The Inheritance of the Struggle for Life in Zapatista Childhood and Youth

Mexico City | Desinformémonos. The Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) shared a video in which young people and children from 12 to 20 years of age explain in Tzeltal, Tzotzil, Tojolabal and Cho’ol how to make different materials, baskets, musical instruments, among other objects, based on “the knowledge they have inherited from their parents, grandparents, great-grandparents and so on for generations.

The common thread of their creations, explained the EZLN, “is the repudiation of capitalism, preparing to survive the storm and, the day after, trying to build a new world”. “The school where they learned this knowledge is in the hearts of their fathers, mothers and predecessors,” added the Zapatistas in the communiqué, published in the framework of the “Rebel and Revel” Art Encounter, which began this April 13 in the Zapatista caracol Jacinto Canek.

The video shows the young people explaining the making of their baskets with materials “from mother earth”; paintings with inks made with earth and different types of plants to obtain the colors, partitions made with plants and earth; pots, plates, platters; making ‘calhidra’; musical instruments such as drums and flutes that they use for music in their communities’ festivities; “morraletas” and bags; making fire, among other objects and materials.

The Rebel and Revel Encounter has brought together more than a thousand artists, musicians, filmmakers, poets, sculptors, dancers and radio broadcasters from Zapatista communities and other parts of Mexico and the world, such as Germany, Brazil, France, Greece, Palestine, Peru and Sudan. Since it began, musical numbers, dances and artistic exhibitions have been presented.

Until April 20, the event organized by the EZLN will be a space for any artist “who is against the capitalist, patriarchal, racist, discriminatory and criminal system, and, of course, who feels called” to exhibit their art.

See the photos by Luis Enrique Aguilar of Desinformémonos here:

Here is the complete communiqué:

Here we present a summary where young Zapatista women and men show some of the knowledge they have inherited from their parents, grandparents, great-grandparents and so on for generations.  In their own mother tongue, of Mayan roots, they explain how they make baskets with materials from mother earth; paintings with inks made with earth and different types of plants to obtain the colors, their drawings represent their past, their present and the future that is on the horizon and for which we fight; partitions also made with plants and earth; pots, plates, platters; manufacture of calhidra; musical instruments such as drums and flutes that they use for music in the festivities of their communities; making ropes and, with them, weaving nets to carry corn, backpacks and bags; making fire; and paintings on skin with natural inks.  They speak in their languages Tzeltal, Tzotzil, Tojolabal and Cho’ol. The common thread is the repudiation of capitalism, preparing to survive the storm and, the day after, trying to build a new world. All are under 20 years of age. The infant is 12 years old. The school where they learned this knowledge is in the hearts of their fathers, mothers and predecessors.

The complete videos of each task, in their original languages, will appear later on the Enlace Zapatista web page.

Original text published by Desinformémonos on April 15th, 2025.
Communiqué and video published by the EZLN on April 14th, 2025.
Translation by Schools for Chiapas.

https://abolitionmedia.noblogs.org/?p=18559

EZLN Invites Us to Think about “The New World We Want”

San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas. At the start of the ‘’(Rebel and Rebellious) Art: A Gathering of Art, Rebellion, and Resistance Toward the Day After’’ on Sunday, the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) called on everyone to “think about the new world we want” because capitalism “was born badly and that is why it will die.”

Sub-commander Moisés said at the opening of the encounter that “what we want is art for life,” while noting that “the capitalist system has accustomed us to it and that is why it dominates us, but after it dies, we will have nothing” if we do not prepare.

“Its work was to destroy what was good, and since it will die, there will be no drones because there will be no batteries, and cars because there will be no gasoline,” he emphasized before more than a thousand people gathered in a recently renovated Zapatista space in the community of Winictón, municipality of Tenejapa, to welcome visitors. Before the official inauguration, dozens of uniformed and hooded Zapatistas marched, uniformly clanging their sticks, the only weapon they carried.

“What brought us together here is art. Everything is art, except that in this place called Mexico and in the world today, there is an art created by those who dominate the world; that is, there is capitalist art, a capitalist system,” said Moisés.

