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---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 09:42:51 -0600 (CST) From: SIPAZ WEBADMIN <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: En;[SIPAZ] OBSERVATION PROJECT:Monthly Report -Oct 2006 .. PROJECT OF OBSERVATION AND MONITORING OF POLITICAL AND CIVIL RIGHTS OF THE PEOPLES OF CHIAPAS MONTHLY REPORT OCTOBER 2006 SIPAZ, in collaboration with the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center, Alianza Cívica, PROPAZ (Swiss Program of Observation and Peace Promotion in Chiapas), and Peace Watch Switzerland, have been developing a program in Chiapas, on observation and monitoring with regard to the political and civil rights during the electoral process as well as that of the Other Campaign, which will extend until December. The objective is to monitor and report any violation of the political and civil rights of the indigenous peoples and communities, as defined in the Mexican Political Constitution and in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of the United Nations, ratified by the Mexican government. This program also aims to report any attempt to create serious social destabilization, and as such, to work to prevent or avoid increased situations of violence against the communities. What follows is a summary of the program during the month of October. The complete report will be available (in Spanish) on the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center website (http://www.frayba.org.mx). At the national level in the month of October, the political context was focused on the sociopolitical conflict in Oaxaca, which continued growing around the main demand: the resignation of the state governor, Ulises Ruiz Ortiz (URO). During the whole month of October, this movement, organized as the Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca (APPO), was confronted with: State provocations and intimidations; Armed aggressions and murders; High-level agreements between the federal government, the political sectors and the local bosses; Maneuvers attempting to provoke divisions; The closeness of the political class and their power games; As well as the strength of the Federal State itself, which launched a repressive operation on October 29th. In this intervention, more than 4000 agents of the Federal Preventive Police (PFP) participated, using military helicopters and cannon tanks. This police operation was detained and compelled to fall back by the thousands of civilians that mobilized on November 2nd. The magnitude of this operation and the previous actions of para-police groups that remained unpunished (with 15 people killed when this report was published) led various human rights organizations and networks (official, non governmental, national and international ones) to express their concern and to demand that the Mexican State put an end to these actions. After more than 150 days of struggle, and despite the assassinations, the movement in Oaxaca has managed to increase its levels of participation, of representation and of fighting spirit. According to various analysts, this is due to: its horizontal structure, its collective leadership, the distance it has maintained from the political parties, its ability to neutralize instigators, the intensive use of community radios and communication through Internet, as well as self-discipline and a permanent practice of civil resistance. Because of their actions and the results, this movement has compelled various political actors to change their position and to express their support: Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), the National Democratic Convention (CND), the Subcomandante Marcos, the Other Campaign, the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) as well as guerrillas with an historic presence in Oaxaca. The APPO was also able to join together different political strengths to conform a National Front Against Repression in Oaxaca and to launch an incipient Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Mexico, both initiatives being part of the context just before Felipe Calderón takes office as the new Mexican President (December 1st). Other events that were key elements in the national context in October were: the state elections for governor in Tabasco that many have denounced as the most fraudulent in recent Mexican history, and that were won by the candidate of the Party of the Institutional Revolution (PRI); the final election of 5 of 6 of the federal electoral magistrates, after many negotiations and power games between the PRI, the National Action Party (PAN) and the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD); the self-assignation of a millionaire bonus between the retiring electoral magistrates. During October, AMLO reinitiated different activities as the “legitimate president”, just before he takes power as such (November 20th). This fact may explain why president Fox announced the cancellation of the traditional parade that usually takes place in the center of Mexico City this same day. On the other hand, the Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) validated the formation of the Ample Progressive Front (FAP) integrated by the political parties that had belonged to the Alliance for the Good of All: PRD, the Workers’ Party, PT; and Convergence. The political actions that this Front will carry out were presented publicly. In October, Felipe Calderón traveled through Central and South America. He announced the possible reactivation of the Plan Puebla-Panama (PPP) as well as the elaboration of a Transexennial Development Plan named "Mexico 20-30". Calderón named Agustín Carstens, an expert in macroeconomics and ex sub-director of International Monetary Fund (IMF), in the circle of his close collaborators. The last meeting of Calderón in October was a meeting with the main groups of power in Mexico: bankers, builders, managers from