From the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center (Frayba), we denounce the strategies of encirclement and dispossession of the territory recovered by the struggle of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN), carried out in the Autonomous Zapatista Town of Belén, Peasant Region, belonging to Caracol 8 “The Light that Shines on the World,” based in the community of Dolores Hidalgo (official municipality of Ocosingo, Chiapas).
The Assembly of Zapatista Autonomous Government Collectives (ACGAZ)—part of the Zapatista structures that promote El Común—denounced attacks that began in April, which included refusal to engage in dialogue, incursions into and surveying of the autonomous territory recovered in 1994, threats, theft of crops, burning of two houses, and dispossession, perpetrated by a group of civilians together with the Ocosingo municipal police, the State Police, the Government Delegate, the Chiapas State Attorney General’s Office, and members of the Mexican Army.
The goal is to convert the recovered territory into private land, which has left at least 13 people forcibly displaced, all of them EZLN Support Bases, in addition to 40 non-Zapatista peasants, who were stripped of the land that is their source of food and work, all of whom were responsible for the collective work of the region and the communal milpa.
These events are not isolated incidents but rather constitute a renewal of the strategy of harassment and aggression against Zapatista territory, its political project, and its struggle for life, carried out by the forces of the Mexican state. As in the days of the PRI, now disguised as the 4T, this is the second time this year that joint operations (Mexican Army and state forces, including the Pakal Immediate Reaction Forces) have carried out incursions into Zapatista territory. The first occurred on April 24 in the community of San Pedro Cotzilnam, municipality of Aldama, Chiapas, Vicente Guerrero Autonomous Region. In addition, there were incidents of harassment and surveillance in April 2025 during the Zapatista (Rebel and Revel) Art Encounter.
The dispossession is taking place within the framework of the ongoing counterinsurgency strategy, now making use of the justice system to confront the peoples of Chiapas, in the midst of a process of “land restitution,” with the support of the Ministry of National Defense, constituting a provocation and direct confrontation against the EZLN, which puts at risk the lives and integrity of the people who inhabit the territory.
The current political violence is accompanied by a profound process of dispossession aimed at handing over the territory of the peoples and communities of Chiapas to the interests surrounding extractive, infrastructure, tourism, and energy industry megaprojects.
This new attack violates the collective rights of the peoples, particularly Articles 1 and 2 of the Mexican Constitution. It also violates the regional and international human rights system to which Mexico is a signatory, such as Articles 13, 14, and 15 of ILO Convention 169 on the Rights of Indigenous and Tribal Peoples, as well as Articles 25 to 32 and 25 to 27 of the UN and OAS Declarations on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and 25 to 27, respectively. Both declarations uphold respect for the land and territory of indigenous peoples and common property. Likewise, the San Andrés Accords frame the territory as the backbone of the existence of indigenous peoples.
Frayba, in an effort to prevent the conflict from escalating and to stop human rights violations, has provided all the information to the state and federal governments so that they may act under their responsibility to respect Zapatista territory in relation to the attacks, threats, and dispossession coming from their own state agents.
We demand respect for the integrity of non-Zapatista individuals and the EZLN Support Bases, as well as their territories where The Commons and Non Property are being built. We call for national and international solidarity to take action in defense of life and territory.
Original text published by Frayba on September 30, 2025.
Translation by Schools for Chiapas.