The struggle in Oaxaca was one of high points of workers struggle anywhere in the world last year. Now the movement of teachers and others in APPO is facing savage repression. We need to tell the story of the Oaxacan commune and make practical solidarity with workers under attack. (For an eyewitness account of the struggle on this website click here.)
The latest Mexican Labor News and Analysis contains a report on the situation, based on a visit by trade unionists and lawyers 17-21 December.
The report says that the Mexican National Commission for Human Rights issued its preliminary report on December 18, in which it concluded that 20 people had been killed, 370 injured and 349 imprisoned since June 2, 2006. The delegation were told that many others have disappeared or are in hiding. The Commission reported that it had received 1,211 complaints regarding alleged violations of human rights due to the “improper use of the police forces, arbitrary detentions, people held incommunicado, disappearances, damage, injuries, threats and illegal raids,” concluding: "The parties [to the conflict] and the Federal Preventive Police, which intervened for the purpose of restoring public order, have used violence repeatedly and excessively. As a consequence, the institutional, social and cultural life of the state has been damaged."
Examples of repression in the report are:
On October 28 four people were killed, including indymedia journalist Brad Will and a teacher, Emilio Alonso Fabian. The following day, the federal preventive police were sent into Oaxaca.
Then, on November 25th, the federal preventive police in full riot gear responded to provocateurs by firing tear gas into the crowd. The police had encircled the area some six to eight blocks away, so when people ran to escape the police and tear gas, many were picked up who had nothing to do with the march or with APPO.
Men and women were beaten, thrown face down and stacked on trucks. Of the 170 detained that day, 141 were subsequently transported to an airfield where they were taken by helicopter to Nayarit, some 745 miles away… The following week, some teachers were arrested in their classrooms, and people were dragged from their homes.
A student leader was detained by police wearing civilian clothing when leaving a movement radio station. He was hit on the head with a pistol, which left a gash in his face. He was told to write a false confession that he had a pistol and coke and was kicked and hit until he did so. He was also given the names of three activists and told to write that two had burned trucks and the third was the boss of the other two. He heard someone take off his belt and was asked if he had ever been fucked and how it felt. They subsequently sprayed something on his back which he understood they were going to set on fire, although they did not actually do so. Six days later he was finally released on bond and charged with theft.
A university student who was arrested affirmed that they did not have weapons, only papers, and that these were illegal arrests. He said two people were arrested for having union credentials, another for being the group’s spokesperson, one for wearing a Tai Kwan Do jacket, and that he believed that he was arrested for objecting, for having papers where he had written something about what was going on in Oaxaca, and for having UNAM identification. He said that some 200 armed Federal Highway Police stopped them, and hit them for three hours. They put blankets over them and kicked them, he explained, in order not to show marks. They brandished loaded weapons and told them they had three seconds to run. He said they suffered “physical blows and also with words.” When they were transported by helicopter, the police kept threatening to throw them out of the back of the helicopters and asking if they could fly.
We also know about other cases involving teachers:
On Wednesday 18 October, primary school teacher, Pánfilo Hernández Vásquez was coming out of an assembly with neighbours in the Jardín neighbourhood, when he was shot twice in the abdomen. He later died from his injuries.
Source: Narconews
Erangelio Mendoza Gonzalez, former general secretary of Section 22 del SNTE was imprisoned from the beginning of August until the end of October.
Source: Education International
Macario Otálo Padilla, the former director of Section 22 of the National Teachers Union (SNTE) was kidnapped on 18 December with two other APPO activists. They were taken to a private home, beaten and tortured and then dumped behind a shopping mall after a two-hour ordeal.
Source: Narconews
