From AP [1], Dec. 23:
OVENTIC, Mexico - About 5,000 Zapatista rebels, many in black ski masks, gathered in this village in southern Mexico to show their support for protesters in the historic city of Oaxaca who are trying to oust the state governor.
The meeting on Friday signals a strengthening of ties between the Zapatistas, who staged an armed uprising in the state of Chiapas in 1994, and the Oaxaca protesters, who took over the center of their city for five months this year, building barricades and chasing out police.
The Zapatistas fight in the name of Indian rights and socialism while the Oaxaca protesters accuse their state gov. Ulises Ruiz of corruption and thuggery.
Zapatista Comandante Hortensia, an Indian woman bearing a black ski mask, said the Mexican government uses repression against the Oaxaca protesters.
"In Oaxaca, women have been tortured, sexually abused and imprisoned," she said.
[...]
Noticeably absent from the Zapatista meeting was Subcomandante Marcos, their most high profile leader. Marcos left the Zapatista stronghold on Jan. 1 and has been touring round Mexico trying to create a national leftist movement.
Of course, as we have noted [2], Marcos has just arrived back in Chiapas from his national tour.
See our last posts on Mexico and the struggle in Oaxaca [3], and on Chiapas [4] and the Zapatistas [2].
