March 16, 2020

To the people of Mexico:

To the peoples of the world:

To the National Indigenous Congress – Indigenous Governing Council

To the national and international Sixth:

To the networks of resistance and rebellion:

Sisters and brothers:

Compañeros, compañeras, compañeroas:

We inform you that:

Considering the real, scientifically proven threat to human life posed by the spread of COVID-19, also known as “coronavirus.”

Considering the frivolous irresponsibility and lack of seriousness of the bad governments and of the political class as a whole, who make use of a humanitarian problem to attack each other instead of taking the necessary measures to confront that danger that threatens life without distinction of nationality, sex, race, language, religious belief, political militancy, social condition, and history.

Considering the lack of accurate and timely information on the scope and severity of the contagion, as well as the absence of a real plan to deal with the threat.

Considering the Zapatista commitment in our fight for life.

We have decided:

First – To decree a red alert in our villages, communities, and neighborhoods, and in all the Zapatista organizational bodies;

Second – To recommend to the Good Government Juntas and Zapatista Rebel Autonomous Municipalities, the total closure of their Caracoles and Centers of Resistance and Rebellion, immediately.

Third – To recommend to the bases of support and to the entire organizational structure to follow a series of recommendations and extraordinary hygiene measures to share throughout the Zapatista communities, villages, and neighborhoods.

Fourth – Given the absence of bad governments, exhort everyone in Mexico and the world to take the necessary health measures that, with scientific basis, allow them to go forward and survive this pandemic.

Fifth – We call to not drop the struggle against femicidal violence; to continue the struggle in defense of the territory and Mother Earth; to continue the struggle for the disappeared, murdered and imprisoned; and to raise the flag for the fight for humanity up high.

Sixth – We call for human contact not to be lost, but to temporarily change the ways to know ourselves, compañeros, compañeras, compañeroas, sisters and brothers.

The word and the ear, along with the heart, have many paths, many ways, many calendars, and many geographies find each other. And this fight for life can be one of them.

That’s all.

From the mountains of the Mexican Southeast,

For the Indigenous Revolutionary Clandestine Committee-General Command of the Zapatista National Liberation Army

Subcomandante Insurgente Moisés.

México, March 2020.

En español: http://enlacezapatista.ezln.org.mx/2020/03/16/por-coronavirus-el-ezln-cierra-caracoles-y-llama-a-no-abandonar-las-luchas-actuales/