todo va bien, y acá abajo que todo va mal, y que se va a poner peor”: EZLN ante las problemáticas en México (Desinformémonos, 12 de agosto de 2019)

Adagio-Allegro Molto en mi menor: Una realidad posible. (tomado del Cuaderno de Apuntes del Gato-Perro) (EZLN, 13 de agosto de 2019)

El subcomandante Galeano acusa a AMLO de “mentir” y “maquillar” la realidad financiera de México (Proceso, 15 de agosto de 2019)

Rompimos el cerco (CCRI-CG del EZLN, 17 de agosto de 2019)

EZLN crea siete nuevos Caracoles (La Jornada, 18 de agosto de 2019)

El EZLN anuncia 11 “Caracoles” y 16 municipios rebeldes nuevos; AMLO le responde: “Bienvenidos…” (Sin Embrago, 19 de agosto de 2019)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Chiapas/National: Commission for Concord and Pacification Seeks to Meet Secretariat of Government to Explore Possibiity of Dialogue between Federal Government and EZLN (May 30, 2019)

National: CNI, EZLN and Indigenous Organizations Announce “Zapata Lives, Samir Lives, The Struggle Continues” (March 21, 2019)

National: Controversy between EZLN and AMLO Supporters Floods Social Networks (January 18, 2019)

Chiapas: Encuentro zapatista en el Caracol de la Realidad a 25 años del levantamiento armado (2 de enero de 2019)

Chiapas: FRAYBA Denounces Attack on Zapatista Autonomy

Member of EZLN transport cooperative, archive photo, Angeles Mariscal/Chiapas PARALELO

On July 22nd, in its statement “Attack on Zapatista Autonomy”, the Fray Bartolome de Las Casas Center for Human Rights (FRAYBA) denounced the confiscation of two vans that provide autonomous transportation service by the Ministry of Mobility and Transportation in the Municipality of Salto de Agua in the North of Chiapas.

FRAYBA considered that this action represents one more attack against the support bases of the EZLN in the context of military harassment of its territory. It said that “these acts of aggression and harassment contradict the statements of President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who during his visit to Chiapas said on July 6 that ‘we endorse our respect for the Zapatista Army despite our differences.'”

For this reason, FRAYBA demanded that the attacks and harassment of the autonomy of the Zapatista peoples cease and that they desist from the acts of criminalization against the drivers and autonomous transport, as well as return the two vehicles retained by the delegation of Transportation in Palenque.

For more information in Spanish:

Agresión a la autonomía zapatista (Centro de Derechos Humanos Fray Bartolomé de las Casas , 22 de julio de 2019)

Frayba exige devolver a bases zapatistas vehículos asegurados (La Jornada, 23 de julio de 2019)

For more information from SIPAZ:

National: Controversy between EZLN and AMLO Supporters Floods Social Networks (January 18, 2019)

Chiapas: Zapatista Mass Meeting in Realidad Caracol 25 Years after Armed Uprising (January 14, 2019)