This Week in Oaxaca: The Continuing Lies and Their Truths

This Week in Oaxaca: The Continuing Lies and Their Truths
By Magdalena Dubois, Centro de Medios Libres, CML, Mexico City -vientos.info
Translated and edited by Calamity Barucha, CML

What the government and the mass media say about the struggle in oaxaca and
is people know to be true.

First lie. In an interview with the EFE agency, President Fox declared that
the conflict in Oaxaca is a serious problem but that it doesnt suggest
instability of the country of Mexico becuase it is a problem with a local
character. This is not true. The mobilizations that hace occured in the
last few days in Mexico and the rest of the world demonstrate that now it is
not only a problem of the state of Oaxaca.
Yesterday their were spontaneous highway blockades in the following states:
Yucatan, Queretaro, Veracruz, Chihuahua, Chiapas, State of Mexico....

Second lie. In the same interview, Fox defended the actions of the ¨forces
of order¨, and ensured that ¨It was not a armed intervention, also it was
announced, because there has to be order and law withing the reclaiming of
the city.¨
It is not true. The police forces that ocuppy the city of Oaxaca launch
projectiles of tear gas directed at the bodies of the protesters (Jorje
Alberto Lopez died because of the impact of of a tear gas canister that was
aimed at his chest). They also have heavy weaponry (such as AK-47, R15 and
small arms) and nightsticks.

Third lie. At 9:30 today, november 2nd, the commanding general of the
Preventive Federal Police (PFP), Ardelio Vargas, highlighted that the
intention of the police operative was not to enter the University of Oaxaca
and that in the case of an arrest or detention, the person would be
immediatly let go. Not true. Reports from the University Radio speak of
the PFP entering the university sinse 8 in the morning.
At 8:08 there was a report that the PFP were shooting in the air, towards
the radio (the chots could be heard over the radio). Moreover, at least
twenty people have been detained in the morning, and they have not been let
go. At 1 in the afternoon, when various commercial media were speaking of
the entrance of the PFP into the university, Ardelio Vargas insisted the
contrary. They also spoke of the entrance of six tanks shooting water with
identifying ink that cannot be washed off, and two helicopters flew low
overhead, one of them launching tear gas.

Fourth lie. The media speaks of the retreat of the tanks, which implies the
retreat of the PFP. Its not true. The tanks are not retreating, they only
move back to refill water deposits in order to continue repressing people
who are defending the radio)though one tank was reported to have been
burned).

Fifth lie. The APPO movment is a assosiated with guerillas (the EPR, the
Popular Revolutionary Army). This is not true. The EPR is an armed
resistence and the oaxacan people have been civil and peaceful.

Sixth lie. Fox denied that the police forces were resposible for the deaths
of the of the resisters in oaxaca. he affirmed that there were some human
rights violations, and that the government would act immediatly to resolve
these violations. But this is not true. The two suspected resposible
paries in the death of Indymedia videographer Bradley Will, Abel Santiago
Zarate(Local politician of a oaxacan community and member of the PRI party)
and Orlando Miguel Aguilar Coello (lead bodyguard for PRI party political
members), were detained and presented before the judicial authorities. They
were identified in photos of the shooting. However, the government and the
Attorney General of Oaxaca have denied that these men were involved in the
shooting against the APPO in which Brad Will died, even though there are
testimonies from the neighbors declaring the contrary.
The Attorney General acquited beforehand the suspects, with the argument
that the neighbors that were witness ¨presume the innocence of the citenzens
in virtue that they were repelling the agression of violent people¨

We must put the infomation seige to an end!