Last Wednesday, June 4 an estimated 200 military units including soldiers, various levels of police, tanks and intelligence attempted to enter la Garrucha Caracol and surrounding autonomous Zapatista communities, territories reclaimed by the Ejercito Zapatista de Liberacion Nacional (EZLN) in 1994. This marks an alarming escalation in violent hostility from the Mexican State that we have seen developing since last August.

Take note also that this mid-year marks 3 years since the Zapatistas put out their Sixth Declaration and called for the Other Campaign, a revolutionary process framed as non-violent (obviously it’s difficult to be non-violent when the army is killing your people and stealing your land…). Last Wednesday the army was driven away by the strong response of zapatista autonomous support bases (Bases de Apoyo) who blocked the road.

The army did however promise their return in 15 days saying that they have evidence to believe that there are marijuana plantations in Zapatista territory.

Outrageous! this is how the army controls mexico these days: if it’s not supposedly chasing drug cartels in the big cities (ie. urban military occupation) it’s invading and terrorising rural communities (especially autonomous ones).

Expect a global call out for solidarity actions in the next week or so.

The situation is possibly the most serious that it has been since 1995. 

 For more information in English see www.masn.org.au.
And in Spanish breaking news from the Zapatistas direct is on http://enlacezapatista.ezln.org.mx/.