The evangelical Journal Chretién features a commentary Feb. 12 on religious violence in Mexico's conflicted southern state of Chiapas which is rife with dangerous distortions, and smacks of a propaganda job against the Zapatista rebels. Although writer Aloys Evina begins by boasting of his "many years as a reporter," his garbled report reveals either deep ignorance or willful denial of the realities of Chiapas. The implausible account concerns a supposed Zapatista "lynch-mob" attack on a Maya evangelical preacher.

In a new communique, the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) denounces Mexican President Felipe Calderon's escalated campiagn against narco-trafficking as a "farce" and a "mere pretext to augment the already disproportionate militarization of rural Chiapas." The communique, signed by Subcommander Marcos, draws an analogy between the new crackdown and last year's contested elections, saying "the supposed campaigns against narcotrafficking carried out by the government are a farce. Just like that which brought Mr. Calderon Hinojosa to power."

From El Universal, Feb. 7:

The Supreme Court voted 7-4 Tuesday to launch an investigation into state and federal police conduct during the arrests last May of some 240 men, women and children in the State of Mexico town of San Salvador Atenco.

An international commission of human rights observers announced Jan. 21 that at least 23 people were killed and a number of cases of physical abuse and sexual assaults against women were recorded during the months-long conflict in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca last year. The Barcelona-based International Civil Commission for Human Rights Observation (CCIODH), headed by Spain's Ignacio Garcia, presented a preliminary report on the violations of the rights of civilians, teachers and activists of the Oaxaca People's Assembly (APPO).

In his first published interview with the foreign press since he became Mexico's president last month, Felipe Calderon told the Financial Times: "The United States is jointly responsible for what is happening to us... [I]n that joint responsibility the U.S. government has a lot of work to do. We cannot confront this problem alone."

Francisco Lopez Barcenas writes for La Jornada, Jan. 10, via Chiapas95:

On January 1 of this year, Oaxaca woke up with one more municipality, that of San Juan Copala, created by Triqui communities who officially belong to the Mixtec municipalities of Juxtlahuaca, Putla y Constancia del Rosario, in the western part of the state; municipalities controlled by mestizos. But this isn't just one more municipality out of the 570 in the state. This one is autonomous, like those that indigenous peoples are constructing in different parts of the country as a way of defending their rights and building their own future.

From La Jornada, Dec. 28 via Chiapas95:

The nation's top electoral court ruled Wednesday that irregularities preceding the Oct. 15 gubernatorial election in Tabasco were not serious enough to affect the outcome.

The bishops of San Cristobal de las Casas, Felipe Arizmendi Esquivel (titular), Enrique Diaz Diaz (auxiliary) and Samuel Ruiz Garcia (emeritus) officiated at a mass in the Chiapas Highland village of Chenalho Dec. 22 in memory of the victims of the Dec. 22, 1997 massacre at Chenalho's outlying hamlet of Acteal, in which 45 unarmed Tzotzil Maya were slain. In an emotional ceremony that mixed Catholic and Maya rituals, the gathering prayed at the grave of the victims, who belonged to the civil indigenous organization Las Abejas (the Bees).