On April 23 in Arizona, Cochise County Attorney Ed Rheinheimer filed a felony complaint against US Border Patrol agent Nicholas Corbett, charging him with four counts of homicide: first- and second-degree murder, manslaughter and negligent homicide. On Jan. 12, Corbett… Read moreBorder Patrol agent faces trial in killing
A group of Mexican writers, intellectuals and artists have issued an open letter to Gov. Patricio PatrĂłn Laviada of Yucatan state demanding the release of 22 people still being held in MĂ©rida after being arrested at the March 13 protests… Read moreYucatan: demand release of anti-Bush protesters
The Fray BartolomĂ© de Las Casas Human Rights Center (Frayba), based in the Highlands of Mexico’s conflicted southern Chiapas state, has issued a new report charging that 13 years after an armed uprising in the state, the roots of the… Read moreFrayba: causes of Chiapas conflict still prevail
The Mexican senate has passed a package of reforms to Article 139 of the Federal Penal Code modeled on anti-terrorist legislation in the United States—above the objections of the left-opposition PRD, PT and Convergence, whose legislators assailed the changes as… Read moreMexican senate passes anti-terror package
Gov. Ulises Ruiz of Oaxaca has called upon Mexican military authorities to investigate a new guerilla group which has announced its existence the in conflicted southern state. In a message posted to the website of the Spain-based Documentation Center for… Read moreOaxaca: new guerilla group under investigation
A criminal complaint has been filed in the Mexican border city of Matamoros against Luz MarĂa González Armenta, leader of Defense and Promotion of Human Rights-Emiliano Zapata (DEPRODHEZAC), weeks after she was detained at a political protest. González was arrested… Read moreCriminal complaint filed against Matamoros rights defender
Rodolfo Chávez Galindo, a campesino leader active in the opposition to La Parota hydro-electric complex, was arrested by state police April 21 in the conflicted southern Mexican state of Guerrero, charged with the illegal detention of an engineer from the… Read moreGuerrero: hydro-dam opponent arrested
From Amnesty International, April 19: Political activist David Venegas was arbitrarily detained by state police in central Oaxaca City on 13 April, and reportedly tortured. He has been charged with serious criminal offences, on the basis of evidence which appears… Read moreOaxaca: Amnesty International alert for arrested activists
The Popular People’s Assembly of Oaxaca (APPO) has joined with members of the Union of Mexican Jurists in a “Popular Court” to judge the repression and rights violations in southern Mexico’s Oaxaca state over the last year of social conflict…. Read more“Popular Court” judges Oaxaca repression
The Other Campaign of Jovel—local chapter of the Zapatista civil initiative in the Chiapas highland city of San Cristobal de Las Casas—has turned over to the agrarian authorities in the state capital, Tuxtla GutiĂ©rrez, a critical analysis of land conflicts… Read moreChiapas: agrarian authorities accused in land conflicts
Representantives of dozens of ejidos (agricultural collectives) in the northern zone of Mexico’s Chiapas state issued a statement denouncing the approval of illegal sales of collective lands. The protesters, mostly Chol Maya from the municipalities of Tila and Salto de… Read moreChiapas: campesinos protest illegal land sales
The president of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (CIDH), FlorentĂn MenĂ©ndez, was in Mexico April 11 to meet with officials from the federal Government Secretariat. MenĂ©ndez urged officials to seek a solution to the ongoing teachers’ strike in the… Read moreAPPO: Oaxaca struggle not over
