Those kidnapped belong to three families linked to a regional environmental movement known as the Organization of Ecologist Farmers. Two leaders of this organization, Eva Alarcon and Marcial Bautista, were abducted earlier this month as they traveled aboard a passenger bus on their way to a meeting in Mexico City.

The daughters of the two kidnapped organizers held a press conference in Mexico City Tuesday begging the kidnappers to negotiate and to return their parents alive.

Twenty four local police and four state level detectives have been arrested in connection to the federal investigation into the case.

The whereabouts of the abducted environmental activists and their relatives remains unknown.

The victims were identified as 20 year-old Gabriel Echeverría de Jesús and 21 year-old Jorge Alexis Herrera Pino. The student organization behind the protests stated a third student, Edgar David Espíritu, died Monday night. However, at the time of this writing, Espíritu is reportedly alive but in a coma.

State authorities initially denied police shot at protesters, but a video released by Milenio TV shows a man in plainclothes firing a high caliber rifle from a police line in the direction of the protests. The police in video made no attempt to stop or apprehend the gunman.

La Jornada published a photo today showing plainclothes police with high caliber rifles at the scene of protest in Chilpancingo. El Universal also published video of plain clothes police armed with rifles.

Students mobilized on Monday to pressure the governor to appear at a budget negotiation meeting that had been cancelled and postponed for months.

In addition to the killings, at least 20 people were arrested. At least one has been released with serious facial bruising. The Tlachinollan Human Rights Center, which is providing legal counsel to some of the detained, stated a 19 year-old claimed he was tortured into making a false confession about firing a rifle during the protest.

Tuesday afternoon, Guerrero’s governor announced the dismissals of the state attorney general and the state police chief and his deputy.

Mexico’s system of rural academies (the Normales Rurales) was set up to train children of marginalized small farmers to become teachers in rural communities. The schools have been hard hit by budget cuts and reduced enrolment opportunities over the past 10 years.

Papers with names of the murdered and disappeared on a wall in Oaxaca City

Much of the news of Mexico’s Drug War focuses on the shootouts, massacres and abductions which have killed tens of thousands of people in the north. Violence in the south takes on a different form and generally receives less attention.

Download audio file (20110919sy.mp3)

The southern states of Guerrero, Oaxaca, and Chiapas share certain characteristics. They are Mexico’s poorest states, are rich in natural resources, have large indigenous populations and long traditions of social movements.

In parts of southern Mexico, the legacy of the decades-long Dirty War against political dissidents has dovetailed with the climate of violence and impunity of the ongoing Drug War.

MICAELA CABAÑAS: “Desde hace mas de 40 años que tenemos en esta lucha…(fade under, reporter interprets)

Such is the case of Micaela Cabañas, who joined the caravan in her home state of Guerrero. Her father, the iconic guerrilla leader and rural teacher, Lucio Cabañas, died during an army siege in the mid ’70s. Her mother and aunt, Isabel and Reyna Anaya, were assassinated just over two months ago while leaving a church. Just hours after the crime, Micaela Cabañas received a death threat from the cell phone that had been stolen from her murdered mother.

MICAELA CABAÑAS (voiceover): “We have to continue the struggle. We have to continue planting seeds – seeds that send down firm roots steeped in education and culture – to continue on this path towards the light.”

A historic grievance in this corner of Mexico has been indigenous control over ancestral territory. Conflicts over land can take many forms; from outright paramilitary displacement campaigns sponsored by powerful regional land bosses…to rifts within a community over religion or politics. Exploitation of inter-communal divisions are sometimes fueled by outside forces.

One of the deadliest recent rural conflicts in Oaxaca occurred last year in the town of San Juan Copala. Armed men forced supporters of

Caravan event in the main plaza of Oaxaca City

a local self-governance model to flee the town after a 10 month long siege. The displaced say their aggressors received resources from what was then the state’s ruling party to keep the town under siege and crush the indigenous autonomy project.

Macario Garcia Merino spoke to the caravan during one of its stops in Oaxaca.

MACARIO GARCIA MERINO (voiceover):“It’s not just the situation in San Juan Copala and it’s not specific to the state of Oaxaca. We’ve come to realize that this situation, this war of extermination, is throughout the entire country. This is why we need all need to band together and walk together to find justice.”

San Juan Copala, like other areas experiencing forced displacements, is believed to contain significant mineral wealth.

(SPEECH/AMBI – Monte Alban ceremony)

The issue of conflict and indigenous control over their mineral-rich lands was acknowledged specifically during a ceremony for caravan participants at the Monte Alban archaeological site.

Amada Puentes, whose son has been missing since he was taken from the streets of Monterrey by policemen more than 2 years ago, said the ceremony for peace had a profound impact.

