17 April 2003
The following message has been sent out by the Network of Community Human Rights Defenders of Chiapas. It concerns very serious threats against the residents of Nuevo San Rafael (officially known as Ignacio Allende), a small community located at the south of Montes Azules.
On April 10th 2003, representatives of the Lacandon indigenous people, accompanied by 18 members of the Mexican Navy arrived in the community. The three Lacandon representatives told the residents of Nuevo San Rafael to leave the area within two days, stating that, if they did not leave of their own volition, they would be forcibly removed.
On April 12th, 2003, a group of forty Lacandons and Choles, who claimed to be from the neighbouring communities of Frontera Corozal, Nueva Palestina, Lacanjá, Najá and Metzaboc, arrived in Nuevo San Rafael. These men were armed with machetes and, in some cases, with fire–arms. As they approached the community, they met with Héctor Trujillo Gómez and Jorge Gómez Román, representatives of PROFEPA (the federal government body responsible for ensuring respect for Mexico's environmental laws and regulations), who had apparently been awaiting their arrival. Subsequently, four more government officials arrived by boat. Although they did not identify themselves, these last four men appeared to be from SEMARNAT (the Ministry of the Environment) and the National Coordination of Protected Areas.
The group then entered the community, led by two representatives of the local authorities of the Lacandon communities and one representative of the local authorities of the Chol community of Frontera Corozal. The six government officials remained in the rear. The attitude of the Lacandon representatives was extremely antagonistic. They went so far as to confiscate expensive video equipment belonging Community Communication Promedios, one of several organizations that had been invited to be present as human rights observers by the residents of Nueva San Rafael.
When discussion between the two groups (the Lacandons and Choles on one side and the residents of Nueva San Rafael on the other side) became very heated, one of the human rights observers asked PROFEPA representative Héctor Trujillo for his help in trying resolve the problem through peaceful negotiation. Sr. Trujillo stated that he had no solution to propose and that he was only present by invitation of the Lacandons.
After about 30 minutes of discussion, the Lacandons extended their forced eviction deadline for another week, saying that they would return on April 19th to carry out the threatened eviction. They then approached the human rights observers informing them that they would not be able to return to Montes Azules unless they had express permission from the Lacandon community authorities.
The Network of Community Human Rights Defenders is extremely worried by this situation. They believe that it was only the presence of the human rights observers that prevented a physical clash between the two groups on April 12th. Furthermore, the Community Defenders have expressed concern regarding the Chiapas state government's failure to respond to their warnings regarding the possibility of the Lacandon's resorting to violence in future attempts to evict the residents of Nuevo San Rafael.
BACKGROUND:
1) As you will remember from earlier urgent actions, in 1972 sixty–six Lacandon families were allotted 614,000 hectares of land by the federal government. This very large area became known as the Lacandon Zone. (The Lacandon families had actually requested 10,000 acres.) Subsequently, the area was subjected to extensive logging. Then, in 1978, a presidential decree designated 331, 200 hectares of land, eighty per cent of which was part of the Lacandon Zone, as the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve.
In more recent years, the Lacandons have allied themselves with the federal government, as well as with the business–oriented environmental organization Conservation International, in a demand that the communities settled on lands that are part of the Lacandon Zone or within the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve be evicted. It appears that the Lacandon native people, who may be considered as victims rather than villains, have for twenty–five years been the tools of government policy.
(It should be noted that different members of the Chol indigenous people, a number of whom are described here as accompanying the group of Lacandons, take differing political positions. This underlines the fact that the Montes Azules situation is in no way an inter–ethnic conflict.)
In a recent interview, a representative of Nuevo San Rafael explained that the twenty families who form the community had moved there both in search of land and in flight from the paramilitary group Paz y Justicia. The following statement reflects their attitude to their forest environment, "We do not want to sell wood. If we sell the wood, what are our children going to see in the future when there are no trees. The same goes for the fauna, the animals. We don't want them to be destroyed."
RECOMMENDED ACTION:
Please write to the Mexican government to express your concern regarding the danger of a violent confrontation in the community of Ignacio Allende (Nuevo San Rafael). Please ask the government to take immediate steps to bring about a negotiated settlement between the two groups involved. Please stress the need for the government to resolve the situation of the communities that are located within the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve, by recognizing their right to remain in the reserve and to assume the responsibility for protecting the forest on the basis of community environmental protection plans that are defined and carried by the local communities themselves.