transnational companies as well as representatives from international financial institutions. During that period of time, drug trafficking killed at least 92 people, with executions that remained unpunished in 13 Mexican states, and the most violent cases being observed in Guerrero and Michoacán. Regarding the Other Campaign, the Good Government Committees in Chiapas were reopened in October. Meanwhile the National Tour of Delegate Zero was reinitiated. The dates and places of preparatory meetings for the Second Intergalactic Encounter against Neoliberalism and for Humanity were made public while the consultation of the Other Campaign members on the six points of political definition, proposed by Subcomandante Marcos, continued. During his tour in the Northwestern part of Mexico, the Delegate Zero’s activities were mainly meetings and public acts with Indigenous Peoples from Sinaloa, Sonora, South and North California and Chihuahua. There were constant denunciations by Indigenous peoples of the exploitation of their lands and natural resources, especially due to the imposition of tourist mega projects and the illegal wood cutting. The Commission of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandona Jungle (Sixth Commission) also met with groups of fishermen, agricultural workers as well as men and women working in “maquilas” who denunciated the subhuman conditions in which they work. In this second part of his tour, the struggle of the people of Oaxaca appeared more and more frequently in Subcomandante Marcos’ discourse. From Chihuahua, he convoked the Zapatista support bases and the members of the Other Campaign to block roads and railways on November 1st as an expression of their support for the people of Oaxaca. On that date, approximately 4,000 Zapatistas organized demonstrations and blocked 18 major roads in Chiapas. Also in October, various reports and resolutions were presented publicly regarding human rights violations during the repressive operation that took place in Atenco last May: the Amnesty International report, the report of the International Civil Human Rights Observation Commission that was presented to the European Parliament; the report of the Human Rights National Commission (CNDH), which includes formal recommendations to different governmental agencies and declarations of the presidency of the UN Human Rights Council (taken over by Mexico at this moment). Regardless of the differences of tones and focuses, all those reports and declarations mention the profound human rights violations and the fact that impunity remains. Meanwhile, in Chiapas, the political attention remained focused on the decision of the Electoral Tribunal of Judicial Power of the Federation (TEPJF) regarding the state elections for governor that were held in August. As mentioned in our September report, the inverse parallelism compared to the federal elections in July was still to be observed: the TEPJF only ordered a partial revision of the ballot boxes that were challenged; it rejected the possibility to declare the elections invalid, as requested by the PRI, and it finally declared Juan Sabines (candidate of the Alliance for the Good of All) as elected governor. A few days before this decision of the TEPJF, and as an indication of what might follow, Calderón had sent a personal letter to Sabines in which he recognized him as the elected governor and offered him the possibility of a close collaboration. In counterpart, and once his triumph had been confirmed officially, Sabines personally visited Calderón and invited him to his swearing in as new governor in Chiapas. He declared himself a governor without a political party and rejected the possibility of being present in the taking over of AMLO as “legitimate president”. Other political events in the political context of Chiapas in October were the approval of a polemic State Law on Transparency and Access to Public Information as well a new constitutional reform that will expand the period of 118 mayors and of 40 state deputies from 3 to 4 years. Both legislations were questioned as a way of enabling the actual one. Those two legislations have been signaled by local political analysts as a new achievement from governor Pablo Salazar to insure himself impunity and the continuity of his project. Regarding the conflicts in Chiapas, the area affected by Hurricane Stan last year remains the most problematic. The official report from Pablo Salazar government one year after the disaster was contradicted by communal representatives and social organizations from the Sierra region, who on the other hand published their “Other Report Regarding Reconstruction". Meanwhile, in the Coast region, representatives of the victims of the floods started a hunger strike to denunciate the non execution of the governmental promises to rebuild lodgings. In the Highlands, no new serious social conflicts were reported, although strong rains caused the death of 12 indigenous persons. In the Lacandon Jungle, a complicated conflict appeared in Lacanjá Tzeltal after the governmental attempt to reinitiate the building of a drainage system that, according to the inhabitants of the region, affects their health and the ecosystems of the biospheres of Montes Azules and Lacantún. In the Northern part of the Lacandona Jungle, denunciations against the governmental attempt to impose the PROCEDE (Program of Certification of Ejidal Rights) continue. The Zapatista support bases of ‘Los Choles’ came back to Chuyipá (county of Tumbalá) from which they had been violently expelled and from which they may be expelled once again. In the Northern region of Chiapas (Pueblo Nuevo Solistahuacán), an old conflict due to agrarian, municipal, ecumenical and political differences was reactivated. It involved the kidnapping of a journalist supposedly by gunmen from a federal deputy. In the Central zone, agrarian conflicts in the community of Nicolás Ruiz