Solidarity with the resistance against corporate windfarm in Oaxaca, Mexico

Oaxacan Wind Farm. Photo Noticias de Oaxaca

The Indigenous Peoples’ Assembly of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec in Defence of the Land and Territory (APIIDTT) is calling for Indigenous Peoples and the international community at large to stand with the Zapotec Communities in Mexico who are resisting a new corporate wind farm on their land.

For more on this story, please see these recent articles on Upside Down World and The Huffington Post.

Urgent Communication

TO NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL MEANS OF COMMUNICATION
TO THE INDIGENOUS COMMUNITIES
TO THE POPULATION IN GENERAL

On the 31st of October and the 1st of November, members of the Oaxaca state police, the auxiliary police and plain clothes individuals on motorcycles escorted the workers and bosses of the wind power companies that are trying to find a way through the village of Álvaro Obregón, to enter Barra Santa Teresa and begin construction work for their project.

The wind power project has been rejected countless times since its inception by the inhabitants and fishermen of San Dioniso del Mar and Juchitán, who inhabit the lagoon system of Laguna Superior, where the Barra Santa Teresa is located, and where they undertake their principal productive and ritual activities. Furthermore, the lagoon system contains a fragile mangrove ecosystem and is the habitat for a great quantity of aquatic species, birds and mammals.

With these actions, the Oaxaca state governor has made clear that he acts for the benefit of foreign businesses, handing over the communal territories for foreign exploitation instead of contributing to the protection due to their biological and cultural importance, not only for the communities of the Isthmus, but for the whole state. Cue Monteagudo continues to disrespect the decisions and demands of the inhabitants and tenants of the Tehuantepec Isthmus, responding with bullets and arrests. Yesterday, the 1st of November, the village tenants of Álvaro Obgregón mounted a blockade to prevent further expansion of the wind power project. In response, at about 8.30 on the morning of the 2nd, a group of state police, auxiliaries and private employees of the company Mareña Renovables violently cleared the fishermen and tenants (Zapotecs) from Álvaro Obregón. They fired bullets and discharged pepper spray at women, youth and old people, beating several of those present, including pregnant women. The police detained 9 people, among these 2 women, without giving any information about the charges or where the prisoners would be taken. The names of the detainees are:

We request from all organisations, supporters, communities, journalists and authorities their solidarity in the spreading of this information and the demand that the Oaxaca state authorities and the company Mareña Renovables liberate immediately the detainees and that they respect the decisions of the indigenous community of the Tehuantepec Isthmus against the construction of the windpower project in their territory, due to the likelihood of ecocide and ethnicide in the area.

NO WINDPOWER PROJECT ON THE TEHUANTEPEC ISTHMUS

IMMEDIATE LIBERATION OF THE DETAINED

STOP THE INTIMIDATION, HOSTILITY AND VIOLENCE GENERATED BY THE WIND POWER PROJECT ON THE TEHUANTEPEC ISTHMUS

ASSEMBLY OF THE INDIGENOUS PEOPLE OF THE ISTHMUS IN DEFENCE OF THE EARTH AND THE TERRITORY

Indigenous Peoples’ Assembly of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec in Defence of the Land and Territory