Acteal: Massacre in Mexico

April 1998
T H E RaVEN C H R O N I C L E S

`PacifIc Northwest Urban Writing`

A JAPENESE AMERICAN IN MEXICO

Acteal: Massacre in Mexico

Holly Yasui

THREE DAYS BEFORE Christmas, on December 22, 1997, forty-six indigenous people, sympathizers of the EZLN (Zapatista Army of National Liberation) were massacred in a mountain village called Acteal in the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico. Fifteen corpses recovered from the bloody mountainside were children, one a babe-in-arms. Also twenty-one women, and ten men.

Perhaps the preponderance of women and children may be explained by the fact that the short, thin legs of boys and girls can't run as fast as grown adults, and that mothers lingered even as the shots rang out, trying and sometimes succeeding in sheltering their terrified sons and daughters. All the victims were fleeing, shot in the backs with AK-47 assault rifles and hacked up by machetes.

And who could have perpetrated such a heinous, unspeakable crime against these unarmed, unaggressive people who were praying ... praying ... as they were pursued, mutilated and killed?

The mainstream news reports refer to "pro-government paramilitary groups" in the Chiapas Highlands. Perhaps this moniker is used to distinguish the genocidal murderers of Chiapas from the "anti-government paramilitary groups" that plague the United States. But this phrase also disguises the fact that the paramilitary group responsible for the massacre of Acteal is not only pro-government; the government itself is pro-paramilitary.

On July 4, 1997, the state government of Chiapas, headed by PRI-appointed governor Ruiz Ferro, granted $4,600,000 pesos to the paramilitary group "Peace and Justice" for a so-called agricultural and financial renewal program to be carried out -- "according to agreed-upon procedures and norms " for one year."

Four and a half million pesos, a half-million U.S. dollars -- more than most people in the world will see in their entire lifetimes, the entire lifetimes of their entire families -- that buys a lot of arms and ammunition.

How else could rural farmers of the so-called "Peace and Justice" group purchase expensive, customs-controlled combat arms like the AK-47s.?

"Peace and Justice" ... agricultural and financial renewal ... "-agreed-upon procedures and norms" ... the utter hypocrisy and lies involved in this conspiracy of extermination absolutely sickens me.

I have only a brief space in which to try to express my outrage and grief over this horrendous atrocity and to explain why I feel that you, too, should care about what transpired in a cold, poor village far from your warm, safe home.

To me, the Zapatistas have represented the world's best hope for social justice that revolutionaries all over the world have sought. These diminutive, dark-skinned people have conquered many with their quiet dignity and refusal to be coerced, co-opted, or manipulated. Even as the death toll by arms has mounted over the years, even as the war of attrition -- death by disease, starvation, despair over the deaths of loved ones -- has dragged on and on, the Zapatistas have stood proud and uncompromising against the all-powerful federal and state governments. They have continued, in spite of incredible odds, to insist upon the conditions agreed-upon by the government negotiators and the EZLN at San Andres (but never carried out by the government); to struggle non-violently to make known the deteriorating conditions under which they are forced to live, suffer, and die; to appeal to civil society, in Mexico and in the world, to not forget them, because the rights they are fighting for are the universal human rights that belong to all of us, each and every single one of us who breathe the air of this world.

I must confess that in dealing with the ongoing difficulties that face non-wealthy expatriates living and working in Mexico, I ceased to support the Zapatistas financially and through my writing. Other, more pressing issues relegated them to the back of my mind, low on my list of priorities. Until the 23rd of December, 1997, when the front pages of all the newspapers in this country cried out against this brutal, unforgivable crime.

Does it always take death, especially a gruesome massacre as in Acteal, to remind us that we cannot survive as a people, as a species, as a world, if we allow our society to continue to be driven by power-lust, greed, hypocrisy, and ... yes, willful ignorance? And by our society, I mean the international community of individuals and groups who believe in universal human rights regardless of nationality, skin color, or political affiliation.

Nothing will bring back the lives of those in Acteal who were massacred, nor heal the traumatic wounds of those who watched their families and friends massacred. But there are still many ... as many as six thousand refugees in Chiapas suffering acutely from the highly tense, militarized, death-squad environment that their beautiful mountain homes have become.

As foreign guests in this country, there is little we expatriates in Mexico can do directly about the massacre of Acteal (there is an article in the federal constitution that forbids political activity by foreigners) ... except to inform ourselves and others, and speak out for the basic, universal human rights of life and liberty.

If your consciousness has been touched in some manner by this atrocity and the continuing horror in Chiapas, please write to, join and/or contribute to any of the human rights organizations that maintain a critically important international presence in Chiapas: Amnesty International; Human Rights Watch/Americas; Global Exchange; the International Red Cross.

Contact List for Human Rights Organizations:

http://www.hrw.org/

Human Rights Watch
350 Fifth Avenue, 34th Floor
New York, NY 10118-3299 USA

The main telephone switchboard number is:
1-212-290-4700

Main fax number:
1-212-736-1300

http://www.amnesty.org/

admin-us@aiusa.org
Amnesty International, International
Secretariat, 1 Easton Street, London WC1X 8DJ, United Kingdom

http://www.globalexchange.org/

Global Exchange
2017 Mission Street #303
San Francisco, California 94110

phone (415) 255-7296 fax (415) 255-7498

email: gx-info@globalexchange.org

http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Metro/5784/genocida.html
for more news in Spanish and English: the massacre, reactions, etc.