were slightly disminshed. In the county of Venustiano Carranza, social pressures increased, with demands for the publication of a financial audit of the current mayor. In different regions, the denunciations and complaints against the Federal Commission of Electricity (CFE) continued. In that sense, Delegate Zero announced from Mexicali, Baja California "agreements towards a general strike to stop the electricity in the whole country". On the other hand, federal deputies from all the political parties asked president Fox to "revise electricity rates and to withdraw the warrants existing against activists who struggle against high electricity rates, and to free the campesinos in Chiapas that are in jail for this reason ". The Negotiation table of displaced people that the Human Rights Center Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas was accompanying, denounced the non-fullfilment of governmental promises regarding justice and the reparation of damages. Finally, after three months without a new case of this kind, the Human Rights Fray Bartolomé de las Casas denounced the burglary of their offices by unknown individuals, probably with the attempt to intimidate them in their work. This is the twentieth case of intimidation and threats against human rights defenders in Chiapas tin the past year, all of them remaining unpunished. The human rights that were violated during this period were: The rights to integrity, life, territory, health, food, lodging and work (case of the community Los Ch'oles, in Tumbalá); All Human rights (case of the victims from the floods in Stan zone that appear in "The Other Report regarding reconstruction "); The human rights to water, health, food, information, consultation and informed decision (case of Lacanjá Tzeltal); Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (case of the communities struggling against CFE); The right to territory, communal control of natural resources as well as to the recognition and respect of cultural practices and traditional institutions (case of the communities where the government tries to impose, which was denunciated by 11 social and civil organizations at the Inter-American Human Rights Commission (CIDH) in October) ; The right to free expression and information (case of the journalist that was taken hostage in Pueblo Nuevo); and, the civil right to public information (case of the State Law on Transparency and Access to Public Information approved recently). Finally as a project of observation and monitoring of political and civil rights, we wish to express our concern about the level of human, political and civil rights suffered by an ample sector of the population in Oaxaca. ^^^TOP SIPAZ.ORG - CR SIPAZ 1995 / 2005 ------_NextPart_2906212302499121333312 Content-Type: text/html; charsetwindows-1252 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable <style type"text/css"> </style> <style type"text/css"> </style> PROJECT OF OBSERVATION AND MONITORING OF POLITICAL AND CIVIL RIGHTS OF THE PEOPLES OF CHIAPAS MONTHLY REPORT OCTOBER 2006 SIPAZ, in collaboration with the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center, Alianza Cívica, PROPAZ (Swiss Program of Observation and Peace Promotion in Chiapas), and Peace Watch Switzerland, have been developing a program in Chiapas, on observation and monitoring with regard to the political and civil rights during the electoral process as well as that of the Other Campaign, which will extend until December. The objective is to monitor and report any violation of the political and civil rights of the indigenous peoples and communities, as defined in the Mexican Political Constitution and in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of the United Nations, ratified by the Mexican government. This program also aims to report any attempt to create serious social destabilization, and as such, to work to prevent or avoid increased situations of violence against the communities. What follows is a summary of the program during the month of October. The complete report will be available (in Spanish) on the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center website (http://www.frayba.org.mx (http://www.frayba.org.mx/) ). At the national level in the month of October, the political context was focused on the sociopolitical conflict in Oaxaca, which continued growing around the main demand: the resignation of the state governor, Ulises Ruiz Ortiz (URO). During the whole month of October, this movement, organized as the Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca (APPO), was confronted with: * State provocations and intimidations; * Armed aggressions and murders; * High-level agreements between the federal government, the political sectors and the local bosses; * Maneuvers attempting to provoke divisions; * The closeness of the political class and their power games; * As well as the strength of the Federal State itself, which launched a repressive operation on October 29th. In this intervention, more than 4000 agents of the Federal Preventive Police (PFP) participated, using military helicopters and cannon tanks. This police operation was detained and compelled to fall back by the thousands of civilians that mobilized on November 2nd. The magnitude of this operation and the previous actions of para-police groups that remained unpunished (with 15 people killed when this report was published) led various human rights organizations and networks (official, non governmental, national and international ones) to express their concern and to demand that the Mexican State put an end to these actions. After more than 150 days of struggle, and despite the assassinations, the movement in Oaxaca has managed to increase its levels of participation, of representation and of fighting spirit. According to various analysts, this is due to: * its horizontal structure, * its collective leadership, * the distance it has maintained from