Date: Mon, 12 Jan 1998 01:56:36 -0600 (CST) From: Sendic Estrada Jimenez <sestrada-AT-fcfm.buap.mx> Subject: M-NEWS: E;AP,Mexican Army Closes in on Towns Sympathetic to Rebels,Jan 8 (fwd) ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Sat, 10 Jan 1998 11:11:57 -0600 (CST) From: Chiapas95 <owner-chiapas95-AT-eco.utexas.edu> Reply-To: Chiapas 95 Moderators <chiapas-AT-eco.utexas.edu> Subject: E;AP,Mexican Army Closes in on Towns Sympathetic to Rebels,Jan 8 This posting has been forwarded to you as a service of Accion Zapatista de Austin. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 8 Jan 1998 21:28:46 -0800 (PST) From: Tom Burghardt <tburghardt-AT-igc.apc.org> Reply-To: a-infos-d-AT-tao.ca Subject: (en) Mexican Army Closes in on Towns Sympathetic to Rebels ________________________________________________ A - I N F O S N E W S S E R V I C E http://www.ainfos.ca/ ________________________________________________ http://www.boston.com/dailynews/wirehtml/008/ ----- _________________________________________________________________ MEXICAN ARMY CLOSES IN ON TOWNS SYMPATHETIC TO REBELS _________________________________________________________________ By Trina Kleist, Associated Press 01/08/98 15:41 SIBACA, Mexico (AP) - Dozens of soldiers with automatic rifles swarmed into this Tzeltal Indian hamlet at the crack of dawn Thursday, entering homes in what they said was a search for weapons. About 150 terrified villagers fled two miles down the dirt road and set up a roadblock of logs at the turnoff from the highway as protection. About 50 soldiers formed a line alongside them. The villagers screamed at the soldiers in the Tzeltal language, and signaled them to leave. One woman grabbed the barrel of an automatic rifle and shouted at the soldier holding it, using a language he didn't understand. ``We don't want you to be here,'' she said. ``It would be better if you went back to your barracks. There's nothing bad here.'' The woman, like the other village women dressed in a traditional white robe, would not give her name. In Sibaca itself - a coffee-growing village in the hills - 14 Humvees and three personnel carriers were parked in front of the ruins of a 16th-century church. A plane flew overhead and three Mexican patrols walked through the village with guns drawn. Village leaders turned on a siren, calling residents to a meeting. Those who gathered asked an army official to explain what the soldiers were doing. ``We are here for your benefit. We are here to make sure that other armed groups don't come in,'' he said. A village leader, Nicolas Lopez Gomez, asked him: ``If you want to do social work here, why won't you tell the people what's going on?'' The officer, who refused to give his name, didn't respond. The army operation Thursday in this hamlet 40 miles northeast of San Cristobal de las Casas followed several similar sweeps in the southern state of Chiapas since Dec. 22, when pro- government gunmen massacred 45 peasants in the highlands hamlet of Acteal. Survivors of the slaughter have blamed paramilitary forces aligned with the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party. The villagers were said to have supported the rebels. The army has sent in at least 5,000 new soldiers to the southern state of Chiapas, in addition to the 35,000 who already were there. Soldiers have been stopping cars and going house to house to search for weapons. And they have been closing in on villages sympathetic to rebels of the Zapatista National Liberation Army - like Sibaca. Villagers are scared, and angry. ``They say the president wants a dialogue,'' said a woman at the roadblock who gave only her first name, Maria. ``He just wants war and to kill Indians.'' Soldiers in Chiapas say they are under orders not to speak to reporters, and Mexico's Defense Ministry did not respond to requests for comment. Officials have said soldiers are merely enforcing federal firearms laws. But one soldier at a roadblock admitted that the list of license plate numbers he was taking down had nothing to do with firearms laws. Some soldiers also are engaged in distributing food and medical care to needy refugees. But since the massacre, the soldiers also have entered areas sympathetic to the rebels; villagers accuse them of trying to crack down on the rebels in violation of peace accords. The firearms law ``is the pretext of the evil government for provoking war,'' a man named Carlos said Wednesday outside the village of Oventic. Disarmament suddenly became a key issue in the 4-year-old Zapatista rebellion after the massacre. Although government and military officials have vowed to enforce gun laws against all sides in the conflict, weapons searches primarily have been made in rebel-supporting villages. ``It's only a maneuver ... to distract public opinion from the massacre of Acteal, to provoke the Zapatista Army and renew armed confrontations,'' rebel leader Subcomandante Marcos wrote in a statement released Wednesday. On Saturday, about 150 soldiers were stationed outside La Realidad, a jungle village that the Zapatistas often have used for ceremonies. Terrified villagers already had packed up in preparation to move, but voted in a town meeting to stay. Villagers in Oventic - where rebel support runs high - fled when soldiers set up a roadblock a half-mile from town Tuesday. All returned later in the day when the roadblock was removed, but many still fear an imminent army incursion. And on Wednesday night, soldiers searched homes in the village of Morelia for the second time in a week - but found no weapons. 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