La Jornada
September 3, 2001
By Elio Henriquez

San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas -- The 15 minutes which Vicente Fox said would be enough for him to resolve the Chiapas conflict have dragged out now for nine months. The problem has not been resolved, and, on the contrary, the peace process has been plunged into one of its worst crises of the eight years of the armed uprising.

It was within this context that this Sunday, September 2, marked five years since the suspension of dialogue between the federal government and the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN). In the opinion of Governor Pablo Salazar Mendiguchía and the bishop of the local diocese, Felipe Arizmendi Esquivel, real conditions do not appear to be in place to reinitiate dialogue, but the mechanisms that will make it possible must be sought.

On the same subject, César Chávez, member of the Commission of Concordance and Peace (Cocopa), and Victor Manuel Martínez Bulle Goyri, the first examiner of the National Human Rights Commission (CNDH), emphasize that, despite the fact that negotiations have been suspended, there have not been any armed confrontations between the parties in conflict.

The Scenario

On September 2, 1996, the EZLN stated that it was suspending its participation in the dialogue at San Andrés and that it would return to the table when the government had satisfied the following conditions: First, the release of all assumed zapatista prisoners and support bases who had been detained in the North of Chiapas. Second, the naming of a government interlocutor with the capacity for decision-making, the political will for negotiation and respect for the zapatista delegation. Third, the establishment of a commission for the monitoring, verification and fulfillment of the accords reached at the indigenous rights and culture table.

Fourth, serious and concrete proposals for accords for the democracy and justice table, and commitments to achieve accords on this subject. Fifth, an end to the climate of military and police persecution and harassment against the chiapaneco indigenous and an end to the "white guards" (or a law which recognizes them institutionally and regulates them so they will not operate with impunity).

The "Signals"

Last December 2 - one day after Vicente Fox was inaugurated as President of Mexico - the rebel group decided to renew contacts with the federal government and reduced the conditions to the following three, now referred to as "signals":

One, the fulfillment of the San Andrés Accords, specifically, converting the legislative proposal drawn up by the Cocopa into law. Two, the release -of all zapatista prisoners in jails in Chiapas and in other states, and, three, the withdrawal of the Army from seven positions, among them Guadalupe Tepeyac, Río Euseba, Jalnachoj, Roberto Barrios, La Garrucha and Cuxuljá.

Nine months have gone by, but only the third condition has been met up to this point, and only the release of a dozen prisoners remains for the second signal to be met. But what has practically slammed the door on the process, and provoked suspension of the incipient contacts with the government - "through the commissioner, Luis H. Alvarez" - is the first signal. The indigenous reforms approved by the Congress of the Union in late April did not meet the expectations of the zapatistas, of the National Indigenous Congress or of other parts of the population. The process has not yet, however, been concluded.

One thousand eight hundred and twenty-five fays after the rebels' decision, four persons expressed their opinions, in separate interviews, about what has been gained and what lost during this five-year period.

Salazar Mendiguchía: "We have not achieved the peace we wanted, but the containment of the violent part of the war has been achieved. Wéve won that. The ideal would be that, during this period, we would be able to prevent the deterioration of community life."

He added: "Regrettably I do not see where we are going to pick up the thread for renewing dialogue. I hope that wéll all be able to use our imagination and find a formula that will allow the parties to return to the table."

The chiapaneco executive commented that "if dialogue had not been suspended, many deaths, conflicts and displacement of indigenous might, perhaps, have been saved," because, during that period and up until last December, "there was an absurd policy that tried to not only contain, but also to break up the communities. It confronted entire families, and, as a result of that counterinsurgency policy and of the fighting, we have the deaths at Acteal, at El Bosque, and hundreds of displaced."

Dialogue, he emphasized, is "key, and as long as it does not take place, there will be no final peace agreement, which is where we want to get to. That's why it is vital that we find the path to dialogue, which has been lost. At this moment, I don't have the way," he said.

"There Is Awareness That Arms Are Not the Answer"

Bishop Arizmendi, in turn, responded that much had been gained, insofar that "the learning that arms are not the solution to the conflict, and that the EZLN, the federal government and Mexican society have been convinced every day that that is not the path we all aspire to. Trust and credibility have been lost, but we also have to be creative in order to seek new mechanisms for dialogue. One has to admit, however, that, right now, it's difficult to reach agreement on what the patria, politics, the economy, democracy and society should be, because the positions of both parties are in almost complete conflict."

But what "we are all in agreement on is that poverty is inhuman, as well as marginalization being unjust and racism wrongful. In that the people need water, electricity, schools, security, justice, and we all have to work for that. Even though dialogue is suspended, we can work for what the people are asking: "basic services. In the communities, very few are talking to me about indigenous reforms. They're telling me, rather, that the price of coffee is very low, that therés not enough maize, that the land is producing less, that migration is increasing."

He said that right now "I don't see any prospects for dialogue, because we have lost trust and credibility. But what is important is to continue with security, which is what we have gained, that arms are not the path that Mexico wants, that we continue fighting through peaceful, legal means." That is why he stated, "the fact that military confrontations between the parties have not been revived is a good sign that we all want to move forward through other paths."

Sad, the Lack of Negotiations

Meanwhile, Martinez Bulle Goyri stated that "it's a great loss that there is no dialogue. It's obvious that many of the things that were hoped would be achieved quickly, like improvement in the peoples' real conditions, like rights for the communities being in effect, have been set back during these five years of absence of dialogue. That is the saddest."

He noted that the absence of negotiations for five years "is a reason for concern," since it means we have not been capable of making advances even while we are building a purportedly democratic country, with electoral processes recognized throughout the world, there has been intransigence and even apathy, on both sides."

At the current moment, he said, "I don't see any door open for reinitiating dialogue, and it seems as if both sides have lost the will for dialogue, like they don't know where to go to negotiate. I don't see the conditions or the political spaces, for that negotiating table."

Cesar Chávez: Potentiality of a Possible Agreement

A member of the first and the current Cocopa, César Chávez said: "It's important to have maintained the possibility of building an agreement through dialogue. There have been several benefits: In the first place, that the EZLN has held that conviction, as it demonstrated with the great march for constitutional reform so that the San Andrés Accords", signed on February 16, 1996, "could be put into effect."

"It's a positive attitude by a group which rose up in arms. That attitude is present, and that is a victory. And, on the government's part, we have gained by the fact that the temptation does not exist to resort to arms to resolve the problem, which could end up in genocide for the country. The most positive part is our having maintained that position."

On the other hand, he stated that "we must maintain the suspension of the arrest warrants (against EZLN leaders), so that we can have the constructive possibility for dialogue and negotiation."

Translated by irlandesa