Oaxaca’s new governor, Gabino Cue Monteagudo, holds the unhappy job of cleaning the Augean stables of crime and corruption. He is widely credited with honesty and decency, but initiating and promoting profound change may require more than one generation.
The long march arrived at the Plaza de la Catedral—the very same one occupied by Zapatistas on January 1st, 1994. This time, 30 EZLN commanders awaited the crowd.
The Zapatistas remain the ever patient outsiders in a country torn apart by violence and corruption, quietly building an autonomous alternative, a living example of what a disciplined, long-term struggle can achieve.
Social psychologist Abraham Rivera speaks about the Rural Cities Initiative in Chiapas, Mexico. This interview is accompanied by numerous photos of the “Sustainable Rural City” Project of Santiago el Pinar.
After four years of war that has left nearly 40,000 people dead, countless more disappeared, and soldiers on the streets of every state in the country, many Mexicans are finally “fed up” with President Felipe Calderón’s drug policy. This weekend, Mexicans in at least 25 of the country’s 31 states will protest to “stop the war, for a just and peaceful Mexico.”
The construction of Santiago El Pinar, the second Sustainable Rural City, clearly unveils another facet of the project: that of a counterinsurgency strategy devised by the Chiapas government against the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN). Located very close to the Zapatista autonomous municipalities of San Juan de la Libertad and San Andrés Sakamch’en, the ‘city’ breaks down the traditional ways of life, and forces people to enter the capitalist mode of production of small businesses oriented towards the external market.
The Mesoamerican Peoples Forum was launched in 2001 in Tamaulipas, Mexico to combat Plan Puebla Panama. Over 500 people gathered for this year’s VIII Mesoamerican Peoples forum in Minatitlan, Mexico in April.
Every year, the Wixarika (Huichol) indigenous people of central west México walk 500 km to the sacred land of Wirikuta, where according to legend, the sun was born. This sacred land is currently under siege by a Vancouver-based mining company.
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