Chiapas: Las Abejas de Acteal Hold Commenoration 22 Years after Acteal Masacre

@Frayba

On December 21st and 22nd, Las Abejas Civil Society together with the diocese of San Cristobal de Las Casas, other civil and social organizations, remembered the 45 victims of the Acteal massacre, which happened 22 years ago, on December 22nd 1997, by a paramilitary group from the same municipality of Chenalho.

The commemoration included several activities, including a pilgrimage, pronouncements, and a mass celebrated by the bishop of the diocese of San Cristobal de Las Casas, Rodrigo Aguilar Martinez.

In a statement published the same day, Las Abejas rejected the offer of reparations proposed by the government and urged the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) to proceed with the case: “Sisters and brothers who also work for the truth and justice, let’s not be afraid to continue organizing to build peace on our continents and stop the war that the rich and powerful wage against us. We cannot fall into the pitfalls of bad government. Our Civil Society Organization Las Abejas de Acteal does not accept or request a friendly settlement for the Acteal Case because a monetary remedy does not sow precedents so that these heinous acts are not repeated. On the contrary, their goal is to divide us and leave us humiliated. Within the framework of the commemoration of the 22 years of the Acteal Massacre, we insist on the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights that it already states the merits report of Case 12.790 Manuel Santiz Culebra and Others (Acteal Massacre) to curb impunity and wear down survivors and their families, who have been severely affected by their life project.”

For more information in Spanish:

A 22 años del Crimen de Estado cometido aquí, no hay voluntad política de crear estrategias para que hechos como el de Acteal jamás se repitan. Las Abejas de Acteal, 22 de diciembre de 2019.

A 22 años de la Masacre de Acteal se mantiene viva la resistencia y la esperanza CDH Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas, 22 de diciembre de 2019.

Acteal, 22 años de la matanza en Chiaps que cimbró al país El Universal, 23 de diciembre de 2019.

For more information from SIPAZ:

Chiapas: Sociedad Civil Las Abejas de Acteal rechaza solución amistosa en el caso de la masacre de Acteal presentado ante la CIDH marzo 7, 2019

Chiapas : Sociedad Civil Las Abejas denuncia allanamieno de su clínica en Acteal; Concejo Pacifista declara que es un “asunto entre particulares”; Sociedad Civil Las Abejas ratifica “por eso hemos rechazado la solución amistosa, porque traería división” . septiembre 23, 2019

Chiapas: Marcha-peregrinacion de las Abejas de Acteal para exigir justicia verdadera y digna agosto 14, 2019

Chiapas/International: Solidarios de la Voz del Amate Seeks Alliances with Other Processes in Latin America

Alberto Patishtan (@El Sie7e de Chiapas)

In a press conference that was held in San Cristóbal de Las Casas on December 4th, members of the Solidarios de la Voz de Amate organization announced that on December 8th they will participate in the Observatory of Rights of Peoples “The Worthy Fight of the Latin American Peoples, is the Libertarian Air of the Peoples of the World” in which they will share the struggle for political prisoners and unduly imprisoned in Chiapas.

Former prisoner Alberto Patishtan (who was in jail from 2000 to 2013) said they intend “to raise our voice of struggle and resistance, for the government to listen to us that we are not alone in the demand for our rights.” He recalled that “nine colleagues who have been in criminal proceedings for several years without sentencing and others who have already been sentenced with evidence that was manufactured by public ministries” are still imprisoned in Chiapas. He affirmed that “the government from political operators has studied the criminal records, they realized the irregularities, but even so due to lack of will and arrogance they do not want to free our companions in struggle for many years.” He denounced that “with sacrifice they have demonstrated their innocence by exposing their bodies and their lives, by means of a hunger strike and fasting inside the prisons, where they stopped eating for several days, even so the government does not want to yield. It’s not about competition, it’s about the freedom of poor and innocent Indians.”