“We,” he added, “want to create another art, but it is for life. The art created by the capitalist system is lethal for the people of the countryside and the city, and also for nature. The capitalist system was born badly, and it will end badly. It was not born for life. All the poor of the world are witnesses. We are certain that what capitalism gives is not life. But they used the art of inhumane domination.”

He added: “That’s what we’re calling you for, because we believe we can. We’re here at this gathering; we’re not here for a concert, because a concert is just a group representing something.”

He reiterated that “the capitalist system was born badly, and because it’s bad, it’s going to die. What happened to us? We got used to the system, and that’s why they dominate us. After it dies, we’re going to have nothing. Their job was to destroy what was good before. And since it’s going to die, there won’t be drones because there won’t be batteries, and cars because there won’t be gasoline. Imagine everything else. So, how will life be?”

He maintained that capitalism “has destroyed even nature, and there will be a reaction from nature,” so “we have to organize ourselves to see how we’re going to survive. We have to think about what will make us survive. That’s the art for which we’re here. That’s the task.”

He added: “We Mexicans are witnesses. Those who call themselves the government have done nothing. It’s the same system in other countries, as they say, or peoples, as we say. So we all have to think about the new world we desire, not the one those in power want, as they say. Power lies with the people. What they say is not power. No. Power lies in us deciding, proposing, discussing, and it’s up to us to decide which of the many ideas is the best. That’s power. The people decide, not a few.”

The sub-commander affirmed that “what we want is art for life; let’s think about what it will be like when there is no capitalism. One day without capitalism, what are we going to do? Because that’s what will happen. That’s why we are at this meeting: art to create a new life, art for life, because the art created by the capitalist system is no longer useful; we have begun the commons, and we are going to demonstrate in practice what that commons is, not in rhetoric.”

He emphasized: “We’re going to do it because it’s a new art that can’t be found in any book or manual. We’re going to create it because the capitalist system has completely destroyed it. That’s why we’re here.”

Original article by Elio Henríquez, La Jornada, April 13, 2025.
Translated by Schools for Chiapas.

https://abolitionmedia.noblogs.org/?p=18338

Statement From the National Assembly for Water and Life and in Solidarity With the Searching Families Throughout the Country

IN VIEW OF THE CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY AND THE FINDINGS AT THE FORCED RECRUITMENT CENTER OF THE EXTERMINATION CAMP WITH CLANDESTINE OVENS IN TEUCHITLÁN, JALISCO, WE HOLD THE MEXICAN NARCO-STATE RESPONSIBLE.

THIS CAPITALIST WAR, IMPOSED THROUGH DISORGANIZED CRIME, NOT ONLY ANNIHILATES HUMANITY WITH TERROR, BUT ALSO AIMS TO END THE FUTURE OF YOUNG PEOPLE, BOYS AND GIRLS.

To the General Command of the EZLN

To the National Indigenous Congress, CIG-CNI

To the Adherents of the National and International Sixth

To Dignified and Rebel, Insubordinate Europe

To the peoples and neighborhoods that were never conquered

To the public

WE DENOUNCE: IT WAS, IT IS AND WILL CONTINUE TO BE THE NARCO-CAPITALIST STATE.

19 clandestine graves have been discovered so far this year in Jalisco; however, as of January 27th, 2025, the number of missing persons reached 121,651, according to the National Registry of Missing and Unlocated Persons (RNPDN).

The search collective Colectivos Guerreros Buscadores de Jalisco in the municipality of Teuchitlán reported the discovery of crematoriums, bone remains, and personal belongings such as shoes, jewelry, hats, backpacks, and accessories.

Given the acts of the Narco-State, which evoke images of the worst attacks against humanity, with mechanisms of militarized warfare, in a previously vulnerable society, accompanied by racism, classism, and an immeasurable hatred of life (sic).

We state, in these painful moments, that there are no words we can share with our searching sisters who, day after day, dedicate their time, their effort, and whatever little money they may have to this profession called SEARCHING, to bring a little peace to the families who have lost a loved one.

We are grateful for your endless love for your children, husbands, brothers, sisters, and strangers whom you honor day after day in your search, despite so much pain and barriers, despite the risk to your physical integrity.

