War against the people “is developed and systematized” starting with the presidency: Third National Assembly for Water and Life

Desinformémonos | Mexico City

“The war that the peoples, communities, neighborhoods, colonies, tribes and nations throughout the national territory are facing is being developed and systematized by Andrés Manuel López Obrador, “Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces” and head of the federal executive, to guarantee and safeguard the interests of big capital and the narco-State,” concluded the Third National Assembly for Water and Life, which took place on August 12 and 23 in San Gregorio Atlapulco.

The more than 800 inhabitants of different indigenous communities, collectives and activists who participated in the assembly denounced that in order to implement the “war of extermination” against the peoples, the federal government “is militarizing the entire country, as a means to impose its mega-projects of death such as the Mayan Train, the Inter-Oceanic Corridor, the Morelos Integral Project and the Santa Lucia International Airport, which, based on colonialism, patriarchy, homogenization, imposition, hate and fear, seek to order and reorder our territory.”

They added that organized crime and paramilitary groups “systematically collaborate with the armed forces, the National Guard and the state and municipal police,” in such a way that they are “co-dependent components, muscles and ligaments of the armed wing of the Capitalist Narco-State.”

The peoples of the Assembly assured that in spite of the government’s onslaught they continue with the coordination of resistance and organization to confront the violence, for which they announced coordinated activities such as a National Campaign against the War and for Life, the mobilization to demand a halt to the war against the Zapatista communities and the peoples of Mexico on October 12, and a demonstration on September 25 against the National Water Commission (Conagua) for being “the principal responsible for the institutionalization and instrumentation of the plundering of water.”

The following is the complete communiqué:

To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Sixth Commission of the EZLN
To the National Indigenous Congress
To the Indigenous Council of Government
To Ma. de Jesús Patricio Martínez, Spokesperson of the CNI-CIG
To the Peoples of the World who resist the Capitalist and Patriarchal System
To the Original Peoples, Tribes, Nations, Communities and Neighborhoods that have never been conquered
To the Peoples who struggle and resist in the Anáhuac River Basin
To the Afro-descendant and native peoples of Abya Yala
To the Insubmissive, Dignified and Rebellious Europe
To the National and International Sexta
To the Networks of Resistance and Rebellion
To those who signed the Declaration for Life
To all the people of the world who fight against capitalism
To the free, independent, alternative media, or whatever they are called…

Brothers and Sisters All.

Welcome to the House of Indigenous Peoples and Communities “Samir Flores Soberanes.”

We, the undersigned, 834 participants in the Third National Assembly for Water and Life, which took place on August 12 and 13 in the Original Town of San Gregorio Atlapulco, Xochimilco, CDMX; all from 209 organizations, collectives, networks, original peoples and indigenous resident communities, free media and individuals. We can also report that 21 states of the Mexican Republic, among them: Baja California Norte, Chiapas, Mexico City, Durango, State of Mexico, Guanajuato, Guerrero, Hidalgo, Jalisco, Michoacán, Morelos, Nayarit, Nuevo León, Oaxaca, Puebla, Querétaro, Quintana Roo, San Luis Potosí, Sonora, Tlaxcala, Veracruz and the attendance and participation of 9 countries of the world: Germany, Argentina, Costa Rica, United States of America, El Salvador, Spain, France, Japan and Italy; we convened in six work tables to discuss, analyze, reflect and agree on actions in defense of Water and Life and against the war on the Zapatista peoples.

For the above reasons and based on the 7 Zapatista Principles of Leading by Obeying, from San Gregorio Atlapulco, Xochimilco…

We Declare:

First. That the peoples, neighborhoods, tribes, nations, communities, organizations, collectives, men and women who struggle and resist against the capitalist and patriarchal system and for the defense of water, territory, Mother Earth and the autonomy of our peoples, denounce the war of extermination that is being carried out in our territories. Especially that which is being carried out against the Zapatista Peoples. This war is imposed with Exploitation, Dispossession, Repression and Contempt; that is to say, it rides on the 4 wheels of capitalism. As defenders of water and life, we denounce this system of destruction and death.

Second. That the war faced by the peoples, communities, neighborhoods, colonies, tribes and nations throughout the national territory, is developed and systematized by Andrés Manuel López Obrador, “Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces” and head of the Federal Executive, to guarantee and safeguard the interests of big capital and the narco-State; Furthermore, he is militarizing the entire country, as a guarantee to impose his mega projects of death such as the Mayan Train, the Inter-Oceanic Corridor, the Morelos Integral Project and the Santa Lucia International Airport, which, based on colonialism, patriarchy, homogenization, imposition, hatred and fear, intend to order and reorder our territory. Therefore we denounce that organized crime and paramilitary groups systematically collaborate with the armed forces, the National Guard and the state and municipal police, to the point that we can no longer understand them as distinct phenomena, but as co-dependent parts, muscles and ligaments of the armed wing of the Capitalist Narco-State.