the political parties, * its ability to neutralize instigators, * the intensive use of community radios and communication through Internet, * as well as self-discipline and a permanent practice of civil resistance. Because of their actions and the results, this movement has compelled various political actors to change their position and to express their support: Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), the National Democratic Convention (CND), the Subcomandante Marcos, the Other Campaign, the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) as well as guerrillas with an historic presence in Oaxaca. The APPO was also able to join together different political strengths to conform a National Front Against Repression in Oaxaca and to launch an incipient Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Mexico, both initiatives being part of the context just before Felipe Calderón takes office as the new Mexican President (December 1st). Other events that were key elements in the national context in October were: * the state elections for governor in Tabasco that many have denounced as the most fraudulent in recent Mexican history, and that were won by the candidate of the Party of the Institutional Revolution (PRI); * the final election of 5 of 6 of the federal electoral magistrates, after many negotiations and power games between the PRI, the National Action Party (PAN) and the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD); * the self-assignation of a millionaire bonus between the retiring electoral magistrates. During October, AMLO reinitiated different activities as the “legitimate president”, just before he takes power as such (November 20th). This fact may explain why president Fox announced the cancellation of the traditional parade that usually takes place in the center of Mexico City this same day. On the other hand, the Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) validated the formation of the Ample Progressive Front (FAP) integrated by the political parties that had belonged to the Alliance for the Good of All: PRD, the Workers’ Party, PT; and Convergence. The political actions that this Front will carry out were presented publicly. In October, Felipe Calderón traveled through Central and South America. He announced the possible reactivation of the Plan Puebla-Panama (PPP) as well as the elaboration of a Transexennial Development Plan named "Mexico 20-30". Calderón named Agustín Carstens, an expert in macroeconomics and ex sub-director of International Monetary Fund (IMF), in the circle of his close collaborators. The last meeting of Calderón in October was a meeting with the main groups of power in Mexico: bankers, builders, managers from transnational companies as well as representatives from international financial institutions. During that period of time, drug trafficking killed at least 92 people, with executions that remained unpunished in 13 Mexican states, and the most violent cases being observed in Guerrero and Michoacán. Regarding the Other Campaign, the Good Government Committees in Chiapas were reopened in October. Meanwhile the National Tour of Delegate Zero was reinitiated. The dates and places of preparatory meetings for the Second Intergalactic Encounter against Neoliberalism and for Humanity were made public while the consultation of the Other Campaign members on the six points of political definition, proposed by Subcomandante Marcos, continued. During his tour in the Northwestern part of Mexico, the Delegate Zero’s activities were mainly meetings and public acts with Indigenous Peoples from Sinaloa, Sonora, South and North California and Chihuahua. There were constant denunciations by Indigenous peoples of the exploitation of their lands and natural resources, especially due to the imposition of tourist mega projects and the illegal wood cutting. The Commission of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandona Jungle (Sixth Commission) also met with groups of fishermen, agricultural workers as well as men and women working in “maquilas” who denunciated the subhuman conditions in which they work. In this second part of his tour, the struggle of the people of Oaxaca appeared more and more frequently in Subcomandante Marcos’ discourse. From Chihuahua, he convoked the Zapatista support bases and the members of the Other Campaign to block roads and railways on November 1st as an expression of their support for the people of Oaxaca. On that date, approximately 4,000 Zapatistas organized demonstrations and blocked 18 major roads in Chiapas. Also in October, various reports and resolutions were presented publicly regarding human rights violations during the repressive operation that took place in Atenco last May: * the Amnesty International report, * the report of the International Civil Human Rights Observation Commission that was presented to the European Parliament; * the report of the Human Rights National Commission (CNDH), which includes formal recommendations to different governmental agencies * and declarations of the presidency of the UN Human Rights Council (taken over by Mexico at this moment). Regardless of the differences of tones and focuses, all those reports and declarations mention the profound human rights violations and the fact that impunity remains. Meanwhile, in Chiapas, the political attention remained focused on the decision of the Electoral Tribunal of Judicial Power of the Federation (TEPJF) regarding the state elections for governor that were held in August. As mentioned in our September report, the inverse parallelism compared to the federal elections in July was still to be observed: the TEPJF only ordered a partial revision of the ballot boxes that were challenged; it rejected the possibility to declare the elections invalid, as requested by the PRI, and it finally declared Juan Sabines (candidate of the Alliance for the Good of All) as elected governor. A