Mujeres y niños desplazados del autonombrado municipio autónomo de San Juan Copala iniciaron una huelga de hambre en el Zócalo de Oaxaca para demandar garantías de seguridad para sus compañeros, a quienes reportan atrapados por un cerco paramilitar al pueblo. Esta violencia ha dejado una decena de personas en los últimos 5 meses.

Mientras tanto, a convocatoria de dos reconocidos sacerdotes, dos de los 3 grupos que se disputan el control político de la región triqui aceptan participar en mesa de diálogo: o MULT, acusado participar en el cerco paramilitar sobre Copala,  y  MULT-I, organización detras del municipio autónomo, finalmente no consiguen reunirse con los representantes de la iglesia porque MULT-I exige primero detener la violencia.

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Displaced Triqui women and children from the self-declared autonomous municipality of San Juan Copala began a hunger strike today to demand an end to the paramilitary violence that has killed at least ten people in the past 5 months. They are calling on the government to guarantee the safety of autonomy sympathizers trapped in the town by a paramilitary siege.

Today was to mark the start of emergency church mediated talks between MULT-I, the organization behind the autonomous municipality, and MULT, one of the groups accused of participating in the paramilitary siege of Copala. The other group is the UBISORT, which has been linked to the PRI, the political party which has ruled Oaxaca for 8 consecutive decades.

In a press conference to announce the start of their hunger strike, displaced spokesperson Reyna Martínez Flores announced that MULT-I would cancel its participation in the dialogue due to a surge of violence over the weekend. She and the other protestors want security guarantees for the evacuation of autonomy sympathizers trapped in the town, among them, two people over the age of 90.

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Mexico will kick off celebrations tonight to mark the bicentennial of its independence from Spain. One town that won’t be celebrating is San Juan Copala, where violence has forced the cancellation of any official event.

Members of San Juan Copala’s indigenous autonomy movement say armed men from rival factions entered the town Monday, took over the local government building, and fired off automatic weapons. A local woman was reportedly injured by a high-caliber bullet, but has been unable to leave the town or seek medical attention.

A communiqué alleges that pro-autonomy residents have been given an ultimatum to either leave the town or face death.

Around 25 women and children displaced from San Juan Copala have been living in a protest encampment in downtown Oaxaca City since August 11th. They are all members of the movement that declared the town an autonomous municipality in January 2007.

The women moved their protest encampment a few blocks on Monday night from the central plaza (or zócalo) to the Santo Domingo church area. The state government had agreed to send tons of food and two police patrols to San Juan Copala in exchange for having the main square cleared of protests for the duration of Bicentennial celebrations.

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A key figure in the Triqui autonomy movement was assassinated Thursday afternoon along with his wife in the town of Yosoyuxi near San Juan Copala. Timoteo Alejandro Ramírez was one of the main organizers behind the “autonomous municipality” of San Juan Copala.

In Mexico, a “municipality” has the same political status as a county seat. Yosoyuxi is located within the territory of the 3 year-old self-declared autonomous municipality.

Timoteo Alejandro Ramírez and his wife, Cleriberta Castro, ran a small store in the front portion of their home. According to a press release from the autonomous municipal authorities, eyewitnesses saw men in a 3-ton truck pull up to the store front run by the couple under the guise of selling merchandise. Ramírez and Castro were found dead later by a neighbour.

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The ambush that killed a prominent Mexican human rights defender and a Finnish observer near San Juan Copala, Oaxaca may be the first time in Mexican history that paramilitaries have opened fire on an international humanitarian caravan, but it’s not an isolated act of violence. The fiercely independent Triqui nation has been steeped in years of bitter internal fighting which was itself preceded by decades of military occupation.

Francisco López Bárcenas, an academic who has written extensively about Triqui history, traces the current crisis back to the 1940s when the government withdrew recognition of San Juan Copala’s status as a county seat municipality – Mexico’s only political district with a distinctly Triqui identity.
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