For more information in Spanish:

Buscan presos alianza de apoyo con el resto de Latinoamérica(El Sie7e de Chiapas, 5 de diciembre de 2019)

Pueblos latinoamericanos se reuniran en Oaxaca para alzar su voz de lucha (Prensa Libre, 5 de diciembre de 2019)

Buscan presos políticos alianza de apoyo con el resto de Latinoamérica (Noticias Primera Plano, 4 de diciembre de 2019)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Chiapas: Exigen libertad para las 9 presos solidarios de la Voz del Amate (6 de noviembre de 2019)

Chiapas:Presos del Cerss 5 son amenazados de ser reubicados si no detienen su protesta (6 de septiembre de 2019)

Chiapas: After over 100 Days on Hunger Strike, Prisoners Need Appropriate Medical Attention and Continue to Demand Freedom (June 27, 2019)

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Chiapas: Plantón y Ayuno en Solidaridad con Presos en Huelga de Hambre (a 84 días de su inicio), 6 de junio de 2019

Chiapas: Freedom for Juan de la Cruz Ruiz

Photo @Frayba

On December 3rd, the Fray Bartolome de Las Casas Center for Human Rights (also known as Frayba) announced through a press conference that it had presented an indirect injunction for the freedom of the torture survivor, victim of violations of due legal process and currently in arbitrary deprivation of his freedom, Juan de la Cruz.

The indigenous Tsotsil Juan de la Cruz Ruiz, a prisoner for more than 12 years accused of the crime of homicide, filed the injunction to request the protection of federal justice as since February 2016 there is a recommendation for freedom with suspended sentence issued by the Reconciliation Bureau, La Jornada reported.

At the conference Pedro Faro Navarro, director of Frayba, reported that the request for indirect injunction was delivered in the District Court of Injunction and Federal Trials in the State of Chiapas, of the Twentieth Circuit, based in the capital.

“In the aforementioned document, it is claimed that even when there is a recommendation for freedom with a suspended sentence, dated February 11th, 2016, Juan de la Cruz remains in unjust prison at the Center for Social Reinsertion for the Sentenced No. 5, in San Cristobal de Las Casas,” he added.

He also noted that the recommendation “was sent for specific processing before the Undersecretary of Executions of Criminal Penalties and Security Measures, which since February 12th, 2016 received and had to issue the freedom ruling.”

He said that Juan’s family and those “who accompany him in the defense of his rights” face harassment, threats, vigilance and intimidation, facts that were already denounced before the State Attorney General’s Office.

Frayba urged “the highest Court to grant the injunction and protection of federal justice and that the authorities responsible for resolving this case comply with the recommendation they have issued so that Juan is released immediately.”

For more information in Spanish:

Para más información vea esta conferencia de prensa, en el Museo de la Ciudad de Tuxtla. (Chiapas Paralelo, 3 de diciembre de 2019)

Tras 12 años preso, indígena tzotzil solicita protección de la justicia (La Jornada, 3 de diciembre de 2019)

Indígena preso en Chiapas pide protección de la justicia federal (El Heraldo de Chiapas, 4 de diciembre de 2019)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Chiapas:Presos del Cerss 5 son amenazados de ser reubicados si no detienen su protesta (6 de septiembre de 2019)

Chiapas: After over 100 Days on Hunger Strike, Prisoners Need Appropriate Medical Attention and Continue to Demand Freedom (June 27, 2019)

Chiapas: After over 100 Days on Hunger Strike, Prisoners Need Appropriate Medical Attention and Continue to Demand Freedom (June 27, 2019)

Chiapas: Indigenous Prisoner Released after 16 Years Awaiting Sentencing and 60 Days Hunger Strike (May 26, 2019)

Chiapas: Chiapas Prisoners Enter Fourth Week of Hunger Strike (April 8, 2019)

Chiapas: Diego Lopez Mendez Freed, Prisoner and Member of Solidarios de la Voz del Amate (March 15, 2019)

National/International: “When Words Are Not Enough” – Amnesty International Report almost One Year after AMLO Takes Office

On November 27th, almost one year after the inauguration of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO) as the new president of Mexico, Amnesty International (AI) presented a report entitled “When Words Are Not Enough” in which it takes stock of progress made on the human rights crisis in the country.

“The government of President Lopez Obrador has shown a willingness to move forward partially on some initiatives, especially on the issue of disappearances in the country. However, after a year of his government, there are no substantial changes in the lives of millions of people facing a very serious human rights crisis that has lasted for more than a decade. The very high levels of violence that undermine the right to life, the torture that is still widespread, the alarming rates of violence against women, and a militarized security strategy more alive than ever, are a sign of the tragic reality in Mexico,” Erika Guevara Rosas, director for the Americas of Amnesty International, said.

Refarding advances, she considered that the decision of the government in August to recognize the competence of the Committee against Enforced Disappearances of the UN to review communications on individual cases, gave a solution to one of the repeated demands of relatives of missing persons and human rights organizations. “However, this measure has not yet been implemented.”

AI said it sees “a huge incongruity between what the government says and what it then does. It promises a more humane treatment for migrants and in need of international protection, but sends the National Guard to persecute and detain them. It says he will protect human rights defenders and journalists, but publicly discredits them. It is worrisome that human rights violations remain the rule in Mexico and not the exception,” Erika Guevara Rosas added.