few days before this decision of the TEPJF, and as an indication of what might follow, Calderón had sent a personal letter to Sabines in which he recognized him as the elected governor and offered him the possibility of a close collaboration. In counterpart, and once his triumph had been confirmed officially, Sabines personally visited Calderón and invited him to his swearing in as new governor in Chiapas. He declared himself a governor without a political party and rejected the possibility of being present in the taking over of AMLO as “legitimate president”. Other political events in the political context of Chiapas in October were the approval of a polemic State Law on Transparency and Access to Public Information as well a new constitutional reform that will expand the period of 118 mayors and of 40 state deputies from 3 to 4 years. Both legislations were questioned as a way of enabling the actual one. Those two legislations have been signaled by local political analysts as a new achievement from governor Pablo Salazar to insure himself impunity and the continuity of his project. Regarding the conflicts in Chiapas, the area affected by Hurricane Stan last year remains the most problematic. The official report from Pablo Salazar government one year after the disaster was contradicted by communal representatives and social organizations from the Sierra region, who on the other hand published their “Other Report Regarding Reconstruction". Meanwhile, in the Coast region, representatives of the victims of the floods started a hunger strike to denunciate the non execution of the governmental promises to rebuild lodgings. In the Highlands, no new serious social conflicts were reported, although strong rains caused the death of 12 indigenous persons. In the Lacandon Jungle, a complicated conflict appeared in Lacanjá Tzeltal after the governmental attempt to reinitiate the building of a drainage system that, according to the inhabitants of the region, affects their health and the ecosystems of the biospheres of Montes Azules and Lacantún. In the Northern part of the Lacandona Jungle, denunciations against the governmental attempt to impose the PROCEDE (Program of Certification of Ejidal Rights) continue. The Zapatista support bases of ‘Los Choles’ came back to Chuyipá (county of Tumbalá) from which they had been violently expelled and from which they may be expelled once again. In the Northern region of Chiapas (Pueblo Nuevo Solistahuacán), an old conflict due to agrarian, municipal, ecumenical and political differences was reactivated. It involved the kidnapping of a journalist supposedly by gunmen from a federal deputy. In the Central zone, agrarian conflicts in the community of Nicolás Ruiz were slightly disminshed. In the county of Venustiano Carranza, social pressures increased, with demands for the publication of a financial audit of the current mayor. In different regions, the denunciations and complaints against the Federal Commission of Electricity (CFE) continued. In that sense, Delegate Zero announced from Mexicali, Baja California "agreements towards a general strike to stop the electricity in the whole country". On the other hand, federal deputies from all the political parties asked president Fox to "revise electricity rates and to withdraw the warrants existing against activists who struggle against high electricity rates, and to free the campesinos in Chiapas that are in jail for this reason ". The Negotiation table of displaced people that the Human Rights Center Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas was accompanying, denounced the non-fullfilment of governmental promises regarding justice and the reparation of damages. Finally, after three months without a new case of this kind, the Human Rights Fray Bartolomé de las Casas denounced the burglary of their offices by unknown individuals, probably with the attempt to intimidate them in their work. This is the twentieth case of intimidation and threats against human rights defenders in Chiapas tin the past year, all of them remaining unpunished. The human rights that were violated during this period were: * The rights to integrity, life, territory, health, food, lodging and work (case of the community Los Ch'oles, in Tumbalá); * All Human rights (case of the victims from the floods in Stan zone that appear in "The Other Report regarding reconstruction "); * The human rights to water, health, food, information, consultation and informed decision (case of Lacanjá Tzeltal); * Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (case of the communities struggling against CFE); * The right to territory, communal control of natural resources as well as to the recognition and respect of cultural practices and traditional institutions (case of the communities where the government tries to impose, which was denunciated by 11 social and civil organizations at the Inter-American Human Rights Commission (CIDH) in October); * The right to free expression and information (case of the journalist that was taken hostage in Pueblo Nuevo); and, * the civil right to public information (case of the State Law on Transparency and Access to Public Information approved recently). Finally as a project of observation and monitoring of political and civil rights, we wish to express our concern about the level of human, political and civil rights suffered by an ample sector of the population in Oaxaca. ^^^TOP (#ARRIBA) SIPAZ.ORG (http://www.sipaz.org) - CR SIPAZ 1995/ 2005 ------_NextPart_2906212302499121333312-- -- To unsubscribe from this list send a message containing the words unsubscribe chiapas95 (or chiapas95-lite, or chiapas95-english, or chiapas95-espanol) to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Previous messages are available from http://www.eco.utexas.edu/faculty/Cleaver/chiapas95.html or gopher to Texas, University of Texas at Austin, Department of Economics, Mailing Lists.
