And now:Ish <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: >Date: Mon, 21 Dec 1998 15:06:26 EST >From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >Subject: [FN] Fwd: '97 Mexico Massacre Changed Village >To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > >From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >Return-path: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Subject: '97 Mexico Massacre Changed Village >Date: Mon, 21 Dec 1998 14:50:29 EST > >'97 Mexico Massacre Changed Village > >.c The Associated Press > > By NIKO PRICE > >ACTEAL, Mexico (AP) -- Little has changed in Chiapas' sluggish war in the year >since peasants aided by police marched into this muddy little village and >gunned down 45 men, women and children for not supporting Mexico's ruling >party. > >Everything has changed for Acteal. > >A 5-year-old boy pushes a toy truck though the mud, using his left hand >because the fingers of his right were hacked off. An uncle leads a 4-year-old >girl along a path; her parents are both dead and the bullet that passed >through her brain left her blind. > >Almost everyone here is still mourning -- a quarter of the village's >population is buried beneath a brick chapel in the center of town, empty but >for the names and framed photographs of the dead. > >``I have so much pain,'' lamented Mariano Vazquez Ruiz, a 34-year-old farmer >who survived by playing dead under a pile of bodies for an entire day while >blood oozed from a bullet wound in his chest. > >He lost his wife and two daughters; he lives now with his mother and three >sons, one of whom is the maimed 5-year-old. > >For Vazquez, the nightmare continues. The only work he knows is coffee >farming, and he is too scared to harvest his fields. > >``I'm afraid because the paramilitaries are still on the loose,'' he said. > >He said government supporters from surrounding villages harvested his fields >last year and that they would run him off, or worse, if he tried to reclaim >them. > >Twice this month, soldiers aligned with anti-rebel villagers have driven >Acteal residents from their coffee fields in the nearby village of Majomut, >shooting in the air and in one case stabbing two women and a man with >bayonets. > >Soldiers at two roadblocks note down the name and purpose of anyone headed >toward Acteal. First Officer Luis Plascencia said he was searching for >weapons, and couldn't explain why that required seeing ID of people who didn't >have any. > >The village of mostly illiterate Indians has quickly become a player in the >international human rights circuit. Journalists, social workers and leftists >from around the world are a constant presence there, and villagers have >traveled throughout Mexico to address human rights conferences about the >slaughter. > >Acteal residents and human rights groups say members of the vigilante squad >that carried out the massacre are still free. > >The attorney general's office on Sunday issued a 153-page report saying 135 >people had been arrested in the case. But only one has been convicted and no >high-ranking officials have been arrested. Eighteen, including former Gov. >Julio Cesar Ruiz Ferro, have resigned over the scandal. > >The report concluded that old conflicts -- not politics -- and local >lawlessness were primary causes of the massacre. Marina Jimenez, head of the >Fray Bartolome de las Casas Human Rights Center, disputed that. > >``The investigation is trying to cover up the existence of paramilitary groups >and the role of the state and federal governments in the massacre,'' she said. > >``Local government leaders continue to meet with the paramilitary groups, and >the army is playing a determining role in the arming and training of the >civilian population.'' > >She also accused Gov. Roberto Albores Guillen of bad faith in his recent >proposal of an amnesty for weapons possession -- which he calls an attempt to >abolish paramilitary groups. > >The proposal apparently would free anyone arrested on weapons charges, >retroactively -- including some of those arrested in the Acteal massacre. > >The governor canceled an interview scheduled with The Associated Press, then >said he was too busy to set another time. > >In the Cerro Hueco prison in the state capital, Tuxtla Gutierrez, three of >those arrested in the massacre denied having been anywhere near the village >when the shooting started. > >``Here we are, paying for the sins of others,'' said Felipe Vazquez, a local >police commander accused of telling state authorities that rumors of an attack >were false even as the gunfire continued. > >``Our conscience is clean,'' added Jacinto Arias, who was mayor of the >municipality that includes Acteal. > >Meanwhile, the low-level war between the government and leftist Indians >continues to simmer. > >The Zapatista National Liberation Army rose up in a 12-day war in January >1994, then retreated into the remote mountains of Chiapas, demanding >negotiations with the government. > >Occasional skirmishes continue to kill supporters of both sides, but there >have been few direct clashes between troops and rebels. There may be only a >few hundred of the latter left. > >AP-NY-12-21-98 1449EST > > Copyright 1998 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP >news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise >distributed without prior written authority of The Associated Press. <<<<=-=-=FREE LEONARD PELTIER=-=-=>>>> If you think you are too small to make a difference; try sleeping in a closed room with a mosquito.... African Proverb <<<<=-=http://www.tdi.net/ishgooda/ =-=>>>> IF it says: "PASS THIS TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW...." Please Check it before you send it at: http://urbanlegends.miningco.com/library/blhoax.htm