We tell you with great sadness that your work always inspires us with strength to continue defending our land and water. The same causes that threaten you with forced disappearances, extrajudicial executions, arbitrary detentions, repression, and other crimes of this criminal state also affect us. Therefore, with these words, we embrace you and join you with our voices, demanding clarification of the facts and justice, and we make your demands our own. We embrace your dignified rage, your dignified rebellion, your dignified struggle for life.

We reaffirm and echo just a few points from some human rights organizations that support searching families, and official websites of searchers.

– That in recent years, thanks in large part to the #SearchingMothers groups, places like this have been found in several states across the country.

– That a #ForensicBacklog exists, as is the case at the Regional Center for Human Identification in Coahuila.

– That the Mexican State’s priority in recent years has been to manipulate the figures, abandoning the National Center for Human Identification, leaving each state to deal with the issue, allowing the empowerment of prosecutors’ offices, disdaining international support, and denying the existence of the crisis.

– That the change in administration brought with it state violence, forced disappearances by action, omission, and acquiescence, executions, arbitrary detentions, and repression by this criminal state.

– That impunity is perpetuated by bad governments responsible for the narco-graves, and by their illegal hand, drug trafficking.

We witness and denounce the excessive cruelty experienced by hundreds of thousands of human beings in Mexican territory and how the capitalist hydra embodied in this bad government feeds on the pain and suffering of this humanitarian crisis.

Therefore, we hold the Mexican State responsible for these state crimes and recall its failure to carry out the search in September 2024, in which no findings were reported on this same property.

Therefore, we, the people who make up the National Assembly for Water, Life, and Territory, demand that the State fulfill its obligations under the Mexican Constitution and international conventions.

A thorough review of the issue in the face of the crisis of disappearances is essential.

It is essential to recognize the humanitarian crisis and adopt a state policy on the matter, as recommended by the UN Committee on Enforced Disappearances.

The functioning of the National Forensic Data Bank and the National Center for Human Identification.

Despite these demands on the State’s responsibilities, we cannot conceive of justice being served by those who disappear and murder Mother Earth and her children (humanity). Therefore, we call on the CONSCIOUS SOCIETY OF GOOD HEART to:

– Join the dignified demands of the searching families.

– Physically accompany them at their gatherings.

– Take direct action to demand their just demands.

– Disseminate, monitor, and follow up on the search groups and brigades’ search events and calls for action posted on their official websites.

– We remember the call made by the National Search Brigade on April 19th and 20th, 2025, and their solidarity, empathy, and support in the humanitarian brigade.

Today it is our turn to look, feel, and act because sooner or later it will knock on our door, and perhaps we will be the latest.

We join the call for National Mourning: “400 candles + 400 pairs of shoes” organized by groups of searching families in Jalisco, Querétaro, Mexico City, Coahuila, Tamaulipas, Colima, Michoacán, and other territories for March 15th at 5:00 pm.

Let us raise our voices, let us make the Dignified Rage of the Searching Mothers our own, regardless of calendars and geographies, because our fight is for Life.

They Took Them Alive, We Want Them Alive!

KINDLY YOURS

LAND, WATER, AND FREEDOM

UNTIL DIGNITY BECOMES A CUSTOM!

NATIONAL ASSEMBLY FOR WATER, LIFE, AND LAND

Data: https://www.facebook.com/share/p/12GY7gaKJK4/?mibextid=oFDknk
#HastaEncontrarlosATodos
#LutoNacional

Original statement from the National Assembly for Water and Life, Wednesday, March 12, 2025.
Translated by Schools for Chiapas.

https://abolitionmedia.noblogs.org/?p=17563

Call for a Global Day of Action: Justice for Samir Flores Soberanes! After Six Years of Impunity!

TO THE SIGNATORIES OF THE DECLARATION FOR LIFE

SISTERS, BROTHERS:

It has been 6 years since they took the life of our brother Samir Flores Soberanes, six years that those who ordered him to be killed still govern, six years of continuous deceit, suppression and contempt for our peoples, six more years of resistance, of rebellion, of struggle for life, of being Samir, inspiration, seed and encouragement to build autonomy, of another possible world.

