ZAPATISTA ARMY FOR NATIONAL LIBERATION.

March 2015.

To the compas of the Sixth in Mexico and in the World:

Compas:

I have been asked to let you know that…

Despite the significant increase in military activity in the vicinity of the Zapatista Caracoles (aggressive patrols, intimidating checkpoints, threatening flyovers)—particularly in the caracoles of La Realidad and Oventik (the first has just opened a school-clinic, and the second will host the tribute to Don Luis Villoro Toranzo)…

Despite the growing belligerence of the paramilitary groups sponsored by the Chiapas government…

Despite the tired “new” lies in the paid media /no, there is not and there has not been any proposal for dialogue; no, not since 2001, that is to say that no federal official has approached the EZLN in the last 14 years for any reason other than in an attempt to assasinate the Zapatista leadership; no, the federal and state governments are not looking to improve the living conditions of indigenous people in Chiapas, rather, they are trying to divide communities; no, the only governmental approaches that Jaime Martinez Veloz claim for himself were not to Zapatistas but to the paramilitaries backed (before he took over) by Luis H. Alvarez, Juan Sabines Guerrero, Felipe Calderon Hinojosa, and now Manuel Velasco Coello, Rosario Robles Berlanga and Enrique Peña Nieto, one of whose groups (the CIOAC-H) is responsible for the murder of the compañero teacher Galeano; no, and so forth and so on/…

Despite the fact that truth and justice are still missing in Ayotzinapa…

(Continuar leyendo…)

San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, México
10 March 2015

The Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center (Frayba), has documented, through the Civilian Observation Brigades (BriCO), systematic incursions by the Mexican Army, who are harassing the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) bases of support, in the territory of the Good Government Council of La Realidad, Jungle-Border zone, Caracol I “Toward Hope” (JBG).

The military actions in the territory of the JBG consist of incursions in convoys with trucks, hummers, jeeps, and motorized equipment; with members of the Mexican Army that range from 4 to 30 people. There are also low flights with light aircraft and helicopters photographing and filming members of the BriCO, zapatistas, and the JBG facilities. Since July 2014 these actions have been increasing, both in the size of the troops and the frequency with which they happen. (See the record of military activity at La Realidad).

Frayba is concerned with the increasing harassment by the Mexican Army in zapatista territory, since it constitutes actions to provoque and besiege that harm the rights to autonomy and free determination stipulated in the Mexican Constitution, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the Convention 169 of the International Labor Organization (ILO), and the San Andrés Accords.

Therefore, this Human Rights Center demands: Respect for the free determination and autonomy of zapatista peoples; and an end to the harassment by the federal government through the Mexican Army.

Finally, we recall that on May 2, 2014, members of the Central Independiente de Obreros Agrícolas y Campesinos Histórica (CIOAC-H), ambushed zapatista bases of support in the territory of the JBG of La Realidad; durng the attack, the armed group murdered José Luis Solís López, “Maestro Galeano,” and destroyed the Autonomous Clinic and School. The aforementioned organization is part of the municipal government of Las Margaritas and has the protection of the state government of Manuel Velasco Coello, which has allowed it to carry out aggressions, forced displacements, and murders in the region. (See Frayba Bulletin 16 on the aggression to zapatista bases of support at La Realidad on 5 May 2014.)

Thank you Part III:

The Most Expensive Building in the World

Subcomandante Insurgente Moisés.  Subcomandante Insurgente Galeano.

February-March, 2015

[showtime]

It is the eve of the big day… in the wee hours of the morning. The cold bites under the cover of shadow. On the solitary table that furnishes this small hut (which has no sign but is known to now be the headquarters of the Zapatista Command), there is a handwritten, wrinkled sheet of paper detailing the accounts for the construction of the clinic-school in the Zapatista community of La Realidad. A voice summarizes the gazes, silences, smoke, rage:

The accounts don’t balance. The life of any Zapatista is worth more than Peña Nieto’s white house and the houses of all of the rich in the whole world combined. The entirety of the funds required to construct the huge buildings where the powerful hide in order to organize their thievery and crimes would not be enough to pay for a even a single drop of Indigenous Zapatista blood. That is why we feel that this is the most expensive building in the world.

So must state clearly that what doesn’t appear in the accounts is the blood of our compañero Galeano. All of the papers in the history of the world would not be enough to balance that account.

And so that is how it should appear in those lists that come out in the press where they name the richest people, and where the poorest live. The rich have first names, last names, lineage, and pedigree. But the poor only have a geography and a calendar. So they should say that the most expensive building on the whole planet is in Zapatista La Realidad, Chiapas, Mexico. And that the Indigenous Zapatista girls and boys attend the most expensive school in the world. And that the men, women, boys, girls, elderly, indigenous, Zapatistas, Mexicans, when they get sick in La Realidad, will be treated in the most expensive clinic on earth.

