[Letters of Solidarity are being sent to the Zapatistas from all over the world and Protest Actions are taking place and being planned. We, the Chiapas Support Committee/Comité de Apoyo a Chiapas, signed the letter below.]
Letter in solidarity with the Zapatista Support Bases from collectives, adherents to the Sixth (La Sexta) and the Escuelita students from Baja California, Mexico and California, United States.
Baja California, Mex./California, USA May10, 2014
To the Towards Hope Good Government Council, Mother of the Caracols Sea of Our Dreams Caracol of La Realidad, Chiapas, Mexico.
To the Zapatista Autonomous Bases
To the Adherents of the Sexta in México and the world
To the people of México
Through this means we send you our solidarity and express our indignation at the cunning attacks against the Zapatista Autonomous Bases (ZAB) in La Realidad perpetrated by paramilitary members of so-calledIndependent Central ofAgricultural Workers and Campesinos Historic (CIOAC-H, its initials in Spanish), sent and organized by the three levels of bad governments against the Zapatista National Liberation Army’s (EZLN, Ejercito Zapatista de Liberación Nacional) support bases; directly sent there by the top paramilitary chief of Chiapas, Manuel Velasco Cuello, who is shielded by the supreme paramilitary leader Peña Nieto.
From the border region of the north, we demand that the different paramilitary bands used against the ZAB are dis-activated, prosecuted and jailed and that the criminal paramilitary assassins who took the life of our compañero José Luis Solis López, a teacher of the Zapatista Escuelita, and then shot him giving him a coup de grace.
We know that assassins are still at La Realidad and continue provoking and will continue doing that because that is the plan of the supreme paramilitary and of the top paramilitary ins Chiapas and the paramilitary chiefs of the CIOAC, as commanded by the supreme government of that paramilitary coward Peña Nieto. But be clear, ladies and gentlemen of the bad government, we adherents of the Sexta on this corner of our homeland will continue being in the Zapatista struggle until you fall as bad governments and the system that permits what is capitalism.
Everything is quite clear: the paramilitaries of La Realidad were well organized and followed their counterinsurgency plan. They were in two groups. One group was at the entrance of the community and the other group was in the center all armed with rifles and guns, machetes, clubs and rocks. Before they carried out the assassination, they started with a provocation destroying the autonomous school of our compañero support bases of the community. Then they cut the water lines of our Zapatista compañeros and of the Caracol’s center. The Zapatista men and women were arriving from working in the area. Immediately, the Realidad paramilitaries went to ambush them at the road at the entrance of the community. They began by attacking them with rocks, clubs, destroying the trucks’ windshields. Our compañeros got off the trucks and defended themselves and others went to alert the Good Government Council who then went to help those being attacked. But they weren’t able to; they were also attacked in the middle of the community with gunfire and that’s where our compañero, José Luis Solís López, a teacher in the region of the Escuelita Freedom According to the Zapatistas, was shot in the right leg and then shot with a 22 caliber bullet on the right side of his chest, then with a blow of a machete to his mouth and then he was re-killed with a coup de grace to the head with a bullet of the same caliber and with several club blows to his back.
There are other ZAB compañeros who are equally severely wounded by the armed attacked, including machetes, clubs and stones. These criminal bands, named the federal and state Chiapas governments and the CIOAC executioners, have been fully identified by us women and men and we know what their objective is: to finish off all the advances made by Zapatista Autonomy in Chiapas and her dignified example that another world and another economic and social system is possible. And that it is being built against all odds in Zapatista autonomous territory in Chiapas and it is being replicated in all corners of Mexico and in many other countries and lands. Know that the Zapatistas are not alone, that the people of the city and countryside are not alone: now we are brothers and sisters with the indigenous Zapatista’s rebellion and dignity.
It is no accident that these same paramilitary gangs directed their attacks of hate and destruction against the Zapatistas Autonomous Schools, against the life of our Zapatista teachers of freedom. But they cannot finish them off because they have resisted more tan 500 years against colonialism and capitalism and have deep rooted and ancient culture, autonomy and dignity. From Mexico’s northwest without borders, we thank you for your resistance and example compañeras and compañeros of La Realidad.
Collectives:
Mexicali, B.C. Mex.
Semilla del Fractal
Tijuana, B.C. Mex.
Colectivo Auka
Casa de Cultura Obrera
Centro de Información para Trabajadoras y Trabajadores
Ensenada, B.C. Mexico
Movimiento Contra el Alza de los Energéticos y la Carestía, A. C.
D.F., Mexico
Costureras de Sueños, San Diego, CA
Colectivo Zapatista de San Diego
Los Ángeles, CA: Colectiva A.R.M.A.
Oakland, CA: Chiapas Support Committee/Comité de Apoyo a Chiapas
Students of the Escuelita Zapatista and/or adherents of the Sexta
Mexicali, B.C. Mex.
León Fierro R.
Silvia Resendiz Flores
Tijuana, B.C. Mex.
Aníbal Méndez Martínez
Carmen Valadez Pérez
Verónica Márquez
Elisa Domínguez Gastelum
Shirley A. Thomas
Gerardo Díaz
Emmanuell Galaviz
Magdalena Cerda Báez
Raquel Herrera Álvarez
Jesús Flores Moroyoqui
Raquel Ruiz
Laura Carrasco
Jaime Cota A.
Magdalena Ramírez Cerda
Ensenada, B.C. Mex.
Concepción Martínez Valdez
Sashenka Fierro Resendiz
María Rosa Soqui Murillo
D.F., Mex.
Inti Barrios
Individuals in solidarity:
Tijuana
Roberto Gerardo Farías
Alberto Lucero Antuna
Cecilia Tabares
Lizzete Mata
Toluca, Edo. De México
Beatriz Caballero
This letter was posted in Spanish on the Enlace Zapatista website: http://enlacezapatista.ezln.org.mx/2014/05/10/carta-de-solidaridad-con-las-bases-de-apoyo-zapatistas-de-colectivos-adherentes-a-la-sexta-y-estudiantes-de-la-escuelita-de-baja-california-mexico-y-california-estados-unidos/
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Read (in Spanish) the protest made on May 5 from the Good Government Council “Hacia la Esperanza” in Spanish against the paramilitary attack: JUNTA DE BUEN GOBIERNO HACIA LA ESPERANZA DENUNCIA ENÉRGICAMENTE A LOS PARAMILITARES CIOAQUISTAS ORGANIZADOS POR LOS 3 NIVELES DE LOS MALOS GOBIERNOS EN CONTRA DE NUESTROS PUEBLOS BASES DE APOYO DEL EJERCITO ZAPATISTA DE LIBERACIÓN NACIONAL-EZLN
You can also read (in Spanish) the May 9 EZLN communiqué, “Pain and Rage:” EL DOLOR Y LA RABIA. EJÉRCITO ZAPATISTA DE LIBERACIÓN NACIONAL. Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos
Translation: Chiapas Support Committee
