Oaxaca, Chiapas Puebla, Mexico City, Queretaro, and Tlaxcala are Mexico.
We are grateful for the immense solidarity of all those who have joined in the protests. We reiterate that justice and freedom can only be achieved and cultivated from the bottom up, from a kind-hearted society that is still human. They will never come from the murderers and criminals who claim to govern this country, nor will they come from above, where extermination, death, and the destruction of humanity and the planet are manufactured.
OAXACA (more than 10 years of criminalization, persecution, and forced displacement in Eloxochitlán Flores Magón).
The defense of the Xangá Ndá Ge River and the exercise of autonomy have been the reasons for criminalizing the community of Eloxochitlán de Flores Magón for more than 10 years. The political bosses led by the family of Eliza Zepeda and Manuel Zepeda enrich themselves through the dispossession and destruction of the river, imposing violence and political cronyism to persecute those who oppose them. Despite the alliance between the three levels of government and the caciques throughout this period, our Mazatec compañeros have waged a tireless struggle that has not only succeeded in freeing compañeros from prison, but has also set legal and organizational precedents with dignity, strength, and reason as their banners.
Political persecution, criminalization, and forced displacement are the calling card of a criminal state that supports ecocide, but even with the unequal laws of the Mexican state, our Mazatec compañeros have proven the innocence of their criminalized compañeros countless times. The recent judicial protection in favor of Francisco Durán Ortiz in the Sixth District Court of Veracruz and the securing of absolute freedom for teacher Olga Maribel are proof of this.
They are currently facing the renewal of 200 arrest warrants against 56 people, based on absurd arguments, which means that our compañerxs are facing a battle that will reach an important moment on September 2 in Boca del Río, Veracruz, with the amparo trial for our sister Eusebia and for more than fifty of our comrades.
PUEBLA (Criminalization and excessive use of force): The bad government is making money off the people’s water by handing it over to corporations, housing developments, and businesses.
The communities of Acuexcomac, Nealtican, and Xoxtla are currently exercising their legitimate right to autonomy, self-determination, and defense of their territory and water in the face of drought caused by the dispossession and illegal sale of water, which has enriched the criminals in power.
In a deceitful and dishonest manner, the Mexican state pressured residents in the past with criminalization to force the signing of “agreements” with the towns of Nealtican and Acuexcomac to hand over water in exchange for freedoms. These agreements are expired and obsolete due to non-compliance.
These mechanisms of capitalist counterinsurgency exercised by the Mexican State and its system of injustice are intensifying considerably, along with increased pollution, intentional scarcity, and looting of water from indigenous peoples.
In this context, the criminalization of our compañeros Renato Romero and Pascual Bermúdez is proof of this. On September 1, a hearing will be held against our compañeros, who are being criminalized for protesting, for defending water, for being peasants and indigenous people.
Renato and Pascual were framed for attacks on public transportation routes, as previous administrations have done to imprison and repress struggles that interfere with their “development” plans.
The arrest of four young people in Puebla on August 30 and the disproportionate operation involving the Municipal Police, Traffic Police, Visitor Assistance and Proximity Group, and State Police are evidence of a repressive policy and excessive use of force. In cases such as the arrest of these four young people, we can see the sad tendency to condemn acts of protest more than the disappearance that has become so terribly normalized in our country. The murder of Aida Karina between San Luis Potosí and Zacatecas and the silence surrounding yet another murder of a searching mother is a painful reminder of this dynamic.
CHIAPAS in San Juan Cancúc (Arbitrary detention of indigenous communities defending their territory):
Agustín Pérez Velasco has been unjustly imprisoned for three years and three months, along with his four comrades. Agustín had gone to testify on their behalf to prove their innocence, but ended up imprisoned in front of CERSS 5.
Manuel Sántiz Cruz, Juan Velásco Aguilar, Agustín Pérez Velásco, Martín Pérez Domínguez, and Agustín Pérez Domínguez remain deprived of their liberty by the Mexican State for defending their territory against megaprojects of death and destruction. They were falsely accused of aggravated homicide in order to generate fear, inhibition, and demobilization among the Tseltal indigenous communities that are organizing against a hydroelectric dam, the superhighway, and militarization.
On September 3, at a press conference, a call will be made to the Mexican State to comply with Opinion 21/2025 of the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, which recognizes the arbitrary detention of the five from San Juan Cancúc and stipulates their immediate release as an appropriate remedy.
TLAXCALA (criminalization for defending territory, opposing deforestation, and traditional role in promoting autonomy and self-determination):
Saúl Rosales has been unjustly imprisoned for three years. He is a campesino and community defender of the forest in San Pedro Tlalcuapan, Tlaxcala. He was sentenced to 20 years for crimes he did not commit.
His criminalization is a response to his role as a traditional leader in his community defending the territory. In 2019, they demanded that the Mexican state take action to stop the devastation of the Malinche forest. The state’s response was to fail to protect the forest and persecute its defenders.
Don Saúl was criminalized as part of a strategy to dismantle the defense of the territory. The imposition of the Malinche Ecopark as yet another ecocidal project is particularly striking.
