After years of calm, Mexico's Zapatista rebels are stirring again in a conflict that President Vicente Fox has failed to end despite a promise to solve it “in 15 minutes.“
Rights workers today accused the army of provoking the guerrillas, led by the elusive, ski-masked Subcomandante Marcos, into putting its forces on a “red alert” this week.
The Zapatistas announced yesterday they were grouping fighters in bases, suspending their radio station and pulling political officers out of villages in the state of Chiapas.
The last similar alert was in 1997 when paramilitaries massacred 45 pro-Zapatista villagers in Acteal but the rebels did not give a reason this time around.
The Fray Bartolome de las Casas human rights group said it was likely a response to military moves in the area in recent weeks which it described as “a tactical repositioning in a war campaign.“
Residents said drug raids by almost 200 soldiers last week in Zapatista-held land could also have upset the rebels. The Defense Ministry said troops destroyed 44 marijuana plantations in 3 municipalities run by the guerrillas.
The rebels shocked Mexico and the world when they emerged unexpectedly out of the jungle on New Year's Day, 1994, with an armed campaign to claim Indian rights.