The Indigenous Rights Centre in Chiapas has campaigned actively against the Mayan Train project and the building of a road between San Cristobal and Palenque due to the negative environmental impacts both these projects would have. Due to their activism, the members of the organisation have been publicly defamed, stigmatised and intimidated. On 8th June 2019, local authorities labelled the Indigenous Rights Centre, along with Jose Javier Avilés Arriola and the Life and Territory Defense Movement (MODEVITE) as being “against the development and progress of communities in the region”, spreading these defamatory statements on social media.