MEXICO CITY (Armed paramilitary groups, arbitrary detention, gender-based torture, and territorial defense in the Xochimilco municipality):
On September 5, 2024, in the municipality of Xochimilco, a raid was carried out by partisan paramilitary groups, orchestrated by the Mexican state from the municipality of Xochimilco and the Public Ministry of Tlalpan, with police encirclement by the SSC and the UPO DE “ZORROS,” A POLICE GROUP TRAINED IN ISRAEL, THE USA, AND COLOMBIA.
As a result, more than 20 people were detained and assaulted. Several of them are currently criminalized with open judicial proceedings.
QUERÉTARO (Arbitrary detention under torture, sexual assault, fabrication of gender-based crimes against an indigenous community, against territorial defense and non-partisan Zapatista political ideology):
On June 4, 2025, the POES (Querétaro State Police) and municipal police officers from Amealco and other regions of Querétaro carried out an illegal raid that resulted in the arrest of seven people (none of whom were minors) were taken to the municipal DIF (Department of Social Welfare and Assistance) in Amealco Querétaro, which appears to be a place where medical reports are carried out to legitimize the fabrication of evidence to link ordinary civil society, that is, the working class, to criminal proceedings and pressure them to obey and pay high costs for alleged fines, which are around $15,000 pesos. The Mexican state in Querétaro is a national benchmark for state crimes and hate speech, racism, and classism against indigenous communities, especially women, for repressing and torturing water defenders, executing civilians for alleged administrative offenses, etc.
On June 4, our colleague Estela Hernández Jiménez was tortured and unjustly and arbitrarily detained while documenting the due process of racist and illegal raids in Santiago Mexquititlán, Amealco Querétaro. She was subjected to cruel and inhuman treatment with excessive force by Mexican state agents, mostly male police officers.
It is alarming that the capitalist narco-state boasts and intimidates detainees with threatening postures, referring to acts typical of organized crime, such as the statement, “it would have been easier to plant drugs on them.”
The same thing happened on June 10, 2022, to the detainees, who reported these same strategies of showing them drugs and mentioning Ayotzinapa as a criminal trophy of the state, reaffirming that “Ayotzinapa will be nothing compared to what will happen to you.”
WE DEMAND:
- Truth, justice, full reparation for damages, and measures to ensure non-repetition for the women and men community defenders of Eloxochitlán de Flores Magón; freedom for the 14 Mazatecs who have not returned home for a decade, and for the 56 criminalized individuals plus 200 unjust and illegal arrest warrants issued by this Mexican system of injustice.
- Absolute freedom for Renato Romero and Pascua Bermúdez and an end to the criminalization of water defense in the Cholulteca region.
- We demand that the Mexican State immediately and unconditionally release the five Tzetzales arbitrarily detained in San Juan Cancúc Chiapas.
- The immediate and unconditional release of Saúl Rosales, defender of the forest, his people, and the Matlalcuéyetl mountain.
- That the safety of journalists in Puebla and throughout Mexico be guaranteed; we repudiate the threats made by the Mexican State against journalists.
- The unconditional release of the defenders of the territory and water in Xochimilco who were arrested during the Morenista raid on members of the Otomí community and the National Assembly for Water and Life.
- Truth, justice, full reparation for damages, and measures to prevent recurrence for Estela Hernández Jiménez, a Ñhöñhö woman from Santiago Mexquititlán, Amealco Querétaro.
WE INVITE AND CALL FOR:
- Physical and remote accompaniment in whatever form, time, and territory you choose, to take action in our spaces through the legitimate exercise of organized protest with the forceful demands described in this communiqué, which may include alerts on official websites and platforms of peoples, collectives, and human rights organizations; letters to authorities; statements; rebellious art events; videos; gatherings at institutions of injustice; marches; and whatever else your righteous anger dictates until justice is served.
- We extend a cordial invitation to the hearing on September 2 in Boca del Río, Veracruz, to demand justice for the criminalized and persecuted Mazatecs of Eloxochitlán Flores Magón Oaxaca.
- We call for the accompaniment of Renato Romero and Pascual Bermúdez, water defenders in Xoxtla who have been criminalized by the servile bad government of the criminal company Concesiones Integrales / Agua de Puebla para Todos. This coming Monday, September 1, 2025, at the Federal Criminal Justice Center (Av. Libertad 6966, next to the San Miguel Puebla prison).
- Continue actions demanding the unconditional and immediate release of those detained and the closure of the cases brought against defenders of the land and water in Xochimilco during the Morena raid.
- Spread the word about the press conference for the release of the five compañeros of San Juan Cancúc, which will take place on September 3, 2025, at 10:00 a.m. at the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center.
- To permanently accompany the dignified search efforts of families throughout Mexico.
- To assist, accompany each other and unite in dignity through the actions called for by the National Assembly for Water and Life, as well as those called for by the National Indigenous Congress.
We call for the Sixth National Assembly for Water and Life, which will take place on October 18 and 19 in Loma de Bácum, Sonora.
We also call for your solidarity in the raffle that we, the peoples who make up the National Assembly for Water and Life, are holding in preparation for the Sixth National Assembly for Water, Life, and Territory.
Sources of information.
Pascual Bermúdez, water activist, faces federal charges.
Frayba case of 5 Tzetzales detained in San Juan Cancúc, Chiapas
CentroProdh in relation to the arbitrary detention of Saúl Rosales.
SINCERELY
Water and Territory Belong to the People, Not the State
NATIONAL ASSEMBLY FOR WATER AND LIFE