But the only way to balance these accounts is to struggle to destroy the capitalist system. Not to change it. Not to improve it. Not to make it more human, less cruel, less murderous. No. To destroy it completely. To annihilate each and every one of the heads of the Hydra.

Even then there would be more to do, as what we want here is to construct something better: another system, one without masters, without patrons, without bosses, without injustice, without exploitation, without disrespect, without repression, without dispossession. One without violence against women, children, anyone who is different. One where work is paid justly. One where ignorance does not rule. One where hunger and violent death are just bad memories. One where no one can be above on the backs of others below. One that is reasonable, one that is better.

Then and only then, the Zapatistas can say that the accounts are even.

(Continuar leyendo…)

On Sunday, March 1, 2015, after more than six months of work, the building that houses a health clinic and a school was presented to the Zapatista bases of support of La Realidad. The solidarity of people and collectives throughout the world made this construction possible. Here we present to you the accounts, the words expressed during this event, and some photos from that day.

[showtime]

On the Bulletin Board

To the peoples of the world:

From Chiapas, Mexico, we send out our word to all those women and men from below, in the countryside and the city, in Mexico and throughout the world, all those who sow resistance and rebellion against the neoliberal capitalism that destroys everything.

We met in the Ñahtó community San Francisco Xochicuautla, State of Mexico, on December 21, 22, and 23; in the Nahua community of Amilcingo, Morelos, on December 22 and 23; in the space of the Frente Popular Francisco Villa Independiente in Mexico City on December 24, 25, and 26; in Moncolva, Campeche, on December 28 and 29; in the Zapatista Caracol of Oventik, Chiapas, on December 31 and January 1; and in CIDECI in San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, on January 2 and 3. We met to hold “sharings,” which means not only to share, but also to learn and build together. These were “sharings” that were grown from the deep pain and rage that belongs to all of us due to the disappearance and murder of the students from the Rural Teacher’s College Raul Isidro Burgos in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero. This was a criminal act that reflects the politics of death that the bad government and the capitalists have pushed into every corner of the country and the world. These missing students are our disappeared, and we, as the National and International Sixth, the National Indigenous Congress, and the Zapatista National Liberation Army will not cease to struggle until they are found.

The capitalists and their overseers in the bad governments have left destruction in each of our individual hearts and great destruction in the collective heart that we make up as peoples, mothers and fathers of the young people who were taken from us, and solidarity organizations, all determined to reconstruct life where the powerful have sown death and mourning.

In the indigenous communities that we comprise, we suffer attacks by the capitalist system through the blood and pain of our children, who are also the only possible future for this planet we call Earth. Amidst the distances and different colors that make up our being and our existence, we maintain the certainty that Earth is our mother and she is alive. And in order to keep her alive, justice must be a demand that is woven by the actions and convictions of those of us who comprise the world of below, those who do not aspire to govern that world but rather construct it along our path.

From the oceans, beaches, mountains, cities, and countryside, we build and rebuild alongside the assemblies, organizations, and collectives that in diverse autonomous forms weave spaces and forms of organization and solidarity that are capable of containing the capitalist destruction that does not distinguish between peoples and colors and in its chronic blindness only recognizes what feeds the same production dressed as permanent war, unjust markets, and colossal profits for a few. These are values alien to our peoples and against the ancient agreements made with our Mother Earth that give meaning and sense to life in the world, that give us freedom and dignity, dignified in living and defending life.

But the capitalists who say they are governing but really are only trying to dominate, administrate, and exploit, have a limit—a very large barrier—when they come up against the dignity of a person, a family, a collective, a society who they have profoundly damaged, from whom they have snatched and killed a part of their heart, thus detonating an explosion of rebellion that has illuminated the World Festival of Resistance and Rebellion Against Capitalism which we call “Where those above destroy, we below rebuild.” Because we are below; from below we understand the world, from below we care for it, below we look at one another and from there, together, we rebuild the destiny that we believe is our own until the powerful snatch it from us and only then do we learn, do we know, that what is really ours is that which we can construct or reconstruct where capitalism has destroyed.

The pain that is converted into dignified rage in the families of the murdered and disappeared students of the Rural Teacher’s College Raul Isidro Burgos is the pain that has kidnapped and disappeared us also, and thus we will never stop struggling until they are found, along with all of the murdered, disappeared, tortured, exploited, disrespected, and dispossessed brothers and sisters, wherever they may be in this savage capitalist geography, on whatever border of the world, in whichever prison.

