Army planning attack on rebels?
Elements of the Mexican government and several state governments have been stepping up repressive measures against opposition groups.
On January 11, Morelos state police arrested three members of the Tepozteco Unity Committee (CUT). The CUT formed in 1995 to protest against plans for a golf course near the pre-colonial village of Tepoztlan, a few miles south of Mexico City; an elected "government in rebellion" has held the village in defiance of Morelos authorities since September 1995.
In Guadalajara, capital of the conservative western state of Jalisco, police have arrested Maximiano Barbosa Llamas and six other leaders of El Barzon, a militant organisation of farmers and small business people unable to pay their bank debts. The seven leaders have been charged with conspiracy, riot, gangsterism and a number of other crimes.
Meanwhile, authorities in the southern state of Oaxaca continue to hold most of the municipal government officials of San Augustin Loxicha on charges that they are founding members of the rebel Revolutionary Popular Army (EPR), which launched a deadly attack in the resort town of Huatulco in August.
Many indigenous communities in Chiapas are making preparations for the possibility of a new military action against the rebel Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN). Peace talks between the rebels and the government broke down earlier in the month.
Local people, international observers, health workers and Protestant ministers have all told the daily La Jornada that the army has been building up its strength since January 11 in areas of EZLN support, where right-wing paramilitary groups have also been active.
In a lengthy communiqué received by the media on January 23, the EZLN charged that the army was "saturating" its bases with troops and equipment, that there was an order for a "surgical strike" that was "already on the desks of the divisional headquarters of the so-called Rainbow Task Force" and that the order "came accompanied with a presidential promise: 'this time there will be no turning back'".
[From Weekly News Update on the Americas, 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY, 10012, USA; email nicanet@blythe.org.]