The Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center (Frayba), based in the Highlands of Mexico's conflicted southern Chiapas state, has issued a new report charging that 13 years after an armed uprising in the state, the roots of the conflict still prevail. The report, "Armed Conflict and its Actors in 2006," finds a resurgence of paramilitary activity, especially attacks on Zapatista communities and attempts to evict them from their lands. The Zapatistas have observed a truce since shortly after their New Years Day 1994 rebellion. Noting that the Zapatistas have concentrated over the past year on an unarmed civil initiative, the "Other Campaign," the report protests that "Military...actions have intensified against...social protest and...organizations that have opted for the construction of a civil and pacific national movement." The report finds that a de facto "state of exception" has persisted in Chiapas despite federal administrations in Mexico City coming and going.

The Mexican senate has passed a package of reforms to Article 139 of the Federal Penal Code modeled on anti-terrorist legislation in the United States—above the objections of the left-opposition PRD, PT and Convergence, whose legislators assailed the changes as "criminalizing social protest." Under the changes, any act of violence aimed at influencing government policy is classified as terrorism, with a penatly of six to 40 years in prison. (La Jornada, April 27)

Gov. Ulises Ruiz of Oaxaca has called upon Mexican military authorities to investigate a new guerilla group which has announced its existence the in conflicted southern state. In a message posted to the website of the Spain-based Documentation Center for Armed Movements (CDMA), the Popular Revolutionary Brigade of the South (BPRS) announced its existence and support of the demands of Popular People's Assembly of Oaxaca (APPO), a civil coalition demanding the ouster of Gov. Ruiz. The BPRS said that a "decadent political system" is forcing the people to turn to armed struggle, accusing Ruiz of "ignominy and unheard-of barbarity." (ADN Sureste, April 26; Xinhua, Vanguardia, April 25)

A criminal complaint has been filed in the Mexican border city of Matamoros against Luz María González Armenta, leader of Defense and Promotion of Human Rights-Emiliano Zapata (DEPRODHEZAC), weeks after she was detained at a political protest. González was arrested March 30 at a vigil outside the municipal presidency office demanding the return alive of a local youth who has been "disappeared" since late January. She was freed after ten hours, but on April 19 Matamoros Juridical Sub-Director Moisés Araujo Olmos submitted a formal complaint to the Tamaulipas state prosecutor accusing González of making death threats against him and calling for criminal charges. The complaint notes that González is a local organizer of the Zapatista rebels' "Other Campaign" civil initiative and its "Sixth Commission" organizing body, charging that "these groups have contact with arms, death, and are dedicated to any dangerous situation." It further charges that she is involved in "delinquency and drugs." González, for her part, has filed charges accusing Araujo Olmos of abuse of authority. (Special to WW4R)

Rodolfo Chávez Galindo, a campesino leader active in the opposition to La Parota hydro-electric complex, was arrested by state police April 21 in the conflicted southern Mexican state of Guerrero, charged with the illegal detention of an engineer from the Federal Electric Commission (CFE) during a protest against the dam at the village of Oaxaquillas in July 2004. At the time of the protest, two others were arrested for the crime: Marco Antonio Suástegui of the Council of Ejidos and Communities in Opposition to la Parota (CECOP), and his comrade Francisco Hernández. Chávez Galindo protested that the case had been closed, but police said the arrest orders against him were still in effect. Chávez denied involvement in the alleged attack, and said that if the CFE wants to build La Parota, "they are not going to achieve it, much less by attacking the people who are in opposition." (La Jornada, April 22)

From Amnesty International, April 19:

Political activist David Venegas was arbitrarily detained by state police in central Oaxaca City on 13 April, and reportedly tortured. He has been charged with serious criminal offences, on the basis of evidence which appears to have been fabricated. He may be at risk of further ill-treatment and unfair judicial proceedings. Human rights lawyer Isaac Torres Carmonas was with him when he was arrested, and the police reportedly threatened him.

The Popular People's Assembly of Oaxaca (APPO) has joined with members of the Union of Mexican Jurists in a "Popular Court" to judge the repression and rights violations in southern Mexico's Oaxaca state over the last year of social conflict. The Popular Court is to collect evidence on "crimes against humanity perpetrated against the people," and submit the findings to national and international legal bodies. APPO Spokesman Florentino Lopez said that over the course of the conflict, police violence has claimed 27 lives, while 43 activists remain in prison—including APPO leader Flavio Sosa, held in isolation at El Altiplano maximum security prison 23 hours a day. (Prensa Latina, April 21)

The Other Campaign of Jovel—local chapter of the Zapatista civil initiative in the Chiapas highland city of San Cristobal de Las Casas—has turned over to the agrarian authorities in the state capital, Tuxtla Gutiérrez, a critical analysis of land conflicts in the restive southern Mexican state. The analysis accuses the federal Agrarian Reform Secretariat and the local Agrarian Tribunals of favoritism in approving land claims by those seeking to expel Zapatista communities. A statement in support of the analysis is signed by over 200 grassroots and non-governmental organizations, and more than a thousand individuals.