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<DIV>apologies cross-posting....</DIV>
<DIV><BR><FONT size=4>PROTEST REPRESSION IN MEXICO</FONT><BR><BR>San Salvador
Atenco, Mexico - May 2006-</DIV>
<DIV><BR>One killed, many brutally attacked and over 200 jailed in vicious state
<BR>violence - Send protest letters to the Mexican authorities<BR><BR>This is a
long e mail but I would urge people to try and make time to read <BR>as much as
they can - the extent of the violence by the police and the state <BR>forces
against the people of Atenco and their supporters is very shocking. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>The context of this state brutality is that Atenco is a strong support base
for the </DIV>
<DIV>Other Campaign, a grass-roots movement initiated by the zapatistas, to
try</DIV>
<DIV>and bring together resistances from below, round Mexico and
internationally.</DIV>
<DIV>Zapatista spokesperson Marcos is currently touring Mexico to meet people
and </DIV>
<DIV>groups in resistance, as part of the Other Campaign.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Within the last few days in Atenco, near Mexico City -<BR>a 14 year old boy
was killed by the police, a 20 year old student is in a <BR>coma and is probably
brain damaged, one of the leaders of the Peoples' Front <BR>in Defense of the
Earth was viciously beaten and is in maximum security <BR>jail, below is a
first-hand account by two Catalan women who were arrested <BR>in Atenco and were
two of a number of women seriously sexually assaulted by <BR>the police, there
are reports of the police raping five women and a man, <BR>over 200 people have
been arrested and several have disappeared.<BR><BR>The people of Atenco have
been heroically resisting the state attack, and <BR>supporters of the Other
Campaign have marched to Atenco in numbers to give <BR>physical
solidarity. Solidarity demos have taken place round Mexico and
<BR>internationally.<BR><BR>Below are emails, phone nos and addresses of
President Fox of Mexico and of <BR>the Mexican Embassy and other Mexican state
institutions in the UK - please <BR>try and find the time to write or
phone.<BR><BR>The main demands of the people of Atenco are outlined immediately
below
-<BR><BR>---------------------------------------------------------------<BR>Sub
Marcos on the situation in Atenco:<BR>"For us, those men and<BR>women who make
up the Peoples' Front in Defense of<BR>the Earth are the Other Campaign in those
lands. We<BR>will respect their decisions. We will go wherever<BR>they tell us
to go. They have been clear in their<BR>demands: the immediate release of those
detained and<BR>the complete withdrawal of the government forces<BR>that are
invading their
lands."<BR><BR>----------------------------------------------------------------<BR><BR><BR>Crackdown
in Mexico; Death, Injuries and Jail.<BR><BR>Global Exchange<BR>May 06,
2006<BR>By John Gibler<BR><BR><BR><BR>Police Brutality in Mexico.<BR><BR>San
Salvador Atenco, Mexico<BR>At 7 AM last Wednesday, May 3rd, state
police<BR>blocked 60 flower vendors from setting up their stands at the Texcoco
local<BR>market in the State of Mexico, about 20 miles east of Mexico City.
The<BR>police beat and arrested those who resisted. The flower vendors called to
the<BR>residents of neighboring San Salvador Atenco for help and the
Atenco<BR>residents blocked the highway that borders their town and leads to
Texcoco.<BR><BR>The police response was overwhelming: hundreds of state and
federal police,<BR>most clad in riot gear, arrived to lift the blockade. Atenco
resisted, with<BR>machetes, clubs, Molotov cocktails and bottle rockets. The
police tried to lift the<BR>blockade five times throughout the day, and five
times they were repelled.<BR><BR>The violence was extreme. Photographs published
in local papers show Atenco<BR>protestors beating a fallen policemen, police
beating tens of fallen<BR>protestors. Severe beatings. Protesters kicking one
fallen police officer in<BR>the face, groups of police pulverizing tens of
protestors with rocks and<BR>batons.<BR><BR>Police also attacked photographers
from both the national and the<BR>international<BR>press. Photographers and
television cameramen from Associated Press,<BR>Reuters,<BR>Milenio, Jornada and
Televisa all reported beatings and attempts to<BR>confiscate<BR>cameras.
