Mexico City | Desinformémonos. The Congreso Nacional Indígena (CNI, National Indigenous Congress) – Consejo Indígena de Gobierno (CIG, Indigenous Council of Government) (CNI-CIG) have called for a global action to stop the war against the people of Mexico and the world, to demand an end to the harassment of the Zapatista autonomous communities in Chiapas, end the militarization of indigenous territories, dispossession, extractivism and looting.

The action will take place on October 12 in commemoration of the 531 years of resistance of the indigenous peoples in Mexico, where communities, organizations, groups and activists will speak out “to stop this war that is structured through dispossession and exploitation, growing threats that involve the plundering of water, the extraction and distribution of hydrocarbons, mining and infrastructure megaprojects aimed at the savage ordering of populations, borders and territories.”

The CNI denounced that violence against indigenous communities continues to increase through a war “developed and systematized by Andrés Manuel López Obrador, ‘Supreme Chief of the Armed Forces’” and head of the Federal Executive, to guarantee and safeguard the interests of big capital and the narco-state.

They pointed out as examples of the war against the people the paramilitary attacks, harassment, threats and repression towards the Zapatista communities in Chiapas, the imposition of megaprojects such as the Mayan Train, the Morelos Integral Project and the Transismic Corridor, and the militarization of the country.

The activities of the Global Action will be against military and paramilitary violence, organized crime and capitalist corporations and in defense of life. Orgnizations and individuals can be register at cnicomunicacion@gmail.com to join the global action.

“October 12 marks the beginning of the resistance of our peoples and communities against the greatest genocide in the history of humanity, against invasion, against conquest, against the dispossession of our lands and territories, against the extermination of our institutions, languages, culture and traditions; that is, against the death that global capitalism produced and continues to produce,” the CNI-CIG stated in the call.

Below is the full statement (Read original in Spanish here.):

OCTOBER 12, DAY OF RESISTANCE AND INDIGENOUS DIGNITY

DECLARATION:

STOP THE WAR AGAINST THE PEOPLE OF MEXICO AND THE WORLD,

AGAINST THE ZAPATISTA PEOPLE AND THE ORIGINARY PEOPLE OF MEXICO

To the people of Mexico and the world,

To the National Coordination Space Against War,

To the National Assembly for Water and Life,

To the fathers and mothers of the 43 disappeared from Ayotzinapa,

To the organizations and groups that defend human rights,

To the Networks of Resistance and Rebellion,

To the Sixth National and International,

To the signatories of A Declaration for Life on the five continents,

To the Rebellious, Dignified and Rebellious Europe.

531 years after the beginning of the resistance and rebellion of our peoples against the war of capitalist invasion and conquest and within the framework of the 27 years since the Congreso Nacional Indígena (CNI, National Indigenous Congress) was founded as the space for struggle and unity of the native peoples of Mexico, WE CALL ON the peoples of Mexico and the world to redouble our resistance against the death that today more than ever is imposed on us by patriarchal capitalism on a planetary scale.

October 12 marks the beginning of the resistance of our people and communities against the greatest genocide in the history of humanity. Against invasion, against conquest, against the dispossession of our lands and territories, against the extermination of our institutions, languages, culture and traditions; that is, against the death that global capitalism produced and continues to produce.

Together with the Asamblea Nacional por el Agua y la Vida (National Assembly for Water and Life), we declare that the war that we people, in communities, neighborhoods, shanty towns, tribes and nations face throughout the national territory, is developed and systematized by Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), “Supreme Chief of the Armed Forces” and head of the Federal Executive, to guarantee and safeguard the interests of big capital and the narco-state; Furthermore, AMLO militarizes the entire country, as a guarantee to impose its mega projects of death such as the Maya Train, the Interoceanic Corridor, the Morelos Comprehensive Project and the Santa Lucía International Airport, which, based on colonialism, patriarchy, homogenization, imposition, hatred and fear, seek to order and reorder our territory. Therefore, we denounce that organized crime and paramilitary groups systematically collaborate with the armed forces, the National Guard and the state and municipal police, to the point where we can no longer understand them as different phenomena, but rather codependent pieces, muscles and ligaments of the armed forces of the Narco Capitalist State.

The siege of the Zapatista communities and the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN), massacres such as that of Acteal, or the executions and forced disappearances against members of the Consejo Indígena y Popular de Guerrero-Emilano Zapata (Indigenous and Popular Council of Guerrero-Emilano Zapata) and the Nahua community of Santa María Ostula, as well as the disappearance of the 43 young people from Ayotzinapa, together with the growing and continued violence against women, or the murder of land defenders, as is the case of our brother Samir Flores Soberanes, are forceful signs of this war.

