"The Displaced Campesinos of Nicolas Ruiz", 10 Aug 2018

[P]eople of Nicolas Ruiz—a remote farming village in Chiapas...—have gathered to demand land, reparations, and justice for crimes committed against them. As Tzotzil-speaking indigenous Mayans, they are but one of many groups of Chiapas’ “dezplazados” (displaced) who’ve been forced over the years to leave their home following threats and invasions by armed intruders...A group of roughly 800 heavily armed men with close ties to local ranchers came to their village on that dark day, firing automatic weapons into the sky and setting the surrounding fields ablaze with gasoline, eventually catching several houses on fire...Now..they’re demanding that the government...provide reparations in the form of a new...land...free from...violence;... a roof to stay under and a school... [T]he Mexican government in June 2018 opened the doors to privatize Chiapas’ water supply, forcing indigenous residents to “grant concessions to private companies.” To many campesinos, ...true nature [of these actions are]: corporate thievery of land and resources, promoted and facilitated by the mal gobierno. Land, and all the resources within it—whether sought out by transnational corporations or contested on the intercommunal level—thus lies at the center of nearly all of Chiapas’ continuing conflicts... Nicolas Ruiz’s residents...have received continued death threats even after having been displaced...