Photographs and film coverage of the beatings were published on the<BR>internet
and shown on national television. Local and international news<BR>articles
however, have not mentioned the systematic police violence
against<BR>reporters.<BR><BR>All told on Wednesday, over 50 people were injured
and 100 detained by the<BR>police. Protestors took 11 police hostage, but
released them to the Red<BR>Cross<BR>later in the evening. A fourteen year-old
boy was shot in the chest and<BR>killed<BR>in the afternoon. Local media
reported that the boy was killed by<BR>projectiles<BR>from the protestors, but
the death certificate said otherwise: bullet wound<BR>to<BR>the
chest.<BR><BR><BR><BR>Atenco is famous across Mexico for having resisted in 2002
the forced<BR>displacement from their community to make way for a new Mexico
City Airport.<BR>Villagers, mostly small farmers, formed the People's Front in
Defense of<BR>Land<BR>(Frente del Pueblo en Defensa de La Tierra) and, wielding
their machetes,<BR>became a symbol of popular protest in
Mexico.<BR><BR>Organizers from the People's Front have attended several meetings
of the<BR>Zapatista's Other Campaign, and hosted subcomandante Marcos' arrival
in<BR>Atenco.<BR>During his visit, Marcos promised to align the Zapatista Army
of National<BR>Liberation with Atenco's struggle. The Atenco Front, with
machetes in hand,<BR>was<BR>in charge of providing security for Marcos during
the May first Labor Day<BR>march<BR>to Mexico City's main plaza where the
Front's leader, Ignacio Del Valle,<BR>spoke<BR>before tens of thousands gathered
in the plaza.<BR><BR>Two days later riot police stormed the house where he had
been hiding since<BR>the<BR>attack in Texcoco. At that moment the Televisa
cameraman was outside the<BR>house<BR>filming the police operation when some
five police officers approached and<BR>repeatedly beat him with clubs. As a
result there is no film coverage of the<BR>police raid.<BR><BR>Several newspaper
photographers, however, photographed Del Valle's arrival<BR>to<BR>prison several
hours later that night. He was carried in a headlock by a<BR>masked<BR>police
officer, who, in the photographs, is pointing for the
photographers<BR>to<BR>leave the area. Another masked officer walked slightly
behind, grabbing Del<BR>Valle's back. The two masked officers walk Del Valle
through a gauntlet of a<BR>hundred riot police with helmets and shields. Del
Valle's head is covered<BR>with<BR>a towel in the pictures, but his face,
swollen and bloody is partially<BR>visible.<BR>Also visible is a blood stain the
size of a fist on the groin of his jeans,<BR>evidence of repeated strikes to his
testicles.<BR><BR>Police Siege Town, Take over 200 prisoners<BR><BR>The
following day, Thursday May 4th, Mexico woke to the bloody images of<BR>violence
from the day before. Atenco woke to a police siege that led to<BR>hundreds more
wounded and detained.<BR><BR>Around 6:30 AM, over three thousand police
surrounded Atenco and invaded,<BR>filling the streets, cutting down everyone in
their way with clubs and<BR>firing<BR>tear gas, both to disorient, and to kill.
Several protestors were shot in<BR>the<BR>head at close range with metal gas
pellets three inches long and an inch in<BR>diameter.<BR><BR>Within two hours
the police had occupied Atenco.<BR><BR>Then the terror began. The police went
house to house, breaking windows and<BR>doors, pulling people into the street,
beating them and then piling them in<BR>police vans and trucks. The police had a
masked individual in civilian<BR>clothes<BR>who pointed out which houses to
raid. Several people who had participated as<BR>speakers in high-profile Other
Campaign events in Mexico City were singled<BR>out<BR>and beaten. One woman who
spoke in the Zocalo in Mexico City on May first<BR>was<BR>pulled into the street
and kicked repeatedly in the groin.<BR><BR>The police violence on Thursday was
indiscriminate. Both mainstream and<BR>alternative press reporters were
attacked. Several members of the caravan<BR>that<BR>accompanies the Other
Campaign across the country were beaten and arrested.<BR><BR>Samantha Dietmar, a
young German photographer who has been covering the<BR>Other<BR>Campaign since
January was grabbed in the doorway of her hotel, beaten in<BR>the<BR>face and
thrown into a truck. A neighbor who witnessed the attack said
that<BR>she<BR>asked why the police were taking her: "What did she do?" The
police officer<BR>responded, the woman said: "She did whatever I say she
did."<BR><BR>Dietmar was taken to a women's prison on the outskirts of Mexico
City. A<BR>human<BR>rights lawyer who was able to interview her said that she
had serious pain<BR>in<BR>her eyes from the tear gas, and that she had been
beaten in the face and<BR>body.<BR>2 Catalan women, María Sostras y Cristina
Valls, were also arrested in<BR>Atenco.<BR>They have now been deported to