Hand in hand with the Espacio de Coordinación Nacional Contra la Guerra (National Coordination Space Against War) we say that Chiapas is Mexico. And today many of the violences that afflict the entire Mexican territory are concentrated in Chiapas. The war that was imposed on our country from the United States–and that Felipe Calderón undertook the task of deepening–today reaches the entire national territory. The border has moved to the southeast, and with it the war, a war that the current administration has not stopped: 153,941 intentional homicides, 42,935 people missing and not located, 69 journalists and 94 defenders of land and territory and indigenous peoples and the environment murdered in the ongoing process of militarized and criminal recolonization of the current six-year term. Concluding that, in this context, paramilitary and paramilitary groups that have operated with total impunity in Chiapas for three decades, have increased their belligerent actions against the Zapatista peoples. The Organización Regional de Cafeticultores de Ocosingo (ORCAO, Regional Organization of Coffee Growers of Ocosingo), which at least since 2000 has operated in the service of different governments, political parties and power groups in the region, has carried out more than 100 attacks between 2019 and 2023 against Zapatista communities belonging to Caracol 10, Floreciendo la Semilla Rebelde, based in Patria Nueva, Junta de Buen Gobierno Nuevo Amanecer en Resistencia y Rebeldía por la Vida y la Humanidad.

In the face of this capitalist and patriarchal war of world corporations and their governments against humanity, we mobilize to demand a total stop to the military and paramilitary siege and the counterinsurgency strategy directed against the EZLN and the Zapatista communities; and against the indigenous peoples of Mexico, through militarization, militarism, paramilitarization, organized crime or the so-called indigenous justice plans that official indigenism promotes; We organize to stop this war that is structured through increasing dispossession and exploitation that involves the plundering of water, the extraction and distribution of hydrocarbons, mining and infrastructure megaprojects aimed at the savage ordering of populations, borders and of the territories of our peoples.

For all of the above, as an agreement of the Expanded Meeting of the Coordination and Monitoring Commission of the CNI-CIG, we call on the people of Mexico and the world who resist death and oblivion and on the social, civil and political organizations, as well as well as to the women and men of good heart, so that together we raise our voices against the war in Mexico and in the world, against the war against the Zapatista peoples and the indigenous peoples of Mexico and, consequently, we CALL on you to according to your times, modes, calendars and geographies:

ON OCTOBER 12, 2023, WE WILL CARRY OUT:

A GLOBAL ACTION TO STOP THE WAR AGAINST THE PEOPLE OF MEXICO AND THE WORLD, AGAINST THE ZAPATISTA PEOPLE AND THE ORIGINARY PEOPLE OF MEXICO

And we are called to demonstrate in the streets, embassies and consulates, study centers and workplaces, on social networks; everywhere that is possible and essential, against military and paramilitary violence, organized crime and capitalist corporations and in defense of life, registering your activity at cnicomunicacion@gmail.com. We call on each other and we call on you to join forces to collectively weave and plan a NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL DAY OF DISLOCATED ACTIONS, as well as our participation in the THIRD ANNIVERSARY OF THE TAKEOVER OF THE INPI BUILDING (today Casa de los Pueblos Samir Flores Soberanes) by of the Otomí Indigenous Community in Mexico City and a CENTRAL MOBILIZATION IN THE HEART OF MEXICO CITY.

THE WAR AGAINST THE PEOPLE IN MEXICO IS CALLED A CAPITALIST NARCO-STATE.

AFTER 531 YEARS OF WAR WE CONTINUE RESISTING. 27 YEARS OF THE NATIONAL INDIGENOUS CONGRESS.

SINCERELY

Never again a Mexico without us!

For the Comprehensive Reconstitution of our Peoples!

Congreso Nacional Indígena – Consejo Indígena de Gobierno

(NATIONAL INDIGENOUS CONGRESS – INDIGENOUS GOVERNMENT COUNCIL)

_________________________

Translated by the Chiapas Support Committee from the original published in Desinformémonos, September 23, 2023 at https://desinformemonos.org/cni-convoca-a-accion-global-contra-la-guerra-hacia-los-pueblos-indigenas/

Read the Congreso Nacional Indígena-Consejo Indígena de Gobierno’s (CNI-CIG) October 12 2023 call to global action here.