Mexico: Declaration & Call to Action from Oaxaca

from ainfos, reposted 30 August 2008:

Distributed by the Asamblea Popular de los Pueblos de Oaxaca, Consejo Indígena Popular de Oaxaca-Ricardo Flores Magón*, & the Solidarity Without Borders-New York Delegation

Felipe Calderón and Ulises Ruiz Ortiz have set in motion a hunt against APPO and Otra Campaña members. A clear operation of Plan Mexico.

To all the people of Oaxaca, Mexico and the World,
To men and women of good hearts,
To all honest media,
To all human rights organizations,
And to all people who suffered and who still suffer from repression, harassment, imprisonment, and from the loss of a loved one:

Almost another year of impunity for Oaxacan people while the 27 murders of 2006 remain unresolved. The murderers still enjoy their freedom and benefit from the protection of the corrupt governments of Felipe Calderón and Ulises Ruiz Ortiz who want to get rid of those who claim their rights.

It is in this context that the Procurador General de la Republica or PGR (Public Prosecutor) tries to charge the APPO with the murder of Bradley Roland Will, an independent journalist of Indymedia from the United States. As videos clearly show, he was murdered by a group of militiamen from Santa Lucia del Camino municipality. These facts were confirmed by international experts from the independent organization Doctors for Human Rights.

In 2007, Will's family was informed of the lack of seriousness in the PGR investigation and therefore asked Doctors for Human Rights to handle Brad?s case. In March 2008, they investigated where Brad was murdered to find out that the bullet that killed him came from a great distance, proving wrong the hypothesis that a member of the APPO was responsible for this murder. The report of this investigation was sent to the PGR but as always occurs when proofs do not serve their interests, they rejected it.

On the contrary, they are presently conducting the 274/2008 investigation asking for the detention of 4 people. For now, these people cannot be held responsible because of a lack of evidence. However, a lack of rule of law and a reckless bad faith from the State put them in a vulnerable position. Actually, they can be placed under arrest anytime while the State continues its slander against the Oaxacan social movement by associating it with this murder.

As it did in the past with many members and sympathizers of the APPO, the PGR is now distorting the real facts with a clear tendency to criminalize social protest by accusing innocent people who were involved in the Oaxacan social movement, such as Miguel Cruz Moreno, member of the Popular Indigenous Council of Oaxaca Ricardo Flores Magon CIPO-RFM, councilor of the APPO, who voluntarily claimed to be a direct witness of Brad's murder to make sure that it won?t remain unpunished and who were always available when the PGR required him; and the case of Edgar Santiago Navarro, who never came on the scene of crime but who is a student activist in Chapingo; moreover, these two persons are adherents to the Other Campaign and to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle.

This is an additional proof that Mexican State is criminalizing social protest and persecuting social organizations that refuse to play the
Government's dirty game.

APPO

All Power to the People!

======================

* An antiauthoritarian anticapitalist initiative

See http://www.ainfos.ca/en/ainfos21319.html

Bookmark/Search this post with:

delicious | digg | reddit | newsvine | furl | google | yahoo | technorati