In Chicontepec, Veracruz, members of the “Other Campaign in la Huasteca” activist network issued a statement Aug. 31 protesting the “disappearance” of three of the 10 Nahua campesinos detained at a June land occupation and since freed pending charges against them. All ten had gone to a local federal courthouse to check in and sign documents as a condition of their release, and three never returned. The others said they had been detained at the courthouse by elements of the Federal Agency of Investigation (AFI), and are presumably being held at the federal prison at Tuxpan. However, authorities deny any record of their arrest. (La Jornada, Sept. 1)
See our last posts on the Mexico, the human rights crisis and the struggle in Veracruz.
100 “disappeared” in Mexico under PAN
Rosario Ibarra de Piedra, president of the Comité Eureka human rights organization, charged that in seven years of federal administrations under the right-wing National Action Party (PAN) there have been some 100 “forced disappearances,” and called for an independent investigation. Ibarra, a federal senator with the left-opposition Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), announced that on Oct. 2 (anniversary of the 1968 Tlatelolco massacre) she will be formally launching a new National Front Against Repression (FNCR). (La Jornada, Sept. 1)
Veracruz: campesinos “reappear”
Detained campesinos Alicio Martinez Cruz, Pedro Gutierrez Hernandez and Antonio Santiago Hernandez were released on bail from Tuxpan prison Sept. 4. Authorities said they were arrested for carrying illegal arms. (La Jornada, Sept. 4, via the anti-Calderon website Fecal.org.mx)