Banner with written messages next to caravan bus

AMADA PUENTES: “Cuando iniciamos la caravana, yo todavía traía en mi corazón deseos de venganza, ya no tanto de justicia, de venganza. En esta ceremonia creanme que me cambió la manera de pensar “(fade under, reporter interprets)

Puentes says even at the start of the caravan her heart yearned for revenge; not so much for justice any more, but revenge. But she says the ceremony at Monte Alban changed her way of thinking.

PUENTES (voiceover):“I now feel calmer than at the start of this journey. And I know now that it was worth it because I felt connected and I could see that I’m not alone. Even with all the people at the start of this trip, I felt isolated. After such an amazing moment [in the ceremony], my way of thinking and feeling changed. Even though I continue to cry on the inside, I now feel strong. I feel accompanied. And I feel hopeful that I’ll find my son soon.”

From Oaxaca, the caravan continued on to Chiapas, where a delegation met with the indigenous pacifist community Las Abejas and the leadership of a Zapatista base community.

The caravan also focused attention on the relatively under-covered dangers faced by undocumented migrants and their advocates in southern Mexico.

Sunday night, the bus loads of drug war victims, human rights activists, observers and journalists received a welcome by thousands ofpeople in Xalapa, the state capital of Veracruz – a city which has recently begun to experience the shoot outs and spike in missing persons cases that have plagued the north.

(Julian LeBaron tape – fade under, reporter interprets)

In Xalapa’s main plaza, Julian LeBaron, a home builder who has lost a brother and a brother in law to the violence in his home state of Chihuahua, told the crowds of people who have lost loved ones that the house that is best protected isn’t the one with the most police guarding it, but rather the one with the most organized residents.

(Julian LeBaron continues, reporter interprets)

LeBaron said that while he is a victim of crime, members of the the movement need to stop viewing themselves as victims and become the agents of the change they want to see.

 (This report was produced for the September 19, 2011 broadcast of Free Speech Radio News. The audio is downloadable here.)

Earlier this summer, Sicilia led a caravan through northern Mexico to bring attention to the on-the-ground situation in the states hardest hit by “narco-killings”. The southbound caravan will visit Mexico’s poorest states, which are home to large indigenous populations and significant expanses of natural wealth.

The drug war in southern Mexico takes on a different form from the large-scale shoot outs and massacres that have made civilian life difficult in the northern states. The shared border with Guatemala has become a hot spot for the shipment of drugs stored in Central America. Years ago, organized criminals muscled into the smuggling, trafficking and kidnapping of migrants who cross Mexico without visas on their way to the border with the United States.

The caravan is likely to focus public attention on the more hidden aspects of violence and impunity in the southern states; the displacement of indigenous communities, land grabs in resource-rich areas, rural para-militarism and politically-motivated attacks targeted at indigenous autonomy and social movements.

The caravan passed through Morelos today and will visit Guerrero, Oaxaca, Chiapas, Tabasco, Veracruz and Puebla over the coming days before returning to Mexico City on September 19th.

According to a police report, Isabel Anaya Nava and her older sister Reyna were gunned down at approximately 1pm on Sunday while leaving a church where they were selling food. Armed men opened fire on the sisters and then stole their cellular phones before fleeing in a blue vehicle.

Micaela Cabañas Anaya, the daughter of Isabel Anaya Nava and Lucio Cabañas Barrientos, received a threat via phone at 5pm from her murdered mother’s cellular number. Micaela Cabañas is part a group known as “Nacidos en la Tempestad“, an organization of children of people killed or disappeared during Mexico’s “Dirty War” against leftists in the 1960s and ’70s.

After Lucio Cabañas died in a military action in Guerrero’s mountains in late 1974, his teenage wife and newborn daughter were “disappeared” and held in Mexico’s military base Number One, along with members of the Cabañas family. They were released in mid-1976.

Micaela Cabañas wrote in an article that she and her mother only told those close to them of their relation to the famous guerilla leader who founded the “Partido de los Pobres”.

Two of Isabel Anaya’s sisters were killed in early 2011. Human rights groups warn that the theft of Isabel and Reyna Anaya’s telephones indicate their contacts may now be at risk.

Guerrero is one of Mexico’s poorest states. Decades of counter-insurgency against leftist campesino groups has dovetailed with a more recent explosion of drug war-related violence.

A painted banner from the displaced persons camp in Oaxaca

Families displaced by violence in the Mexican town of San Juan Copala are attempting to return to the homes they fled last year. The rural town in the southern state of Oaxaca declared itself autonomous in January of 2007, but differences among factions in the region led to what many call “a paramilitary siege” which lasted for 10 months.

Download audio file (20110524CC.mp3)

In the early months of the siege armed men blocked vehicular access to and from San Juan Copala and fired shots from the hills that overlook the town. As the situation intensified, snipers targeted the families of those who supported the autonomy project – often wounding people who left their homes or who attempted to flee the town on foot.