Barcelona. Both have described how they were<BR>sexually assaulted by police
while being taken in vans to the nearby prison.<BR>They also reported that a
German man was repeatedly raped by police.<BR><BR>The same lawyer said that five
women were raped in the police vans when<BR>taken to<BR>jail.<BR><BR>Between two
and three hundred people were detained, but only 109 have been<BR>recognized by
the police. A list is circulating on the internet, compiled<BR>from<BR>witness
accounts, of 275 people who have been detained. At least 18
people<BR>are<BR>missing.<BR><BR>Hundreds of people sought hiding in houses
across the town. In one house, 23<BR>people were packed into a 12-by-12 foot
room. Just outside the hiding room,<BR>Alexis Benhumea, a 20-year old economy
student in Mexico City, laid<BR>unconscious<BR>for 12 hours. Just after 6:30 AM
he was shot in the head with a SPEDE-HEAT<BR>CN<BR>projectile, manufactured by
the company, Defense Technology / Federal<BR>Laboratories. This is printed on
the projectile: 17CN-LR F206CN Long Range -<BR>150 YDS Single Projectile. The
impact broke his skull open in two places,<BR>exposing his brain.<BR><BR>Alexis
was carried into a house by his father and two friends for hiding.<BR>One
of<BR>the protestors hiding out in the house made an impromptu bandage for
the<BR>wound<BR>to stop the bleeding. The thick bandage was soaked in blood by
the<BR>afternoon.<BR>Alexis's father and those hiding out in the house so feared
for their lives,<BR>and Alexis' life, that they dared not leave their hiding
place. Indeed, just<BR>outside the house, state and federal police blocked both
ends of the street<BR>and<BR>constantly patrolled up and down the
street.<BR><BR>"I was sure that they would kill him and dump him somewhere if I
tried to go<BR>out<BR>and seek medical help," said Angel Benhumea, Alexis'
father. "I didn't think<BR>he<BR>would make it."<BR><BR>After coordinating by
cellular telephones with friends in Mexico City,<BR>correspondents with
Indymedia Chiapas were able to rent a taxi van (which<BR>operate in Mexico like
public buses rather than individual taxis) and stage<BR>a<BR>rescue, taking
Alexis and his father to a hospital 40 minutes away, on the<BR>eastern border of
Mexico City. Alexis arrived alive and survived four hours<BR>of<BR>intensive
brain surgery: hemorrhaging had filled 30 percent of his brain. At<BR>the time
of writing, Alexis' condition is still critical, and the extent of<BR>brain
damage is unknown.<BR><BR>Alexis Benhumea was attacked twice: first with the
pellet that broke his<BR>skull,<BR>and second with the police siege that made it
impossible for his family to<BR>seek<BR>medical attention. If Alexis survives,
he will most likely suffer permanent<BR>brain damage.<BR><BR>By mid-afternoon
Atenco was an occupied city. Burn marks and broken glass,<BR>thousands of police
standing guard, leaning in doorways, lying in stairways,<BR>sprawled out
sleeping in the shade of the central plaza. Yet the climate was<BR>tense. When I
took a picture from a car window of a group of police, one<BR>whipped around and
loaded a gas pellet in his rifle, but not in time to<BR>fire.<BR><BR>Around 5:30
in the afternoon, the state and federal police lifted their<BR>siege,<BR>piling
into their trucks and driving off.<BR><BR>Zapatistas March to
Atenco<BR><BR>Thursday in the evening the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
and local<BR>labor and student organizations called a march for Friday at 4PM
from the<BR>University of Chapingo to Atenco.<BR><BR>At 4PM Marcos arrived at
the university?leaving the house in Mexico City<BR>where<BR>he had been
surrounded by police and federal intelligence officers since<BR>Wednesday
evening. About a thousand people had already gathered for the<BR>march<BR>by the
time of his arrival.<BR><BR>The march left from Chapingo at around 5PM with some
two thousand people.<BR>But<BR>the march kept growing. Standing on overpasses,
it was impossible to see the<BR>end of the march as it occupied the highway that
leads to Atenco. Estimates<BR>among local reporters ranged from 4 to 10 thousand
people by the time the<BR>march<BR>reached Atenco.<BR><BR>As the march crossed
through the town of Texcoco, where the violence began<BR>on<BR>Wednesday, locals
closed the metal doors used to cover their windows at<BR>night,<BR>making the
fear in Texcoco visible and audible. In the four months of
the<BR>Other<BR>Campaign, nothing like this has happened before. Yet the police
were not<BR>waiting<BR>for the marchers. A few motorcycle state police went
ahead of the march, and<BR>several trucks with federal police trailed
behind.<BR><BR>The marchers arrived in Atenco without confrontations with the
police. In<BR>the<BR>central plaza, several local community leaders and parents
whose children<BR>had<BR>been beaten and detained spoke to the crowd that filled