Third. That those of us who organize for the life and autonomy of our peoples, denounce that the multiple heads of the capitalist hydra manifest themselves in our territory in the following manner:

a) The weapons used to impose the plunder of water are manipulation, fear, division, privatization, commercialization, municipalization and remunicipalization, concessions that favor private companies and industry, the co-optation of community water committees, and territorial reordering plans and programs. 

b) The looting is legitimized by complicit academic actors and experts who use concepts such as “agroecology”, “environmental conservation”, “sustainable development”, “green technologies”, and “climate justice” so that the powerful do not get angry and provide funding through NGOs and economic incentives that fragment and divide communities. 

c) In the original peoples of the Basin of the Valley of Mexico, such as Xochimilco, Tláhuac, Milpa Alta, Iztacalco, Coyoacán and many more, we face a process of territorial extermination. The women of these towns are invaded and devastated by mega-urban, housing and commercial complexes that steal our water, quintupling our working hours, destroying our knowledge and taking away our autonomy, provoking greater sexual and economic violence against us until it reaches a deplorable rise in femicides against women of peasant origin, however, thanks to the women who struggle and resist, our ancestral feminisms are rising up. 

d) In Zapatista territory the violence exercised by paramilitary groups such as the Organization of Coffee Growers of Ocosingo (ORCAO), the invasion of government programs for destruction and community division such as “Sembrando Vida” have generated a climate of violence, forced displacement of families and entire communities Zapatista Support Bases, the imprisonment of Manuel Gómez Vázquez and the attempted murder of comrade Jorge López Santiz, which keeps all the Zapatista caracoles on alert.   

e) In the community of Santa María Ostula, municipality of Aquila, Michoacán, our compañero Lorenzo Froylán de la Cruz Ríos, a member of the Communal Guard, was disappeared on August 1 of this year. His lifeless body with evidence of torture was found 9 days later. The perpetrators, who enjoy the impunity and complicity of the state and state governments, are: The members of the Jalisco Cartel New Generation, and the narco-government of Michoacan, headed by the governor, Alfredo Ramirez Bedolla, who has just announced, that “The Communal Guard of Ostula, is outlawed.” This represents a new blow of repression; furthermore, it adds an eviction order by the Unitary Agrarian Tribunal 38, in addition to requesting the presence of the Navy in the autonomous territory of Santa María Ostula, while qualifying the Communal Guard as illegal.

We know from all this that the State is the main actor that promotes dispossession and instrumentalizes the war, this war that we are living against life in all territories, which manifests itself with hundreds of thousands of political prisoners and militarization, persecution of territorial defenders, disappearances, assassinations, femicides, transfeminicides and a multiplicity of hate crimes against the LGBTQ+ community.

Fourth. That the native peoples and indigenous communities belonging to the National Indigenous Congress-Indigenous Council of Government, CNI-CIG; as well as the organizations, networks, collectivities and individuals who participated in the first, second and third National Assembly for Water and Life…

WE DEMAND

• Stop the War against the Zapatista Peoples and Communities and against all the native peoples and indigenous communities of Mexico.
• Stop State repression and drug trafficking crimes directed against the Nahua people of Santa María Ostula. We strongly condemn the disappearance and subsequent murder of our comrade Lorenzo Froylán de la Cruz Ríos, whom we bid farewell with great sadness.
• That the government of the State of Michoacán and the federal government stop the criminalization campaign against the Ostula Communal Guard. 
• Stop the gender violence faced by the women of the native peoples of Xochimilco by the Mayor’s Office for defending their rights, their territory, and their natural resources. To the women traditional authorities of San Gregorio Atlapulco, of the community cemetery, as well as the women of the only Autonomous Council of Government in Xochimilco who have defamed us through social networks, physically beaten us, hurt us socially and psychologically, with death threats, inciting lynching.
• We demand a halt to the criminal proceedings against Patricia González Guzmán, President of the Pro-pantheon Committee of San Gregorio Atlapulco and we demand an end to the dispossession of the water, land and territory of all the original peoples of the Anáhuac basin.
• That the wastewater that reaches the town of San Gregorio Atlapulco from the mountain towns belonging to the Milpa Alta municipality, we demand that the authorities (local, central and federal) install treatment plants in these towns instead of spilling it without any treatment in the community of Atlapulco, in consideration of their right to health.
• We demand the restoration and protection of the natural water cycle in the Tláhuac-Xochimilco, Milpa Alta-Chalco micro-basin region and respect for the original ecosystem. We demand an end to the clientelist and violent invasions of our ancestral territories, under the control of political parties, municipal governments and the misnamed “agrarian authorities.”
• An end to the physical and psychological repression of women, children and senior citizens of the community of Calpulalpan, Tlaxcala, who were repressed in May 2023 for defending water. We also demand the release of fellow land defenders Raymundo Cahuatzi Meléndez and Saúl Rosales Meléndez from the community of San Pedro Tlalcuapan Tlaxcala, as well as a halt to the water law initiative in Tlaxcala. 
• Stop the systematic violence in Querétaro by the Mexican state against those who defend water, springs and territory (mostly ejidos), as in the case of the community of Escolásticas, who were brutally repressed on June 13. We denounce the intensification of violence since the approval of the law that concessions water services in Querétaro. We demand its repeal or elimination.