Please send a brief letter to the Canadian government informing them of the very serious threat of violence in the community of Ignacio Allende.
Those of you who wish to do so, may find it helpful to use the model letter on the Global Exchange web–site. (www.globalechange.org/campaigns/mexico.) This site also contains more background information.
Addresses
Lic. Vicente Fox Quesada Presidente de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos Residencia Oficial de Los Pinos Col. San Miguel Chapultepec, Mexico D.F., C.P. 11850,
MEXICO
FAX: 011 52 55 522 4117 or 516 9537 or 515 1794 radio@presidencia.gob.mx
If you are unable to get your message through, please send it to the Mexican Embassy in Ottawa with a brief covering letter requesting that the message be forwarded immediately to President Fox.
Please send copies of your letter to the following persons:
Lic. Pablo Salazar Mendiguchía
Gobernador del Estado de Chiapas Palacio de Gobierno,Tuxtla Gutiérrez Chiapas, MEXICO
FAX: 011 52 961 20917 salazarp@prodigy.net.mx
Lic. Victor Lichtinger (Minister of the Environment)
Secretario de SEMARNAT
Lateral de Anillo Periférico No. 4209
Jardines de la Montaña, delegación Tlalpan C.P. 14210, Mexico D.F., MEXICO vlichtinger@semarnat.gob.mx
Lic. José Ignacio Campillo García
Procurador Federal de Protección al Ambiente
Periférico Sur No. 5000 Col. Insurgentes, Cuicuilco Delegación Coyoac´n
C.P. 04530, Mexico D.F., MEXICO
jcampillo@correo.profepa.gob.mx
Dr. José Luis Soberanes Fernández
Presidente de la Comisión Nacional de Derechos Humanos
correo@cndh.org.mx
Her Exellency Maria Teresa Garcia Segovia
Ambassador for Mexico
45 O'Connor St, suite 1500, Ottawa, Ont. K1P 1A4
FAX 613 235 9123 info@embamexcan.com
FOR CANADA:
Hon. Bill Graham Minister of Foreign Affairs
FAX: 613 996 9607 Graham.b@parl.gc.ca
MORE THREATS AGAINST COMMUNITY IN MONTES AZULES BIOSPHERE RESERVE
The following message has been sent out by the Network of Community Human Rights Defenders of Chiapas. It concerns very serious threats against the residents of Nuevo San Rafael (officially known as Ignacio Allende), a small community located at the south of Montes Azules.
On April 10th 2003, representatives of the Lacandon indigenous people, accompanied by 18 members of the Mexican Navy arrived in the community. The three Lacandon representatives told the residents of Nuevo San Rafael to leave the area within two days, stating that, if they did not leave of their own volition, they would be forcibly removed.
On April 12th, 2003, a group of forty Lacandons and Choles, who claimed to be from the neighbouring communities of Frontera Corozal, Nueva Palestina, Lacanjá, Najá and Metzaboc, arrived in Nuevo San Rafael. These men were armed with machetes and, in some cases, with fire–arms. As they approached the community, they met with Héctor Trujillo Gómez and Jorge Gómez Román, representatives of PROFEPA (the federal government body responsible for ensuring respect for Mexico's environmental laws and regulations), who had apparently been awaiting their arrival. Subsequently, four more government officials arrived by boat. Although they did not identify themselves, these last four men appeared to be from SEMARNAT (the Ministry of the Environment) and the National Coordination of Protected Areas.
The group then entered the community, led by two representatives of the local authorities of the Lacandon communities and one representative of the local authorities of the Chol community of Frontera Corozal. The six government officials remained in the rear. The attitude of the Lacandon representatives was extremely antagonistic. They went so far as to confiscate expensive video equipment belonging Community Communication Promedios, one of several organizations that had been invited to be present as human rights observers by the residents of Nueva San Rafael.
When discussion between the two groups (the Lacandons and Choles on one side and the residents of Nueva San Rafael on the other side) became very heated, one of the human rights observers asked PROFEPA representative Héctor Trujillo for his help in trying resolve the problem through peaceful negotiation. Sr. Trujillo stated that he had no solution to propose and that he was only present by invitation of the Lacandons.
After about 30 minutes of discussion, the Lacandons extended their forced eviction deadline for another week, saying that they would return on April 19th to carry out the threatened eviction. They then approached the human rights observers informing them that they would not be able to return to Montes Azules unless they had express permission from the Lacandon community authorities.
