January 3-10, 1996: The National Indigenous Forum is held in San Cristóbal de las Casas. The Forum, called for by the EZLN and its advisors, as well as the Cocopa and the Conai, was devised so as to receive the opinions and thoughts from indigenous peoples and representatives all over Mexico whose decisions and proposals were to be taken up by the EZLN in the San Andrés talks. The Forum was attended by 24 comandantes of the EZLN, as well as nearly 500 representatives of over 30 indigenous groups from throughout the country.
February 16th, 1996: Following a prolonged consultation with the indigenous civilian bases of the EZLN, the Zapatistas and the federal government sign the first set of accords resulting from the Dialogue of San Andrés: 40 pages of national reforms to be undertaken regarding Indigenous Rights and Culture. But Comandante David warns: "This is only a small agreement, on paper. We will not be tricked into thinking that what has been signed is a peace agreement." Meanwhile, arrangements are made for the second major set of talks, dealing with Democracy and Justice, to begin in San Andrés on March 5th.
February 29th, 1996: The EZLN proposes that the participants in the National Indigenous Forum constitute themselves into a Permanent National Indigenous Forum (later to become the National Indigenous Congress).
March 4th, 1996: The EZLN announces its list of advisors for the talks on Democracy and Justice. The list includes more than 125 people and organizations, from Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas to former leaders of the PRI and the PAN parties; representatives of the national debtor's movement El Barzón; the government in rebellion of Tepoztlán, Morelos; independent union representatives; journalists; authors; intellectuals; and cultural groups. It quickly becomes clear that with closed-door talks on "the reform of the State" underway between the leaders of the PRD, PAN, and PRI in Mexico City--with no participation whatsoever from civil society--the Zapatistas are attempting to use the talks on Democracy and Justice to broaden the negotiations on national political reforms to include substantial input from Mexican civil society.
March 21, 1996: The negotiations on the issue of Democracy and Justice finally begin in San Andrés Sacamch'en de los Pobres. The dialogue quickly becomes a monologue, however, as the government's representatives refuse to discuss any of the EZLN's proposals; in fact, they seldom utter a single word. To the press, however, they insist that they are only interested in resolving local issues of "democracy and justice", not national reforms. The talks are further marred by increasing repression against indigenous and campesino groups in Chiapas; whenever the negotiations seem to be on the verge of moving forward the police respond with attacks, detentions and arrests.
April 4-8, 1996: The First Continental Encounter for Humanity and Against Neoliberalism is held in the Zapatista Aguascalientes of La Realidad.
May 2nd, 1996: A judge in Tuxtla Gutiérrez finds journalist Javier Elorriaga and Tzeltal campesino Sebastián Entzin guilty of "terrorism" for supposedly belonging to the EZLN, and sentences them to 13 years and 6 years in prison, respectively. This provokes a severe crisis in the already strained dialogue, and on May 11th the EZLN declares a "red alert" among its troops.
May 5, 1996: The PRI affiliated paramilitary group, los Chinchulines, in Bachajon, municipality of Chilon, attack homes of opposition members and the local parish. They burn down houses and several people are killed. Families take refuge in the surrounding hills.
June 6th, 1996: An appellate court revokes the sentences against Elorriaga and Entzin, and releases them. The EZLN responds by standing down from its state of alert.
June 15, 1996: Paz y Justicia, a paramilitary group linked to the PRI in the Northern Zone of the state attacks Zapatista base communities, burning down entire villages and creating more than 2,000 internal refugees.
June 28th, 1996: On the one-year anniversary of the massacre of more than a dozen campesinos in Aguas Blancas, Guerrero by judicial police, a previously-unknown armed group identifying itself as the Popular Revolutionary Army (EPR) makes a dramatic appearance at the events commemorating the killings.
June 30th, 1996: The Special Forum on the Reform of the State, sponsored by the EZLN, begins in San Cristóbal de las Casas. The Forum is organized in a similar manner to the National Indigenous Forum of January, in the way that it attempts to open up the San Andrés talks on Democracy and Justice to otherwise excluded representatives of Civil Society.
July 27th, 1996: The First Intercontinental Encounter for Humanity and Against Neoliberalism begins in the Zapatista Aguascalientes of Oventic, Chiapas, with the participation of nearly 5000 people from 42 countries. Over the course of the following week, the participants hold meetings and discussions on a variety of political, economic, and social issues relating to the global struggle against neoliberalism in all five of the Aguascalientes.
