Words by Comandante Tacho, at the opening of the EZLN Encounter with the Ayotzinapa Caravan, November 15, 2014

Compañeras and compañeros:

Fathers and mothers of the disappeared students from the Escuela Normal[1]“Raúl Isidro Burgos” in Ayotzinapa, state of Guerrero, Mexico.

To the students and to all of those accompanying this caravan, and everyone gathered here.

In the name of the boys, girls, young people, men, women, and elderly of the Zapatista Army for National Liberation, we welcome you to this Caracol of Oventik, Caracol II, Resistance and Rebellion for Humanity.

Compañeras and Compañeros:

We the Zapatista Army for National Liberation want to hear your words of pain and rage, which we share.

We are not concerned with whether municipal presidencies are burning, nor with how many cars, doors, or palaces have been burnt.

What we want to hear is your pain, your rage, and the angst that comes from not knowing where your young students might be.

We also want to tell you that we Zapatisas have been accompanying you in the protests and mobilizations that have been held in Mexico and in the world. Though our acts of pain and rage do not appear in the paid media, we want you know that we have joined you with real and true actions.

This is why we want you to speak to us, and why we want to listen to you.

If we had known a few days earlier that you were coming, there would have been many of us here to greet and listen to you, many more than are here now. You can’t imagine the number of people who would have come.

Those of us who serve as representatives here today receive you with all of our hearts to listen to your pain and your rage.

That is all.

[1] The Escuelas Normales in Mexico are teaching colleges that principally train rural and indigenous young people to be teachers in their own communities.

Traduzione italiano

Words by Comandante Javier, welcoming the Ayotzinapa Caravan to the Caracol of Oventik, November 15, 2014

Brothers and sisters, parents of the 43 disappeared students, and Students and Teachers from the Escuela Normal[1]“Raúl Isidro Burgos” of Ayotzinapa, state of Guerrero:

A very good afternoon to everyone.

In the name of our thousands of compañero and compañera bases of support from the Zapatista Army for National Liberation, we warmly welcome you to this humble center Caracol II of Oventik, Resistance and Rebellion for Humanity, in the Highlands Zone of Chiapas, Mexico.

Those of us present here are representatives of our Zapatista communities, and we receive you with open arms in order to listen to your words.

Know that you are not alone! That your pain is our pain! That your rage is our dignified rage! And that with our actions we support the demand that the 43 students, disappeared by the bad governments’ criminal acts, be returned alive. May you feel at home here, because this place is home to all who struggle.

Thank you.

[1] The Escuelas Normales in Mexico are teaching colleges that principally train rural and indigenous young people to be teachers in their own communities.

Traduction en Français
Traduzione italiano

This Saturday, November 15, a press conference took place at the offices of the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Right Center, with the presence of students from the Isidro Burgos school in Ayotzinapa and relatives of the missing students, who arrived in Chiapas in the “Daniel Solís Gallardo” southern route of the national brigade that is currently visiting several states in the country.

[showtime]

Explicación del propósito de la brigada nacional y las actividades de la ruta sur hasta ahora:
(Descarga aquí)  

María Inés Abraham Gaspar, tía de Adán Abraham de la Cruz:
(Descarga aquí)  

Carmelita Cruz, madre de Jorge Aníbal Cruz Mendoza:
(Descarga aquí)  

Ezequiel Mora, padre de Alexander Mora Venancio:
(Descarga aquí)  

Palabras de conclusión:
(Descarga aquí)  

Preguntas y respuestas:
(Descarga aquí)  

La caravana de padres y compañeros de los 43 normalistas desaparecidos de la Escuela Normal Rural Isidro Burgos de Ayotzinapa llegaron a San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, este 14 de noviembre. Ese mismo día se reunieron con organizaciones e individuos de la sociedad civil en las instalacions del Cideci/Universidad de la Tierra Chiapas. Más tarde, se realizó una marcha que recorrió 3 kilómetros hasta la Plaza de la Paz, donde miles de personas se congregaron para mostrar su solidaridad y compartir la indignación.