Amnesty International concluded that “in order to achieve a substantial change in human rights, the government must stop blaming previous administrations for the situation and, instead, accept responsibility for what is happening in the present and seek solutions to address the serious debts pending in the matter, making sure that any policy of the current administration has human rights and its international obligations as a fundamental basis.”

For more information in Spanish:

Cuando las palabras no bastan (Amnistía Internacional, 27 de noviembre de 2019)

México: Amnistía Internacional alerta sobre la falta de avances en derechos humanos después de un año del nuevo gobierno (Amnistía Internacional, 27 de noviembre de 2019)

“Las palabras no bastan”, la evaluación de AI al gobierno de AMLO en materia de derechos humanos (Proceso, 27 de noviembre de 2019)

México mantiene crisis de derechos humanos en gobierno de AMLO según Amnistía Internacional (El Sol de México, 27 de noviembre de 2019)

Amnistía Internacional califica de “incongruente” la política de derechos humanos de López Obrador (El País, 28 de noviembre de 2019)

For more information from SIPAZ:

International/National: Un Human Rights Committee Issues 48 Human Rights Recommendations for Mexico (November 12, 2019)

National/International: Attacks on Migrant Defenders in Central America, Mexico and U.S. Increase (October 1, 2019)

International/National: UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Expresses Concern over Unresolved Issues in Mexico (September 22, 2019)

 

Guerrero/National: Buildings where Documents Related to Ayotzinapa Case Deliberately Burned

@Cuarto Oscuro

On November 11th, the families of the 43 students of the Normal Rural School of Ayotzinapa disappeared in Iguala, Guerrero, in September 2014 held a private meeting with President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and members of the Truth and Access to Justice Commission for the Ayotzinapa Case. The president repeted his commitment to do everything possible to find the whereabouts of the normalistas. Family members insisted that several former officials be consigned, including the former Attorney General of the Republic, Jesus Murillo Karam and Tomas Zeron, who was responsible for the Criminal Investigation Agency of the agency.

“In several lines of research there are elements to be able to consign responsible people. Mainly they are former public officials who participated in the events. We ask that police who participated in the attacks on the students on September 26th and 27th and officials who did the investigations badly be consigned,” said Vidulfo Rosales, lawyer for the La Montaña Tlachinollan Human Rights Center and family representative at the end the meeting. Rosales also reported that searches are being conducted in ten different locations located mainly in Guerrero, such as Tepecoacuilco, Cocula, Iguala and municipalities adjacent to Taxco. On the information that the Army could provide in the clarification of the case, he declared that “they gave a part, but it is incomplete. On the other hand, they have given an important participation in providing security in the search theme.”

Also before the media, the Under-Secretary of Human Rights of the Ministry of the Interior, Alejandro Encinas, said that the case file is in “a process of total reconstruction, it is not starting from scratch, there are many issues that have already been investigated but it suffers from many failures in the way it was put together.” He said that the Attorney General’s Office (FGR in its Spanish acronym) is preparing the elements to summon to declare the officials involved in the construction of the case.

For his part, Felipe de la Cruz, spokesman for the group of relatives of the students, considered that at the meeting the federal government showed willingness to clarify the case; and that is on the path of leading to the truth. However, he said that if there is be no satisfactory results for January 9th when the next work session takes place, the mobilizations will rise in tone.

Strikingly, and just two days later, several unknown subjects set fire to the facilities of the ex-headquarters of the municipal police in Iguala, where documents related to the disappearance of the 43 were kept, including written testimonies on the activity of municipal police during the night of the 26th and early on September 27th, 2014, some of them possibly responsible for having delivered several of the young people who are now missing to alleged hitmen of the Guerreros Unidos criminal group. Everything was reduced to ruins but gasoline bottles were found, which confirmed that the incident was caused.