August 6th, 1996: The final plenary session of the talks on Democracy and Justice begin in San Andrés, with only minimal participation from the government's representatives.
August 12th, 1996: The plenary session on Democracy and Justice ends with no agreement between the parts. The government attempts to close the negotiations on the theme, and move on to a new set of talks on other issues. This is firmly rejected by the EZLN.
August 29th, 1996: The EZLN, following a process of consultation with its civilian bases, suspends its participation in the peace talks of San Andrés. In a communiqué published on September 2nd, the EZLN lays out the five "minimum conditions" which it insists must be fulfilled before the EZLN will return to the negotiating table:
- Liberation of all the presumed-Zapatista prisoners across the country, and of the members of the EZLN's civilian base being held in the Cerro Hueco prison in Chiapas.
- The appointment of a government negotiating team with decision-making capacity, political will to negotiate, and respect for the Zapatista delegation.
- Installation of the Implementation and Verification Commission for the San Andres accords, and the immediate fulfillment of the agreements already signed between the EZLN and the government on Indigenous Rights and Culture.
- Serious and concrete proposals on the part of the government for the negotiations on Democracy and Justice, as well as the commitment to reach an accord on this topic.
- An end to the climate of military and police persecution and harassment against the indigenous communities of Chiapas, as well as the disappearance of paramilitary groups (or the promulgation of a law which officially recognizes them and gives them uniforms so they do not operate with impunity).
October 9th, 1996: The EZLN announces that Comandante Ramona will be the Zapatista representative at the meeting of the Permanent National Indigenous Congress, beginning in Mexico City the next day. She is the first Zapatista to appear publicly outside of Chiapas.
November 7th, 1996: After a serious of "tripartite" talks between the EZLN, the Cocopa, and the Conai, the Implementation and Verification Commission (Cosever) for the San Andrés Accords is finally installed in San Cristóbal de las Casas, with representation of the EZLN, the federal government, and civil society. Around this time, violence towards NGOs working for peace in Chiapas is stepped up. CONPAZ offices are vandalized and firebombed, their accountant and his family are abducted and held for two days, and members of various NGOs receive death threats.
November 24-29, 1996: The Cocopa, Conai, and EZLN continue meeting in San Cristóbal in order to work out a legislative initiative of constitutional reforms for the implementation of the San Andrés Accords on Indigenous Rights and Culture. The Cocopa is given the authority by both the government and the EZLN to draft the final proposal, to which each side will have the opportunity to respond with a simple "yes" or "no"- without any further observations or corrections on the document.
November 29th, 1996: The Cocopa presents its "final" proposal of constitutional reforms on Indigenous Rights and Culture to the EZLN delegation, and faxes a copy to the Interior Minister, Emilio Chuayffet. While signaling that the Cocopa's proposal skips over many points of the San Andrés Accords, the EZLN accepts it in order to begin the implementation of the Accords and to move closer to a reinitiation of peace talks. The government also signals its acceptance in a private meeting with the Cocopa.
December 5th, 1996: The Interior Ministry backtracks on its original decision, and meets with the Cocopa to inform them that it no longer supports their proposal. This decision unleashes the beginning of the most profound crisis to date in the peace process, and leads many to comment that the Zapatistas' original warning about the peace process may be coming true--that the federal government is prepared to sign everything, but with no intention of actually carrying out anything.
December 7th, 1996: The Cocopa meets with President Zedillo to request that he intervene and accept the document before the entire peace process falls apart. The President decides to temporarily withdraw the comments of the Interior Ministry, and writes a letter to the EZLN requesting a 15-day period with which to "examine" the Cocopa's proposal with his constitutional advisors and to "clear up any doubts" he might have on the matter. The EZLN delegation accepts the Executive's request for an time extension, and on December 15th leaves San Cristóbal to return to their communities in the jungle and highlands.
December 19th, 1996: The Cocopa receives the President's "response" to their proposal, and passes it along to the EZLN. The response is, in reality, a counterproposal (and not a simple "yes" or "no", which had previously been agreed upon), with 27 observations and changes to the original document.
Originally written by Joshua Paulson for the FZLN.