[showtime]
Imágenes: Espoir Chiapas

Los padres y compañeros de los normalistas integran la ruta sur “Daniel Solís Gallardo” (nombrada en honor a uno de los normalistas asesinados por la policía en Iguala el 26 de septiembre de este año) de las brigadas informativas que se realizan por diversas partes del país. La ruta sur recorre los estados de Chiapas, Oaxaca, Morelos y Tlaxcala. La ruta norte “Julio Cesar Mondragón Fontes” visita los estados de Chihuahua, Durango, Zacatecas, Jalisco y Michoacán. Y una una brigada estatal “Julio Cesar Ramírez Nava” recorre los municipios guerrerenses de Tlapa, San Luis Acatlán, Ayutla, Tecoanapa, Zihuatanejo, Atoyac y Acapulco. Las tres caravanas confluirán en la Ciudad de México este 20 de noviembre para concluir la Brigada Nacional con una marcha mitin en el zócalo.

Convocatoria a la Brigada Nacional (Audio por Regeneración Radio – 1:13 hr):
(Descarga aquí)  

Reunión en el Cideci/Universidad de la Tierra Chiapas

“El movimiento no es solamente nuestro, es una exigencia de todos y todas. El problema no es solamente el estudiantado ni de la normal de Ayotzinapa, el problema nos incumbe a todos […] Hemos decidido venir aquí porque son uno de los más grandes referentes en la lucha por el cambio en nuestro país. Al venir acá también le damos un mensaje al Estado mexicano de que esto, lo que ustedes hacen aquí, es lo que queremos hacer de ahora en adelante en nuestro estado, en nuestra escuela. Porque nosotros ya no confiamos en las autoridades, en las instituciones mexicanas, en los partidos políticos…”

Palabras de los padres de los normalistas desaparecidos:

Valentín Cornelio González, cuñado de Abel García Hernández:
(Descarga aquí)  

María Inés Abraham Gaspar, tía de Adán Abraham de la Cruz:
(Descarga aquí)  

Floriberto Cruz Evangelista, abuelo de Jorge Aníbal Cruz Mendoza:
(Descarga aquí)  

Carmelita Cruz, madre de Jorge Aníbal Cruz Mendoza:
(Descarga aquí)  

Ezequiel Mora, padre de Alexander Mora Venancio:
(Descarga aquí)  

Testimonio de un estudiante de primer año, sobreviviente de la represión en Iguala:
(Descarga aquí)  

Explicación de los objetivos de la brigada nacional
(Descarga aquí)  

Marcha en San Cristóbal

A las 18:30 los familiares y compañeros de los normalistas desaparecidos de Ayotzinapa llegaron a la concentración en la Carretera Panamericana y el Periférico Norte, donde un gran número de personas se congregaba (organizaciones sociales, individuos, estudiantes normalistas y el magisterio de Chiapas). De ahí partió la marcha en un recorrido pacífico de 3 kilómetros hasta la Plaza de la Paz. En el transcurso, muchas personas de la sociedad civil se unieron en solidaridad. A pesar de que algunos medios de comunicación locales intentaron instigar el miedo en la población, los comercios no cerraron sus puertas; al contrario, en todo el recorrido la población local mostró su apoyo o se unió a la marcha.

Acto en la Plaza de la Paz

Palabras de los familiares de los normalistas desaparecidos:
(Descarga aquí)  

Palabras de estudiantes de normales rurales de Chiapas:
(Descarga aquí)  

Pronunciamiento de diversas organizaciones sociales, comunidades e individuos de Chiapas, Tabasco, Guatemala y otras partes de América Latina:
(Descarga aquí)  

Palabras de la Sección 7 de la SNTE:
(Descarga aquí)  

Ayotzinapa, Guerrero, 12 de noviembre de 2014. Padres y madres de familia de los 43 estudiantes desaparecidos de la Normal de Ayotzinapa, junto con el Comité estudiantil y las organizaciones de derechos humanos que les acompañan, realizaron un acto solemne con el que dieron inicio formal a las actividades de la Brigada Nacional por la presentación con vida de los 43 normalistas de Ayotzinapa desaparecidos.