“Justice for Samir!” cries the resistance for life against the Morelos Integral Project and against the narco-government, and justice cries out in each one of the towns, places and hearts that knew him before or after his death. “Justice!” we shout from the struggle for life in Gaza, in Chiapas, in Ostula, in the struggle against the Cholula garbage dump, in the clamor of the families of our disappeared sisters and brothers, in the struggle against the military so-called Mayan train, against the inter-oceanic corridor, xenophobia and forced displacement, the mine, the dam, the train, the corridor, the gas pipeline, the thermoelectric plant, fracking, the real estate cartel, the garbage business, the defense of rivers, seas and bodies of water, of forests and autonomous spaces on earth or in the air. Samir built justice during his life.

Six years after his cruel murder on February 20, 2019 in Amilcingo, Morelos, three days before the consultation imposed by Lopez Obrador to “legitimize” his change of heart and finish imposing the Morelos Integral Project (PIM), Samir’s murderers are still free and in power. It has been 6 years of impunity, 6 years of the impossibility of the guilty being punished because the guilty are in the government and can easily escape the justice of the State, because they are the State….

But justice is in the struggle for life, and yes, in our demand, perhaps absurd, to demand that the executioner be prosecuted and punished, to strip the capitalist king, the Mexican narco-government that ordered Samir’s death.

Six years after Samir’s assassination, we call on the signatories of the Declaration for Life to dedicate a moment, an instant, a sowing of memory, of life and rebellion to our comrade Samir Flores Soberanes on February 20, 21, 22 or 23, to build in a dislocated way the “Global Day: Justice for Samir Flores Soberanes! 6 years of impunity.”

On those days, in Mexico, the United States, Euskal Herria, France and Italy, 6 busts of Samir will be installed, sowing his memory in the dignified territories of our sisters and brothers, in countries whose companies are or were involved in the crime of the PIM: Elecnor (Euskal Herria), Saint Gobain (France), Bonatti (Italy), Macquaire (United States), NarcoGobierno (Mexico), so that the responsibility of the capitalist global government for the death of Samir and the struggle for life will not be forgotten.

But not only do we plant the memory of our comrade with the installation of these busts, but also in the struggle for decent housing of the Otomi community of Mexico City that founded and resists the House of the Peoples “Samir Flores Soberanes,” formerly the central offices of the INPI. In a tree in the resistance camp in Lutzerat, Germany, in a song, a poem, a drawing, a talk, a video, a conversation, a photo, a painting, an engraving, a flower or a fruit, in all of them is our brother Samir Flores Soberanes.

We call on the signatories of the Declaration for Life to join with an action or a word to the “Global Day: Justice for Samir Flores Soberanes! 6 years of impunity,” on February 20, 21, 22 or 23, 2025 or when their realities allow them to do so.

Justice will come from below and to the left, in common.

For the integral reconstitution of our peoples

Peoples’ Front in Defense of Land and Water Morelos, Puebla, Tlaxcala

National Indigenous Congress

Zapatista Army of National Liberation

https://abolitionmedia.noblogs.org/?p=14058

Displacements and Attacks Reach EZLN Support Bases in Pantelhó

The support bases of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) lost a school, their homes and the offices of the autonomous government of Caracol VIII Jacinto Canek, located in the community of San José Buenavista Tercero, in the municipality of Pantelhó; after the Indigenous Civil Army, the armed wing of the group they call “Los Herrera”, burned their properties and provoked the forced displacement of the inhabitants of the village.

“The paramilitary group of the Ejercito Civil Indígena de Fracción Tzanembolom, from the municipality of Chenalhó, once again entered the community of San José Tercero, in the municipality of Pantelhó, Chiapas. The Herreras’ hired killers continue to threaten the people,” they explained in their complaint.

“Their homes were burned and destroyed (of the sympathizers and support base of the EZLN) as well as the Zapatista Autonomous Rebel Primary School, the office of the autonomous council, that is to say, everything was destroyed; therefore we urge the state and federal government to take decisive action to resolve the conflict, this situation could lead to unimaginable situations in massacres of children, women, and the elderly and this will remain on the conscience of the authorities if they do not intervene in a timely manner.”