By mid-October of 2010, more than a dozen of the small town’s residents were dead and many others had been wounded by gunfire.

Some residents who have escaped the conflict fled to Oaxaca City where they set up a protest camp in front of the Government Palace. Women here swept the side walk this morning ahead of their departure for Mexico City as part of a caravan.

Reyna Martinez Flores is the spokesperson for the Oaxaca City camp and is herself displaced by the conflict.

She says the purpose of the caravan is to demand justice for those who were killed and to gather up the displaced in order to return to the town.

Two caravans of observers attempted to reach San Juan Copala last year. Armed men fired upon the first one, killing a prominent Mexican human rights activist and a Finnish observer. The second caravan was prevented from advancing to the town by a convoy of state police.

I asked Reyna Martinez Flores if the state government of Oaxaca had given assurances that the caravan would be able to reach the town this time.

“We haven’t received any guarantees and we’re well aware of this…but the thing is that we’ve been here for a long time already and the people want to go back to their town, to their homes. The government has been stringing us along …and has even told us that we should wait until there are conditions for our return. But the people are fed up – desperate in the sense that they no longer want to wait until the government decides when it’s time to go back to San Juan Copala.  The displaced persons are the ones who took this decision and we’re going to respect it.”

Those who fled San Juan Copala either sought refuge in the indigenous Triqui region or have been living in the camps that were established last August in the state capital and in Mexico City. Martinez Flores told FSRN that a group of women will remain behind in the Oaxaca City camp in the event that the displaced are unable to return to their town.

[This report originally aired in the May 24, 2011 broadcast of FSRN]

Police reports indicate the ambush occurred at a spot in the road that had been blocked by large mounds of dirt. Three of the trucks the victims were travelling in were set on fire.

A dispute has been festering in Choapam since December, when a local election was annulled due to irregularities. While the conflict may go beyond the simple politics of which political faction controls the town, details have been sparse. The town is a ten hour drive from the state capital, which prevents reporters with same-day deadlines from visiting the crime scene. This logistical detail also means that many of the comments on the situation cited in news reports come from politicians based in the state capital.

Choapan is located near Oaxaca’s border with Veracruz, a region that has experienced it’s share of drug violence. Most of said violence has been in and around the city of Tuxtepec. In the state capital, the massacre has led to furious finger pointing between members of the new reformist government and the party that controlled the state’s politics for 8 decades.

Reyna Martinez Flores of the displaced persons protest camp in Oaxaca City

The rural town of San Juan Copala, Oaxaca was thrust into an international spotlight a year ago when an armed group opened fired on a caravan of human rights activists, teachers, and international observers. Two people, Bety Cariño and Jyri Jaakkola, were killed by gunshots to the head.

The incident called wider attention to a cycle of violence and power struggles that had been damaging the indigenous Triqui community for decades. It also revealed a blatant lack of action on the part of authorities to protect a civilian population from attacks by irregular armed groups.

In August of 2010, women and children who fled the siege of the town of San Juan Copala set up a protest camp in the central plaza of Oaxaca City. They were joined by others after a violent – and deadly – displacement campaign forced supporters of the autonomy movement from the town. More than 8 month later, they remain camped out under the arches of the Government Palace.

[dewplayer:http://www.southnotes.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/ReinaMtzFloresApril27_lofi.mp3]

There’s no solid indication of when – or if – they be able to return to their homes. As an event to mark the 1 year anniversary of the deaths of Cariño and Jaakkola wrapped up, South Notes spoke with Reyna Martinez Flores about displacement, impunity, and the role women can play in the peacemaking process.

The audio interview is in Spanish and can be downloaded here.

It’s gotten to the point that massacres have become near daily events in Mexico…and behind each of those massacres are the stories of the people who died and their families. These back stories are what investigative reporter Marcela Turati has documented in her new book, “Fuego Cruzado” – or “Crossfire” in English.

Download audio file (MarcelaTurati_lofi.mp3)

Turati sat down with South Notes recently to discuss these stories that go uncovered in a media landscape that can barely keep up with registering the daily death toll. The audio is in Spanish.

Members of the Reyes Salazar family began a hunger strike outside of the special investigators office in Ciudad Juárez on February 8th, then moved their protest camp to the Senate building in Mexico City earlier this week. The home of Sara Salazar, the mother and mother-in-law of those abducted, was burned down on February 15th.

The most famous member of this family was Josefina Reyes, a woman who carried out an extended battle against a planned nuclear waste dump who was also active in denouncing the impunity around a long string on unsolved rape-murders of young women in nearby Ciudad Juárez.

To total of 6 members of the Reyes Salazar family have been killed since late 2008.