Text and photos by Heriberto Paredes
The community of Cherán K’eri, located in the heart of the P’urhépecha Plateau, Michoacán, suffered an attack on the morning of July 2, apparently by members of the CJNG – Jalisco Cartel New Generation – “who tried to enter through the areas of Rancho del Pino and Cerrito del Aire.”
This was reported by the community itself in a communiqué issued after the events: “In response, our Community Round Table(an autonomous security organization established by our system of self-government) resisted the aggression and activated the barricades to protect the population. So far, we report one killed and one wounded, members of the Ronda, a fact that fills us with indignation, sadness and anger.”
This has not happened since 2011. That year Cherán managed to expel from its territory the Familia Michoacana, a criminal organization that for three years illegally and intensively logged the community’s forests. Along with the loggers, the community also expelled the political parties, the municipal government in office and its police for having ties with the criminal organization.
With the attack by the CJNG on Wednesday morning, 14 years of peace in Cherán, which was achieved through its model of autonomous government, were broken.
Since then, Cherán managed to establish an autonomous form of government, based on their uses and customs. Their model of government has been legally recognized and has multiplied in other indigenous municipalities of Michoacán and, since then, the people of Cherán have struggled to keep their territory free of violence, political parties and criminal organizations. It has not been an easy and smooth road, however it is until this morning’s attack that a state of high alert is being restored.
In a first bulletin issued, the communal authorities informed the population that “due to the recent events that have disturbed peace and security within our territory, the determination has been made to immediately suspend all school closing activities, social, cultural, sporting events, and any other type of public gathering until further notice.”
They also asked the community to stay indoors, remain calm and not to spread rumors or unverified news.
Criminal offensive in Michoacán
This attack is not an isolated situation in the region or in the state. In recent weeks, aggressions have intensified in various communities, several of them located in the P’urhépecha Plateau, where towns such as Nahuatzen, Arantepacua, Capacuaro and Santa Fe de la Laguna have also suffered threats, armed incursions and territorial dispossession.
The trend has been increasing over the last four years: episodes in which indigenous communities have been attacked by criminal groups, disrupting community life in places that for years were subjected to violence and whose peace has been difficult to reestablish and rebuild.
An example of this escalation of violence can be found in the most recent drone attacks and the use of high caliber weapons against the Nahua community of Santa María Ostula, in the Sierra-Costa, which has resisted various attacks by the CJNG, an organization that has tried on numerous occasions to enter its territory to take control of the port.
Attacks with landmines have also been registered in the Tierra Caliente region, in communities in the municipality of Apatzingán, and the Human Security Observatory has kept a detailed record of these attacks while denouncing the lack of action by state authorities to prevent these violent scenarios.
In the case of the P’urhépecha Plateau, it has been the communities themselves who have documented and denounced the presence of the CJNG in the surrounding area, which is why the attack on Cherán is attributed to this criminal group. The objective appears to be to enter the territories that maintain self-government in order to impose criminal control over efforts to consolidate communal governments and life projects for the people who live in these communities, with a marked defense of natural resources.
All this is occurring, moreover, at a time when the state government has increased the presence of personnel of the Civil Guard, the National Guard, the Army and the Navy, which has not translated into a reduction in the capacity of criminal organizations, such as the United Cartels and the CJNG, among others, to act and fire.
The government of Michoacan has also tried to join the models of self-government with conflicting actions that have resulted in the division and confrontation of the indigenous communities, such as the creation of supposedly community security forces that are not always supported by the community assemblies.
Cherán clearly indicates its dissatisfaction with the actions of the different levels of government in its communiqué:
“We hold the Mexican State responsible, and in particular the federal and state governments, for their negligence, complicity and silence in the face of this new aggression. Where are the protection mechanisms for indigenous peoples? Where is the real commitment to peace? While the federal government exalts a Justice Plan for indigenous peoples that was not built with us nor responds to our realities, violence is imposed in our territories. While constitutional reforms in matters of justice and security are announced, the peoples remain unprotected, exposed to death, dispossession and impunity. What kind of justice are we talking about if our own forms of organization and defense are neither guaranteed nor respected?”
Indigenous peoples on the front line of resistance in defense of territory
In addition to the P’urhépecha community of Cherán, or like the community of Ostula, at the end of June 2025, at least 10 other communities belonging to the Warijó and Pima peoples denounced drone attacks in the Sierra Tarahumara by the group Los Salazar, belonging to the Sinaloa Cartel, as documented by the Chihuahua media Raíchali.
Drone attacks, explosive mines, armed incursions, and threats: these ingredients make up an offensive against indigenous peoples who have tried to organize themselves to autonomously defend their territories and their forms of political organization. To these must be added impunity in each of the cases, in addition to the complicity of different levels of government.
“We denounce these acts of violence that seek to sow fear, fragment the community and dismantle the processes of territorial defense that we have sustained with so much effort. It is no coincidence that we are attacked when we defend the forest, water and life. The extractive, criminal and political interests converge to attack the people who do not submit,” the Cherán community said energetically after the armed attack.
Original text and photos by Heriberto Paredes published in Fabrica de Noticias on July 2nd, 2025.
Translation by Schools for Chiapas.