© The Raven Chronicles 1998

	April 1998		T H E RaVEN C H R O N I C L E S

	`PacifIc Northwest Urban Writing`		A JAPENESE AMERICAN IN MEXICO Acteal: Massacre in Mexico Holly Yasui THREE DAYS BEFORE Christmas, on December 22, 1997, forty-six indigenous people, sympathizers of the EZLN (Zapatista Army of National Liberation) were massacred in a mountain village called Acteal in the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico. Fifteen corpses recovered from the bloody mountainside were children, one a babe-in-arms. Also twenty-one women, and ten men. Perhaps the preponderance of women and children may be explained by the fact that the short, thin legs of boys and girls can't run as fast as grown adults, and that mothers lingered even as the shots rang out, trying and sometimes succeeding in sheltering their terrified sons and daughters. All the victims were fleeing, shot in the backs with AK-47 assault rifles and hacked up by machetes. And who could have perpetrated such a heinous, unspeakable crime against these unarmed, unaggressive people who were praying ... praying ... as they were pursued, mutilated and killed? The mainstream news reports refer to "pro-government paramilitary groups" in the Chiapas Highlands. Perhaps this moniker is used to distinguish the genocidal murderers of Chiapas from the "anti-government paramilitary groups" that plague the United States. But this phrase also disguises the fact that the paramilitary group responsible for the massacre of Acteal is not only pro-government; the government itself is pro-paramilitary. On July 4, 1997, the state government of Chiapas, headed by PRI-appointed governor Ruiz Ferro, granted $4,600,000 pesos to the paramilitary group "Peace and Justice" for a so-called agricultural and financial renewal program to be carried out -- "according to agreed-upon procedures and norms " for one year." Four and a half million pesos, a half-million U.S. dollars -- more than most people in the world will see in their entire lifetimes, the entire lifetimes of their entire families -- that buys a lot of arms and ammunition. How else could rural farmers of the so-called "Peace and Justice" group purchase expensive, customs-controlled combat arms like the AK-47s.? "Peace and Justice" ... agricultural and financial renewal ... "-agreed-upon procedures and norms" ... the utter hypocrisy and lies involved in this conspiracy of extermination absolutely sickens me. I have only a brief space in which to try to express my outrage and grief over this horrendous atrocity and to explain why I feel that you, too, should care about what transpired in a cold, poor village far from your warm, safe home. To me, the Zapatistas have represented the world's best hope for social justice that revolutionaries all over the world have sought. These diminutive, dark-skinned people have conquered many with their quiet dignity and refusal to be coerced, co-opted, or manipulated. Even as the death toll by arms has mounted over the years, even as the war of attrition -- death by disease, starvation, despair over the deaths of loved ones -- has dragged on and on, the Zapatistas have stood proud and uncompromising against the all-powerful federal and state governments. They have continued, in spite of incredible odds, to insist upon the conditions agreed-upon by the government negotiators and the EZLN at San Andres (but never carried out by the government); to struggle non-violently to make known the deteriorating conditions under which they are forced to live, suffer, and die; to appeal to civil society, in Mexico and in the world, to not forget them, because the rights they are fighting for are the universal human rights that belong to all of us, each and every single one of us who breathe the air of this world. I must confess that in dealing with the ongoing difficulties that face non-wealthy expatriates living and working in Mexico, I ceased to support the Zapatistas financially and through my writing. Other, more pressing issues relegated them to the back of my mind, low on my list of priorities. Until the 23rd of December, 1997, when the front pages of all the newspapers in this country cried out against this brutal, unforgivable crime. Does it always take death, especially a gruesome massacre as in Acteal, to remind us that we cannot survive as a people, as a species, as a world, if we allow our society to continue to be driven by power-lust, greed, hypocrisy, and ... yes, willful ignorance? And by our society, I mean the international community of individuals and groups who believe in universal human rights regardless of nationality, skin color, or political affiliation. Nothing will bring back the lives of those in Acteal who were massacred, nor heal the traumatic wounds of those who watched their families and friends massacred. But there are still many ... as many as six thousand refugees in Chiapas suffering acutely from the highly tense, militarized, death-squad environment that their beautiful mountain homes have become. As foreign guests in this country, there is little we expatriates in Mexico can do directly about the massacre of Acteal (there is an article in the federal constitution that forbids political activity by foreigners) ... except to inform ourselves and others, and speak out for the basic, universal human rights of life and liberty. If your consciousness has been touched in some manner by this atrocity and the continuing horror in Chiapas, please write to, join and/or contribute to any of the human rights organizations that maintain a critically important international presence in Chiapas: Amnesty International; Human Rights Watch/Americas; Global Exchange; the International Red Cross. Contact List for Human Rights Organizations: http://www.hrw.org/ Human Rights Watch 350 Fifth Avenue, 34th Floor New York, NY 10118-3299 USA The main telephone switchboard number is: 1-212-290-4700 Main fax number: 1-212-736-1300 http://www.amnesty.org/ admin-us@aiusa.org Amnesty International, International Secretariat, 1 Easton Street, London WC1X 8DJ, United Kingdom http://www.globalexchange.org/ Global Exchange 2017 Mission Street #303 San Francisco, California 94110 phone (415) 255-7296 fax (415) 255-7498 email: gx-info@globalexchange.org http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Metro/5784/genocida.html for more news in Spanish and English: the massacre, reactions, etc.
			© The Raven Chronicles 1998