For the past two weeks, some 200 troops from Mexico’s elite Federal Preventive Police (PFP) have occupied the village of ZimapĆ”n, Hidalgo, the scene of protests over a toxic waste site that the Spanish firm Befesa is scheduled to open this month. Heavily armed troopsāsome in ski masks and full riot gearāarrived in military-type trucks backed up by helicopters June 12, and continue to patrol the town’s streets. The former bishops of the conflicted San CristĆ³bal diocese in Chiapas, Samuel Ruiz GarcĆa and RaĆŗl Vera LĆ³pez, have demanded the withdrawal of the PFP. (vaXtuxpan, June 30; La Jornada, June 17; Radio AMLO, June 15)
Residents of the local community of BotiƱa, where the plant is being built, have joined with the civic group Todos Somos ZimapƔn in calling for a general municipality-wide plebiscite on the waste facility. (La Jornada, June 30)
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