ZAPATISTAS UNDER ATTACK- SOLIDARITY NEEDED!

ATTACK ONE - MONTES AZULES

The violent evictions in San Manuel and Buen Samaritano were carried out by around 90 members of the police force, who arrived without warning in 6 helicopters. All the villagers present were forced into the helicopters, and their homes and belongings were destroyed.

The latest information is that six of the evicted villagers were still being held in custody in the state capital Tuxtla Gutiérrez, facing serious charges.

Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group has written to the Mexican Embassy to state:

1.We demand the immediate release of everyone arrested in San Manuel and Buen Samaritano.
2. We demand the immediate return of the land and other losses (including the houses destroyed and their contents) to all the people displaced by these abuses.
3. We demand an immediate stop to the continuing violence by the Mexican government against its people.

We encourage other people and groups to do likewise - addresses at end of message.

Other villages in Montes Azules, such as Salvador Allende and Nuevo Corozal , are now under imminent threat of eviction. The Mexican government have long been harassing the indigenous communities in Montes Azules and threatening them with eviction. They claim this is to protect the rain forest, but at the same time encourage commercial logging, bridge and road building, tourist developments, bioprospecting and other commercial and business developments.

In reality the Mexican government sees the indigenous communities in Montes Azules as an obstacle to the US-backed Plan Puebla Panama, which aims for major capitalist development from southern Mexico to the state of Panama.

ATTACK TWO - MORELIA ZONE
Leonardo Navarro Jiménez and his son Juan Navarro Jiménez, indigenous Tzeltal people, were working on their land when they were attacked by 25 members of the OPDDIC organisation who opened fire on them. Leonardo suffered three bullet wounds, and his son Juan one gunshot wound.

Their injuries were so serious that they were transferred to the hospital in the state capital Tuxtla. OPDDIC has consistently been menacing and threatening zapatistas in Olga Isabel, including threatening to attack and evict the central village of the municipality.

ATTACK THREE - JUNGLE ZONE
146 people in 31 Zapatista families are threatened with eviction from land the zapatistas reclaimed from the ex Governor of Chiapas General Absalón Castellanos Domínguez soon after the 1994 uprising.

The families returned to their land on 24th December 2006, after 11 years in exile - they were forced to flee when the Mexican army launched its military attack of February 1995. In mid July of this year a group from the "Union of Ejidos of the Jungle" invaded the zapatistas' land and is threatening to evict them. The "Union of Ejidos of the Jungle" are working together with the Mexican armed forces, who have a military base on the reclaimed land, located near Nuevo Momon, by Las Margaritas.

ATTACK FOUR - NORTHERN ZONE
The home of Maria López Peñate, who lives alone with her daughter in the community Francisco Villa, was destroyed by a deliberate fire started by people opposed to the zapatistas. Maria is involved in the Womens Group of the Autonomous Municipality de La Paz, who, denouncing the attack, declare that "We are a group of indigenous women of all the communities of this municipality who join together to defend our rights as zapatista women and to follow the example of our comrade Comandanta Ramona."

The Group denounce the "bad government" and its attempts to intimidate them, and declare they will not be discouraged and will continue their struggle.

WHAT'S GOING ON?
The situations described here follow a common pattern, whereby the zapatistas have to engage in an ongoing struggle to defend the lands which they reclaimed from the rich landowners following the 1994 uprising. In the continuing "war of low intensity" the government frequently manipulates and pays off other indigenous organisations to do its dirty work, and attack the zapatista communities.

SEND MESSAGES OF PROTEST TO :

Felipe de Jesús Calderón Hinojosa
Presidente de la República
Residencia Oficial de los Pinos Casa Miguel Alemán
Col. San Miguel Chapultepec, C.P. 11850, DISTRITO FEDERAL, México
Telephone: +52 (55) 27891100 Fax: +52 (55) 52772376
E-Mail: felipe.calderon@presidencia.gob.mx

Francisco Ramírez Acuña
Secretario de Gobernación
Bucareli No. 99, Edificio Cobián, 1er piso
Juárez; Cuauhtémoc, Distrito Federal CP: 06600
Fax +52 55 50933414 E-Mail: frjramirez@segob.gob.mx

Lic. Juan José Sabines Guerrero
Gobernador Constitucional del Estado de Chiapas
Palacio de Gobierno del Estado de Chiapas
Av. Central y Primera Oriente, Colonia Centro, C.P. 29009
Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, México
secparticular@chiapas.gob.mx
Fax: +52 961 6188088 Telephone + 52 961 6188056

Lic. Milton Escobar Castillejos
Presidente del Supremo Tribunal de Justicia del Estado de Chiapas y Consejero Presidente del Consejo de la Judicatura del Poder Judicial del Estado de Chiapas
Palacio de Justicia
Libramiento Norte Oriente no. 2100. Fracc. El Bosque. C.P. 29047.
Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas
Telephone +52 961 6178700
E-Mail dyrpstje@hotmail.com

Lic. Mariano Herrán Salvatti

Fiscal General de Justicia del Estado de Chiapas

Libramiento Norte s/n, tercer nivel, Colonia

Infonavit "El Rosario", CP 30064

Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, México

Fax: + 52 961 6165724

E-Mail mherran@fge.chiapas.gob.mx