Fifth. That the native peoples and indigenous communities of the CNI-CIG, articulated with other collectivities, organizations, networks and individuals, gathered in the Third National Assembly for Water and Life, agree to the following:

COORDINATED ACTIONS

• The Fourth National Assembly for Water and Life will take place in the communities that defend the territory in Tlaxcala between the months of February and March 2024.
• Monday, September 25, 2023, we call for a demonstration against the National Water Commission, both in its central offices in the CDMX, as well as in each of its local, state or municipal offices in each state, articulating the struggle. We call on all citizens to demonstrate that CONAGUA is the entity principally responsible for the institutionalization and instrumentation of the dispossession of water in our territories.
• Thursday, October 12, 2023, the National Assembly for Water and Life, calls for the participation in the national mobilization against the war faced by the Zapatista Peoples, Indigenous communities and all the peoples of Mexico, and we call to join the actions called by the National Indigenous Congress, CNI-CIG.
• We announce face-to-face and virtual discussion forums that will follow up on the work tables that were developed in the National Assembly for Water and Life. 
• We announce a “National Campaign against the War and for Life”, which will include the following activities: Forums, Meetings, Workshops, Mass Media Dissemination of the war faced by the Zapatista peoples and indigenous communities; likewise, we invite you to join this Campaign with art, resistance and rebellion. 
• On November 17, December 31 and January 1. We make our own the celebration of the 40th Anniversary of the founding of the EZLN, and the 30th Anniversary of the Zapatista Uprising. For this, we will join and call for political acts and dislocated actions in all possible territories, inside and outside the country. We call for the coordination of these actions.
• On March 8, we agreed to disseminate and join the actions of the International Day of Women who struggle and resist against the capitalist and patriarchal system. The objective is to make visible the struggle of women against violence and feminicide, as well as the defense of water, territory, Mother Earth and life.
• On March 22, 2024, in the context of International Day of Water, we will call for a large demonstration and dislocated actions against the dispossession and plundering of water in our territories.

Finally, and as a result of the agreements reached at the Third National Assembly for Water and Life, we, the peoples, communities, organizations, collectivities and individuals, ratify that we will continue to exercise and strengthen our right to self-determination; which is the path to autonomy. Resistance and rebellion are the tools to recover our history, our territory, our mother earth and life; as peoples we will take back our cosmovision and spirituality that has been stolen from us and we also affirm that We Will Not Surrender, We Will Not Sell Out, and We Will Not Give In.

ATTENTIVELY

For the Integral Reconstitution of our Peoples

Never Again a Mexico Without Us

Stop the War against the Zapatista Peoples

Zapata Lives, the Struggle Continues

Samir Lives, the Struggle Continues

Lorenzo Lives, the Struggle Continues

Long Live the EZLN

Long Live the CNI-CIG

Until Dignity and Justice becomes customary

Because Alive They Took Them, Alive We Want Them Back

No to the Mayan Train

No to the Morelos Integral Project

No to the Interoceanic Corridor

No to the Santa Lucia Airport

Our dreams do not fit in their ballot boxes,
neither do our nightmares and neither do our dead.

Here we are, and here we will be

The coming together of droplets creates a river

Water is not for sale, it is loved and defended

THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY FOR WATER AND FOR LIFE

Original text published in Desinformemonos, August 16, 2023. https://desinformemonos.org/guerra-contra-los-pueblos-es-desarrollada-y-sistematizada-desde-presidencia-tercera-asamblea-nacional-por-el-agua-y-la-vida/
English translation by Schools for Chiapas.