To the Zapatista support base communities,
To the Local Autonomous Governments,
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation,
To the National Indigenous Congress (CNI),
To the compañeras, compañeros, compañeroas, of the Sixth in the world,
To the people who fight from below and to the left.
Compañeras, compañeros, compañeroas,
Three years after the arrival of Squadron 421 to the shores of Vigo, beginning the Journey for Life, and waiting for the second part of the CNI and FrayBa Tour, organizations of the Zapatista Europe Network met together on June 21st, 22nd and 23rd, 2024 in Frankfurt, Germany, at the headquarters of the Antagon Theater, which welcomed us in its space.
During the meeting we collectively reflected on what unites us and what we can do together. We have seen the urgency of meeting because the system of destruction and death that is attacking the people in Mexico, Abya Yala and other peoples in the world, has its mirror in this old Europe.
We are hurt by the advance of racism and the criminalization of migrants, we are hurt by walls and borders, we are hurt by the people killed in the Mediterranean, we are hurt by wars and the advance of European militarization, we are hurt by the violence exercised against women and sexual and gender dissidence, especially towards our trans siblings. The advance of the extreme right comes to further harden these colonial, capitalist and patriarchal policies.
We denounce the complicity of national states in the advancement of the militarization of societies, with the sole purpose of making wars a business at the cost of thousands of lives. We see the crudest face of this situation in the genocide in Palestine, as well as in the wars against the Kurdish, Ukrainian, Congolese, Sudanese peoples, as well as in so many other places in the world.
We denounce the policies of territorial destruction disguised as an ecological transition that hide the perpetuation of a capitalism that they try to sell us as green. In Europe, ecocidal megaprojects are imposed and defenders of the Earth and territory are criminalized, as is happening in France with the Les Soulèvements de la Terre movement.
In Mexico we see that a supposedly progressive and left-wing government continues to perpetuate the war against indigenous peoples and Mother Earth in complicity with organized crime and transnational companies. We firmly condemn deadly megaprojects such as the so-called Mayan Train, the Trans-isthmus Corridor and the Morelos Integral Project, among others.
Militarization has caused violence to severely increase in the country, especially against migrants, women and indigenous communities. We condemn the violence against the civilian population that is being carried out by criminal groups, with the complicity of the bad government of the 4T in places such as Niño Héroes, Chicomuselo, Tila, etc.
We demand an end to the paramilitary and organized crime attacks against the Zapatista communities and we demand the immediate release of the five prisoners of San Juan Cancuc and the Zapatista compa José Díaz Gómez. We also denounce President AMLO’s verbal attacks against human rights organizations as in the case of FrayBa.
It is not just Chiapas where this excess of neoliberal violence is being suffered. We condemn the attacks against the CIPOG-EZ in Guerrero, the Otomí community in CDMX and the Santa María Ostula community in Michoacán. We also denounce the attacks against defenders of territory such as David Hernández Salazar, from Puente Madera and Miguel Peralta, from Eloxochitlán de Flores Magón. We salute the struggle of the Mothers and Families Searching for Missing Persons and denounce the attacks they systematically receive.
We ratify the commitment we acquired by signing the Declaration for Life, assuming that “the fight for humanity is everywhere, all the time.”
From Slumil K’ajxemk’op we salute the 40th anniversary of the founding of the EZLN and the 30th anniversary of the beginning of the War against Oblivion. And we celebrate that, despite everything, its voice continues to be a space of non-war in the midst of war, and that bridge of dignity that the Zapatista movement offers us.
Long live the CNI!
Freedom for political prisoners!
No to megaprojects!
Long live the Zapatista autonomous communities!
Long live the EZLN!
Long live the COMMON!
Collectives Present at the Meeting:
20ZLN – Italy
L’Adhesiva – Catalunya, Spanish State
ASMEX – Valencia Country, Spanish State
CafeZ – Liège, Belgium
Zapatista Calendar – Greece
CGT – Spanish State
Holland Tour – Holland
Mut Vitz Collective 13 – Marseille, France
Solidale Node – Italy
Rebellion Network – Germany
Txiapasekin – Euskal Herria, Spanish State
Union of Solidarity Trade Unions – France
Ya Basta! Network – Germany
Ya Basta! Êdî Bese – Northeast Italy
Y retiemble! – Madrid, Spanish State20ZLN – Italy
Other Signatories of the Declaration:
Documentation Center on Zapatismo CEDOZ – Madrid, Spanish State
Lumaltik – Euskal Herria, Spanish State
Caracoleras de Olba – Teruel, Spanish State
Ass. Solidarity Cafè Rebeldía-Infoespai – Catalonia, Spanish State
Ya Basta! – Milan, Italy
Tatawelo – Italy
London Mexico Solidarity – UK
USI 1912 Unione Sindacale Italiana e Ass. Usicons Nazionale – Italy
Casa Madiba Network – Rimini, Italy
Lugano Zapatista Collective – Switzerland
Armadillo Suomi Collective – Finland
Paliacate Zapatista Self-Organized Libertarian Assembly – Greece
Kinoki. Audiovisual Self-Management – Austria
Original article at Enlace Zapatista, June 30th, 2024.
Translated by Schools for Chiapas.
Original photo at https://pagina3.mx/2024/07/declaracion-del-encuentro-de-la-red-europa-zapatista-frankfurt-2024/