Headlines, Human Rights, Indigenous Rights, Latin America & the Caribbean

MEXICO: Zapatistas Issue Enigmatic ‘Red Alert’

Diego Cevallos

MEXICO CITY, Jun 21 2005 (IPS) - A "red alert" issued by the Zapatista rebels in southern Mexico, with no explanation of either the reasons or the consequences, is apparently linked to unusual recent military movements in the state of Chiapas and a growing presence of paramilitary groups, a human rights organisation said Tuesday.

In the southern state of Chiapas "a tactical repositioning (of troops) is occurring" as part of a continued low-intensity warfare campaign, the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Centre said in a message sent to IPS. "In other words," it added, "the army is not withdrawing, it is reactivating."

Nevertheless, a spokesman for the government of President Vicente Fox said Monday that "everything is completely normal" in Chiapas, despite the fact that the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) ordered its barely-armed "troops" to stand ready.

The Fox administration "categorically" states that there is absolute peace and tranquillity in Chiapas today, said official spokesman Rubén Aguilar, after declining to speculate on why the EZLN declared itself in a state of alert.

In the communiqué dated Jun. 19, the EZLN leadership reported that the group had closed its local autonomous community government centres in villages and towns in the remote rural areas under its control, and that it had "quartered" its troops.

The message also announced future actions, although without specifying what these might be.

The government’s Commissioner for Peace in Chiapas, Luis Alvarez, said there were no grounds for the "red alert".

The insurgent indigenous group originally burst on the scene on Jan. 1, 1994, engaging in less than two weeks of skirmishes with army troops before the government of then president Carlos Salinas (1988-1994) declared a unilateral ceasefire. Since then the Zapatistas have not fired a single shot.

Almost simultaneously with the EZLN’s communiqué, the Defence Ministry reported that soldiers last week destroyed four hectares of marijuana plants growing in the guerrilla group’s area of influence.

Parliamentary Deputy Francisco Espinosa, the current chair of the congressional peace commission, said the EZLN alert came as a "total surprise."

"We do not understand the reasons, because the situation in Chiapas has been very calm in the past few months," Espinosa, a member of the small Labour Party, said in an interview with IPS.

"We are not going to speculate on the EZLN’s motives, but we don’t believe there will be any clashes, because there would be no reason for that to happen," said the head of the commission set up 10 years ago, comprised of lawmakers from all of the country’s political parties, to contribute to the Chiapas peace process.

The Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Centre, however, believes the Zapatistas are responding to harassment. "For the past two months there have been movements of army troops (in the area under EZLN influence) – the biggest military movements since 2001," said the organisation.

The Human Rights Centre, which works in Chiapas, reported that it had documented troop movements in at least seven indigenous communities under Zapatista control, as well as renewed activity by anti-EZLN paramilitary groups.

With respect to the reported destruction of marijuana plantations, the human rights group warned that it is dangerous "to link the question of drug trafficking with the conflict in Chiapas, because it distorts the situation, and even more so if it is used to justify an escalation of violence."

Patricio Benavides, an academic who specialises in political science, told IPS there must be well-founded reasons for the alert declared by the EZLN, even though they are not yet fully known.

But based on reports from human rights groups and the accounts of people who have visited Chiapas, there is conjecture that the rebel communiqué may have been issued in response to the presence of paramilitary groups that harass the Zapatistas and their supporters, said Benavides.

The government denies the existence of these groups.

According to the analyst, what the message does clearly indicate, above and beyond the specific reasons for the announcement of a state of alert, is that the guerrillas are staging a return to the political scene after several years of silence.

The Zapatistas and their charismatic masked leader known as ‘Subcomandante Marcos’ initially kept a high profile, and drew strong international support in the first few years after they appeared in public demanding "democracy, justice and freedom."

But they disappeared from the limelight after early 2001, when the rebel leaders made a highly publicised trip to the Mexican capital, with government protection, to urge Congress to pass a bill on indigenous rights and autonomy that had been agreed upon in peace talks with the government of Ernesto Zedillo (1994-2000), which broke off in July 1996.

The bill was passed, but only after the introduction of amendments that the indigenous group rejected.

The EZLN said at the time that it would only return to the negotiating table when the original version of the law on indigenous rights and autonomy was approved.

Since then, the rebels have stayed in the remote mountainous jungle territory under their control, where they have adopted what they describe as autonomous indigenous forms of local government.

But in an open letter addressed to Massimo Moratti, the president of Italy’s Milan FC football club, Subcomandante Marcos insinuated last May that the "match" between the EZLN and Mexico’s political establishment was about to resume.

Marcos also invited Moratti to bring his team to play a game against the Zapatistas.

Reports by the Fox administration, which are backed up by researchers, indicate that the group maintains political and administrative control over 15 percent of the state of Chiapas, Mexico’s poorest, with a total territory of 75,600 square km along the Guatemalan border.

Anyone wishing to enter the Zapatista-controlled area must undergo a security check, and the government’s social programmes do not operate there.

The area is home to around 100,000 inhabitants, nearly all of whom are indigenous people living in dire poverty – a condition they share with most of Mexico’s Indians, who make up approximately 10 percent of the total population of 104 million.

The Zapatista "insurgents" themselves number around 5,000.

The EZLN’s control over part of that territory was temporarily rolled back in 1995, when the Zedillo administration ordered a military offensive in the area.

In response, the Zapatistas and their supporters simply retreated to inaccessible mountain hideouts.

The government offensive was cut off under pressure from civil society and political leaders, and the Zapatistas gradually returned to their land.

The area under Zapatista influence is surrounded by hundreds of troops deployed in 91 camps set up after the EZLN made its appearance in early 1994.

When Fox took office in December 2000, he ordered the army out of the areas closest to the Zapatistas. But human rights organisations said the move was nothing more than a tactical relocation.

The Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Centre reports that violence continues between indigenous groups in Chiapas, who are divided along religious and political lines, and that army troops continue to bully the Zapatistas.

"From a human rights standpoint, we have seen virtually no change under the current (Fox) administration, neither in terms of respect for indigenous people nor with regard to an end to military harassment," Michael Chamberlain, an activist with the Human Rights Centre, told IPS last January.