Inhabitants of Pantelhó denounced that the government council appointed by the government of Chiapas has links with the “Los Herrera” group. They demanded that the municipal council elected by the communities be recognized. Photo: Ángeles Mariscal

For the government of Chiapas, what is happening in Pantelhó, a municipality located in Los Altos de Chiapas, is a “political-electoral conflict”; however, since 2021, a battle has been waged in this place to expel from the municipality a family, “Los Herrera,” and a group that through criminal violence has controlled the life of the population and has taken over the municipal public administration.

In order to expel “Los Herrera” and their armed wing called the Civil Army of the Indigenous, since 2021, the inhabitants of Pantelhó achieved the articulation of various sectors of the population living in the municipality, and founded the self-defense group El Machete in the community of San José Tercero.

In that year, residents from 86 communities joined together, expelled those they considered their aggressors from the municipal seat, named a Government Council made up of representatives of the communities; they disowned the municipal president Raquel Trujillo, a militant of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), and got the government of Chiapas to recognize the legitimacy of the Council and to remove Raquel Trujillo, who was accused of homicide.

A few months later, the group of “Los Herrera” reorganized and allied with armed groups from the neighboring municipality of Chenalhó, creating an armed group called the Civil Army of the Indigenous; since then, in Pantelhó, the self-defense groups El Machete and the Civil Army of the Indigenous have clashed.

In the June 2024 elections, the population of Pantelhó refused to vote in this context of violence, and demanded the recognition of their authorities named in an assembly of the 86 communities; but the government responded by naming a new municipal council in which one of its members is Rubén Herrera, a member of “Los Herrera.” And with that, violence began increasing in the municipality.

Last December 4, the self-defense groups of El Machete retook the municipal seat, confronting the Indigenous Civil Army for several days, until members of the Secretariat of National Defense (SEDENA) entered the area.

Then the confrontations between the two groups moved to the headquarters of Los Machetes, in the community of San José Tercero. There, EZLN support bases had to be forcibly displaced; they left behind an autonomous school, their homes and government offices, which days later were burned.

Residents who are not part of the EZLN support bases have also been displaced.

Cardboard coffins arranged

As a symbol of the people who have died as victims of groups linked to organized crime, this week the residents of Pantelhó placed cardboard coffins in front of the municipal presidency.

They placed them in the place where a car was burned, and where you can still see on the walls the gunshots from large caliber weapons and the remains of burned walls, product of the confrontations that took place between the self-defense groups El Machete and the Indigenous Civil Army. Women, men and adolescents from the communities of the municipality gathered there.

“For more than two decades, it has ravaged this region for political and economic control. As a consequence, it has murdered hundreds of human beings, including children and women, without the authorities intervening. Therefore, we decided to symbolically present our murdered relatives so that the international community will turn to see our people, as our relatives have been murdered and disappeared in the hands of organized crime,” they said in Spanish and Tseltal.

“We respectfully ask the Mexican government, Dr. Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo, Dr. Eduardo Ramirez Aguilar, the Attorney General’s Office and the State Attorney General’s Office, to act quickly to capture the criminals, who continue to intimidate the population, with high caliber firearms shots in the vicinity of the town. If the government remains incredulous, we have evidence to present”.

They denounced that the Government Council appointed by the government of Chiapas, has links with the group of “Los Herrera.” They demanded that the municipal council elected by the communities be recognized.

“It is appalling that the political power has left in the municipal council a group of people in collusion with organized crime. A very clear example, one of the relatives of the leader of the self-styled Indigenous Civil Army is part of the municipal council, Mr. Rubén Herrera Abarca, is accused by the residents of Pantelhó of being one of the financers of organized crime of the Tzanebolóm fraction and the local congress rewards him with a council seat and the most serious thing, knowing that he has an arrest warrant for collusion in illicit activities, is appointed to be a municipal authority.”

They blamed the Mexican and Chiapas governments for the crisis that could escalate in the coming days. The confrontations in the municipality have continued, despite the fact that elements of the SEDENA remain in the area.

Original text and photos by Ángeles Mariscal published in Chiapas Paralelo on December 23rd, 2024.
Translation by Schools for Chiapas.

https://abolitionmedia.noblogs.org/?p=13370