The Network of Community Human Rights Defenders is extremely worried by this situation. They believe that it was only the presence of the human rights observers that prevented a physical clash between the two groups on April 12th. Furthermore, the Community Defenders have expressed concern regarding the Chiapas state government's failure to respond to their warnings regarding the possibility of the Lacandon's resorting to violence in future attempts to evict the residents of Nuevo San Rafael.
BACKGROUND:
1) As you will remember from earlier urgent actions, in 1972 sixty–six Lacandon families were allotted 614,000 hectares of land by the federal government. This very large area became known as the Lacandon Zone. (The Lacandon families had actually requested 10,000 acres.) Subsequently, the area was subjected to extensive logging. Then, in 1978, a presidential decree designated 331, 200 hectares of land, eighty per cent of which was part of the Lacandon Zone, as the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve.
In more recent years, the Lacandons have allied themselves with the federal government, as well as with the business–oriented environmental organization Conservation International, in a demand that the communities settled on lands that are part of the Lacandon Zone or within the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve be evicted. It appears that the Lacandon native people, who may be considered as victims rather than villains, have for twenty–five years been the tools of government policy.
(It should be noted that different members of the Chol indigenous people, a number of whom are described here as accompanying the group of Lacandons, take differing political positions. This underlines the fact that the Montes Azules situation is in no way an inter–ethnic conflict.)
In a recent interview, a representative of Nuevo San Rafael explained that the twenty families who form the community had moved there both in search of land and in flight from the paramilitary group Paz y Justicia. The following statement reflects their attitude to their forest environment, "We do not want to sell wood. If we sell the wood, what are our children going to see in the future when there are no trees. The same goes for the fauna, the animals. We don't want them to be destroyed."
RECOMMENDED ACTION:
Please write to the Mexican government to express your concern regarding the danger of a violent confrontation in the community of Ignacio Allende (Nuevo San Rafael). Please ask the government to take immediate steps to bring about a negotiated settlement between the two groups involved. Please stress the need for the government to resolve the situation of the communities that are located within the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve, by recognizing their right to remain in the reserve and to assume the responsibility for protecting the forest on the basis of community environmental protection plans that are defined and carried by the local communities themselves.
Please send a brief letter to the Canadian government informing them of the very serious threat of violence in the community of Ignacio Allende.
Those of you who wish to do so, may find it helpful to use the model letter on the Global Exchange web–site. (www.globalechange.org/campaigns/mexico.) This site also contains more background information.
Addresses
Lic. Vicente Fox Quesada Presidente de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos Residencia Oficial de Los Pinos Col. San Miguel Chapultepec, Mexico D.F., C.P. 11850,
MEXICO
FAX: 011 52 55 522 4117 or 516 9537 or 515 1794 radio@presidencia.gob.mx
If you are unable to get your message through, please send it to the Mexican Embassy in Ottawa with a brief covering letter requesting that the message be forwarded immediately to President Fox.
Please send copies of your letter to the following persons:
Lic. Pablo Salazar Mendiguchía
Gobernador del Estado de Chiapas Palacio de Gobierno,Tuxtla Gutiérrez Chiapas, MEXICO
FAX: 011 52 961 20917 salazarp@prodigy.net.mx
Lic. Victor Lichtinger (Minister of the Environment)
Secretario de SEMARNAT
Lateral de Anillo Periférico No. 4209
Jardines de la Montaña, delegación Tlalpan C.P. 14210, Mexico D.F., MEXICO vlichtinger@semarnat.gob.mx
Lic. José Ignacio Campillo García
Procurador Federal de Protección al Ambiente
Periférico Sur No. 5000 Col. Insurgentes, Cuicuilco Delegación Coyoac´n
C.P. 04530, Mexico D.F., MEXICO
jcampillo@correo.profepa.gob.mx
Dr. José Luis Soberanes Fernández
Presidente de la Comisión Nacional de Derechos Humanos
correo@cndh.org.mx
Her Exellency Maria Teresa Garcia Segovia
Ambassador for Mexico
45 O'Connor St, suite 1500, Ottawa, Ont. K1P 1A4
FAX 613 235 9123 info@embamexcan.com
FOR CANADA:
Hon. Bill Graham Minister of Foreign Affairs
FAX: 613 996 9607 Graham.b@parl.gc.ca