The walk of the peoples of the world in the countryside and the city, each with their path, are led by the footprints of their own ancestors, paths that divide, intersect, and cross with ours until they find one direction, marked by a rebellious dignity that speaks so many languages and has as many colors as nature itself, woven from small embroideries that together construct what we need to be.

So, brothers and sisters of this suffering world that is nonetheless happy because of the rebellion that nourishes us: we invite you to continue walking with a small but firm step, to continue to meet, share, construct, and learn along with us, to weave the organization from below and to the left of the Sixth that we comprise.

Only from our rebellion and our resistance will the death of capitalism be born and a new world brought to life, a world for all of us.

San Cristobal de las Casas, Mexico, January 3, 2015

NATIONAL INDIGENOUS CONGRESS, ZAPATISTA NATIONAL LIBERATION ARMY, and the NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL SIXTH

Originally Published in Spanish by Enlace Zapatista

En español: http://enlacezapatista.ezln.org.mx/2015/01/08/pronunciamiento-del-primer-festival-mundial-de-las-resistencias-y-rebeldias-contra-el-capitalismo/

Interviews conducted at Cideci/Universidad de la Tierra Chiapas, at the end of the World Festival of Resitance and Rebellion against Capitalism.

With spoke with Salvador Campanur Sánchez, Purépecha from Cherán, Michoacán, of the National Indigenous Congress, who explains the meaning of this great encounter:
(Descarga aquí)  

Rosa Elba Jiménez Gutiérrez and one of the authorities of the Yaqui Tribe speak of the forms of struggle and resistance in the face of the disposession and violence in the country:
(Descarga aquí)  

Evaristo Domínguez Ramos, from Santa María de Ostula, Michoacán, speaks about the community’s problems:
(Descarga aquí)  

Silvia Marcos and Jean Robert make a balance of 2014, in terms of death and repression as well as resistance and construction:
(Descarga aquí)  

We also asked several participants the same question: “After all that was shared in Xochicuautla, Amilcingo, and Campeche, after hearing all the different pains and rages lived by the peoples of Mexico and the world, and also the forms of struggle and resistance, what do you take from the Festival?”

• José Luis Fernández – Comunidad de Xochicuautla:
  (Descarga aquí)  
• Rosa Elba Jiménez Gutiérrez y autoridad de la Tribu Yaqui:
  (Descarga aquí)  
• Representante del pueblo coca de Mezcala:
  (Descarga aquí)  
• Juan Enrique Bobadilla, Unión de Pueblos y Comunidades Purépechas del DF:
  (Descarga aquí)  

Finalmente, these are the sounds of the Festival’s closure:
(Descarga aquí)  

Escucha el audio aquí:
(Descarga aquí)  

EJÉRCITO ZAPATISTA DE LIBERACIÓN NACIONAL.
MÉXICO.

31 de Diciembre del 2014 y 1 de Enero del 2015.

Compañeras y compañeros familiares de los estudiantes de Ayotzinapa asesinados y desaparecidos por el mal gobierno de este sistema capitalista:
Compañeras y compañeros del Congreso Nacional Indígena:
Compañeras, compañeros y compañeroas de la Sexta de México y del mundo:
Compañeras y compañeros Bases de Apoyo del Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional:
Compañeras y compañeros comandantes y comandantas, jefas y jefes del Comité Clandestino Revolucionario Indígena-Comandancia General del EZLN:
Compañeras y compañeros milicianas y milicianos:
Compañeras y compañeros insurgentes e insurgentas:

Compas:

Por mi voz habla la voz del Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional.

Reciban todas, todos y todoas que están y no están presentes, el saludo de los hombres, mujeres, niños y niñas, ancianos y ancianas zapatistas.

Sea bienvenido el paso, la voz, el oído, la mirada, el corazón colectivo de abajo y a la izquierda.

Tenemos como invitados de honor a los familiares de quienes nos hacen falta en Ayotzinapa, en México y en el mundo.

(Continuar leyendo…)

Durante la celebración del 21 aniversario del inicio de la guerra contra el olvido, y en el contexto del 1er Festival Mundial de las Resistencias y Rebeldías contra el Capitalismo, se realizó un acto en el Caracol de Oventic, Chiapas, en el que participaron los parientes de los normalistas desaparecidos y asesinados de la normal de Ayotzinapa, el Congreso Nacional Indígena, y el Comité Clandestino Revolucionario Indígena-Comandancia General del EZLN.

Berta Nava Martínez, madre de Julio César Ramírez Nava:
(Descarga aquí)  

Mario César González Contreras, padre de César Manuel González Hernández:
(Descarga aquí)  

Congreso Nacional Indígena:
(Descarga aquí)  

Subcomandante Insurgente Moisés por el Comité Clandestino Revolucionario Indígena-Comandancia General del EZLN:
(Descarga aquí)