For more information in Spanish:

Queman documentos relacionados con desaparición de normalistas en Iguala (El Financiero, 13 de noviembre de 2019)

Gobierno de AMLO está en la ruta de llegar a la verdad sobre Ayotzinapa: padres (Revolución 3.0, 12 de noviembre de 2019)

Padres de los 43 le exigen a AMLO dar ya resultados, o retomarán sus protestas con mayor fuerza (Sin Embargo, 12 de noviembre de 2019)

Consignarán a exfuncionarios ligados a indagatorias sobre Ayotzinapa (La Jornada, 11 de noviembre de 2019)

Atrapan a otro implicado en caso Ayotzinapa… y lo sueltan por 10 mil pesos (Aristegui Noticias, 11 de noviembre de 2019)

For more information from SIPAZ:

Nacional: Padres de las 43 normalistas de Ayotzinapa marchan en CDMX, múltiples manifestaciones en el país marcan el quinto aniversario de la desaparición (27 de septiembre de 2019)

Guerrero: FGR reiniciará investigación del caso Ayotzinapa “casi desde cero” (20 de septiembre de 2019)

Guerrero/Nacional : Liberación de 24 inculpados más en caso Ayotzinapa provoca reacción en distintos actores vinculados al mismo (17 de septiembre de 2019)

Guerrero/Nacional: Familiares de los 43 normalistas desaparecidos en Iguala en 2014 se reúnen con AMLO (12 de septiembre de 2019)

Guerrero: Nueva etapa en la investigación del caso Ayotzinapa, crean la Unidad Especial de Investigación y nombran a Omar Gómez Trejo como su titular (1ero de julio de 2019)

National/Chiapas: INM offers public apology to four indigenous migrants from Chiapas

@Proceso

On November 7, in the Hall of Fine Arts in San Cristóbal de Las Casas, the National Institute of Migration (INM) offered a public apology to four Tzeltal indigenous people from Chiapas who were detained, tortured and almost deported by INM elements. In 2015, the two men and two women were on their way north, looking for work in one of the country’s several industrial crops. Presenting their birth certificates and their electoral identification at a checkpoint in San Juan del Río, Querétaro, “INM agents told them they were false, took them to a migratory station and told them they were Guatemalans; they mistreated them so that they would admit to being from Guatemala”, explained María Fernanda Pincus, director of the Legal Clinic of the University program of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). One of the victims was still a minor at the time of the arrest.

Accompanied by the Municipal President of San Cristóbal, Jerónima Toledo Villalobos, Francisco Garduño Yáñez, commissioner of INM, apologized to the legal representative of the victims, Gretchen Kuhner, for the violation of their human rights and the “damage to the image, honor and dignity“, of the 4 people. “They were not present at the ceremony because they want to maintain a private life, but it was very important that a public apology be made because it is not something that happens only to them; they said we don’t want it to happen to us, but neither to other people”, said María Fernanda Pincus. According to Gretchen Kuhner, the victims accept the apology.

As consequence and in an administrative process, two deputy directors, an agent, a coordinator and two heads of department were punished with suspensions between 15 and 30 days. “Through me, the Institute is committed to guaranteeing measures of non-repetition, so that the acts that violated the human rights of these people do not happen again”, Garduño Yáñez said. He added that the end of non-repetition “translates into prevention through the sensitization of public servants attached to the INM, on issues related to indigenous communities and the urgency of its members to migrate to other parts of the country.” According to María Fernanda Pincus, in addition, there will be “reparation of the damage in economic terms, because they were going to work in the north of the country as agricultural day laborers and they will be paid what they missed earning in those days.”

Mario Peña, also from the Legal Clinic of the UNAM’s University Program on Human Rights, pointed out that “there are no conditions to know who are Mexicans and who are foreigners. We have noticed that people in vulnerable conditions with little command of Spanish are more affected and that they are not provided with an interpreter of their language in migration procedures”.

For more information:

Pide el INM disculpas a indígenas tzeltales por agresión en retén (La Jornada, November 7, 2019)

El INM ofrece disculpa pública a indígenas chipanecos confundidos con migrantes (El Proceso, November 7, 2019)

Ofrece INM disculpa pública a 4 indígenas de Chiapas (El Heraldo de México, November 7, 2019)

Ofrecen disculpa pública a tzeltales torturados en 2015 (EL Universal, November 8, 2019)

For more information from SIPAZ:

National/International: Effort to Protect Migrants “Lasted a Few Months”, UNHCHR (November 7, 2019)

Chiapas: Migration Authorities Stop Migrant Caravan in Tapachula (October 17, 2019)

National/International: CSOs Denounce Poor Conditions in Provisional Migration Centers in Chiapas (October 13, 2019)

Chiapas: African Migrants Clash with National Guard in Tapachula (October 8, 2019)

International/National: UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Ends Mexican Visit while African Migrants Protest in Tapachula (October 7, 2019)

National/International: Mexico and US Reevaluate Migration Agreement after Three Months; Disagreement over Desired Outcomes (September 23, 2019)

International/National: UNO Calls for Evaluation of National Guard as Migratory Control in Mexico (September 2, 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)