the town plaza.<BR><BR>"My boy was on his way to work when they grabbed him,"
one woman said, "is<BR>that<BR>justice?"<BR><BR>Subcomandante Marcos attacked
the media manipulation of the violence in<BR>Atenco,<BR>accusing the government
of directing newspaper, television and radio<BR>directors<BR>of holding back
images of police brutality while publishing and passing over<BR>and over the
same images of protestors beating police.<BR><BR>Marcos held in the air five
empty shotgun shells, most likely slug shells,<BR>that<BR>locals found on the
ground after the siege. "Here is the proof of who killed<BR>the boy," Marcos
said.<BR><BR>He offered to hand one of the shells over to reporters from
Televisa and TV<BR>Azteca, the largest media corporations in Mexico, but the
reporters refused<BR>to<BR>identify themselves. Marcos said he would grant
interviews to any reporter<BR>who<BR>agrees to publish the interview "without
cuts or edits," signaling a major<BR>shift in the Zapatista's media policy
during the Other Campaign, which had<BR>been<BR>to refuse all interview
requests.<BR><BR>Marcos reinstated the Zapatista's support for Atenco and its
political<BR>prisoners.<BR><BR>"You are not alone," he said, "We will continue
carrying out mobilizations<BR>across the country until all the political
prisoners are freed."<BR><BR>He also accused the government of plotting the
repression: why were the<BR>police<BR>ready to attack here if the problem was in
Texcoco, he asked. "Because they<BR>want their airport once again, and they are
coming for your land."<BR><BR>Marcos said that he and participants in the Other
Campaign would stay in<BR>Mexico<BR>City indefinitely and called for a national
public gathering in Atenco over<BR>the<BR>next two
days.<BR><BR>------------------------------------------------------------------<BR>>
Here's a Paypal account: to help support prisoner<BR>> solidarity
efforts.<BR>> It's set up by the Centro de Medios Libres ><BR> <A
href="http://www.vientos.info/presosdonaciones/"><FONT face=Arial
size=2>http://www.vientos.info/presosdonaciones/</FONT></A><BR><FONT face=Arial
size=2>><BR>---------------------------------------------------------------------</FONT></DIV>
<DIV>PROTEST TO THE MEXICAN STATE AUTHORITIES</DIV>
<DIV>---------------------------------------------------------------------</DIV><FONT
face=Arial size=2>
<DIV><BR>PRESIDENT FOX OF MEXICO<BR><BR> Vicente Fox
Quesada<BR> Presidente de la República<BR>Residencia Oficial de los Pinos
Casa Miguel Alemán<BR>Col. San Miguel Chapultepec, C.P. 11850, DISTRITO FEDERAL,
México<BR> telephone<BR>(55) 27891100<BR>(55) 52772376<BR></FONT><A
href="mailto:vicente.fox.quesada@presidencia.gob.mx"><FONT face=Arial
size=2>vicente.fox.quesada@presidencia.gob.mx</FONT></A><BR><BR><FONT face=Arial
size=2>More Mexican government contacts here<BR></FONT><A
href="http://www.presidencia.gob.mx/directorio/"><FONT face=Arial
size=2>http://www.presidencia.gob.mx/directorio/</FONT></A><BR><BR><BR><FONT
face=Arial
size=2>-----------------------------------------------------------------------<BR><BR>Mexican
Embassy to the United Kingdom<BR>16 St. George Street<BR>Hanover Sq.<BR>London
W1S 1LX<BR>tel. +44 (0)20 7499 8586<BR>fax. +44 (0)20 7495 4035<BR>e-mail:
</FONT><A href="mailto:mexuk@easynet.co.uk"><FONT face=Arial
size=2>mexuk@easynet.co.uk</FONT></A><BR><BR><FONT face=Arial size=2>Ambassador,
Juan José Bremer de Martino<BR>Deputy Head of Mission, Abel Abarca
Ayala<BR><BR><BR>-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------<BR><BR>Mexican
Government Offices in the UK<BR><BR>MEXICO TOURISM BOARD<BR>Wakefield
House<BR>41 Trinity Square<BR>London EC3N 4DJ<BR>Tel: (44-020) 7488 93
92<BR>Fax: (44-020) 7265 07 04<BR></FONT><A
href="mailto:uk@visitmexico.com"><FONT face=Arial
size=2>uk@visitmexico.com</FONT></A><BR><BR><FONT face=Arial size=2>Sr. Manuel
Enrique Díaz Cebrián<BR>Minister (Information and Tourism)</FONT></DIV><FONT
face=Arial size=2></FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face=Arial
size=2>------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>regular updates at <A
href="http://www.narconews.com">www.narconews.com</A></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial
size=2>---------------------------------------------------------------------------------</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face=Arial size=2>more info on request to
myself, and/or contact</FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face=Arial size=2>Edinburgh Chiapas
Solidarity Group</FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><A
href="mailto:edinchiapas@yahoo.co.uk">edinchiapas@yahoo.co.uk</A></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face=Arial size=2> <A
href="http://www.edinchiapas.org.uk">www.edinchiapas.org.uk</A></DIV>
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