Why did the Zapatistas reject the governments counter-proposal on Indigenous Rights?
The Zapatistas stated that their “particular considerations” for rejecting the document were: “In Article 4, three central aspects of autonomy are nullified: 1) The capacity of the indigenous peoples for self-government. 2) The capacity to apply internal normative systems. 3) The collective access to the use and enjoyment of natural resources on their lands and territories. The Zapatistas also stated that the counter-proposal “reduces indigenous peoples to secondary status”; “is based upon an ethnocentric, discriminatory and racist conception;” and “reveals clearly an ignorance of indigenous peoples, of legal techniques, of the Constitution and of Mexican laws.” What is the “low-intensity war?” Low-intensity war refers to the Mexican government’s policy of militarization, repression and violence against the indigenous communities in Chiapas. The strategy employed by Federal Army troops is to build walls of hunger, isolation and fear in order to undermine the Zapatistas’ social base of