AUDIO by RegeneracionRadio.org
(Descarga aquí)  

(Continuar leyendo…)

Tlatelolco, June 10, Aguas Blancas, Acteal, Atenco, ABC Nursery, Tlatlaya, Ayotzinapa; An accumulation of violence, murders, and disappearances has raised the anger that flows through the veins of the mourning mothers, siblings, and friends who have lost their partners, their friends, their children. The most affected are no longer afraid. And you?

(Continuar leyendo…)

Los desaparecidos de Ayotzinapa

Read in Spanish here:

En México, los fuegos arden, tanto literal como metafóricamente. Esto pasa porque miles de jóvenes sienten una acalorada indignación contra su corrupto gobierno, cómo se demostró en la resistencia que incluye la quema de edificios del gobierno el 13 de octubre en Chilpancingo, la capital del estado de Guerrero, México

¿Por qué les prendieron fuego? Los manifestantes estaban marcando el plazo no cumplido para que los oficiales del gobierno presentaran con vida a 43 estudiantes detenidos y desaparecidos por un grupo de policías corruptos.

(Continuar leyendo…)

Joint Declaration from the National Indigenous Congress and the EZLN on the Cowardly Attack by Government forces against the Ñatho Indigenous Community of San Francisco Xochicuautla on November 3, 2014

To the Ñatho Indigenous Community of San Francisco Xochicuautla
To the National and International Sixth
To the Peoples of the World

Today once again, our brothers and sisters of the Ñatho Indigenous Community of San Francisco Xochicuautla have defended their territory against the destruction and voracious ambition of those above who want to impose their highway project at any cost and in violation of Mexican and international law.

Not content with having laid waste to the forests, the bad governments of Enrique Peña Nieto and Eruviel Ávila Villegas have kidnapped our sisters Felipa Gutiérrez Petra (67 years old), Rosa Saavedra Mendoza (54 years old), and Francisca Reyes Flores (28 years old), and our brothers Armando García Salazar (50 years old), Venancio Hernández Ramírez (57 years old), Domingo Hernández Ramírez (57 years old), Mauricio Reyes Flores (28 years old) and Jerónimo Flores Arcelino (73 years old).

We warn those above, in case they have forgotten, that as peoples and communities who have walked a long journey of resistance in defense of what we are, what we were, and what we will be, we will not tire of planting rebellion where they cut the flowers, oaks, and firs; we will not tire of building resistance where they impose the machinery of destruction.

(Continuar leyendo…)

Joint National Indigenous Congress – EZLN Declaration denouncing the invasion of the Communal Lands of the Ñatho Indigenous Community of San Francisco Xochicuautla and the attack on Indigenous Yaqui Lauro Baumea

To the Ñatho Indigenous Community of San Francisco Xochicuautla
To the Yaqui Tribe
To the National and International Sixth
To the Peoples of the World

Once more we express our pain and rage as the peoples in rebellion and resistance who make up the National Indigenous Congress. We unite our voices, our rage, and our pain in response to what is happening in the Ñatho Indigenous Community of San Francisco Xochicuautla and to the members of the Yaqui Tribe who are defending their water source.

Our brothers and sisters of Xochicuautla have defended their forests against the construction of the private highway between Toluca and Naucalpan, because they know that life itself emerges from these trees, mountains, and waters. They were granted legal protection prohibiting this work on communal lands, but since October 8 of this year, workers from the construction company under the protection of public “Citizen Security” Forces of the State of Mexico have been invading their lands and cutting down hundreds of trees. The bad government doesn’t care if we below use their laws to defend ourselves; they break those laws themselves in order to destroy us. They made them for the same reason.

(Continuar leyendo…)