Support for Mumia & Seattle protesters
Mexican students battle riot cops
By Andy
McInerney
In an inspirational show of international solidarity, on
Dec. 11 hundreds of Mexican students staged a militant
demonstration in front of the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City. The
youths demanded freedom for U.S. death-row political prisoner
Mumia Abu-Jamal and amnesty for protesters at the Seattle World
Trade Organization summit.
The 500 demonstrators were fresh from the barricades of the
eight-month strike at the National Autonomous University of
Mexico (UNAM). The students burned U.S. flags and pelted the
embassy with stones, breaking at least 18 windows and causing
$680,000 damage.
Riot police reportedly launched an attack on the students as
their protest was ending. The young people fought back in what
turned into a running battle with police.
By the end of the day, the Mexican daily newspaper La
Jornada reported that 98 students had been arrested and 10
wounded by the riot cops.
Retreating students pain ted the walls of the Zona Rosa
tourist district in Mexico City with slogans like "Death to the
evil government."
Almost 300,000 UNAM students launched a strike in April when
the university administration tried to impose restrictive
tuition at the UNAM, considered one of Latin America's most
prestigious universities. Although the administration backed
down from the tuition charges and the UNAM rector resigned, the
students are pressing for fundamental democratic reforms of the
university.
The Dec. 11 protest in Mexico City followed a week of
protest by activists in Seattle against the WTO. Police
arrested hundreds of anti-corporate demonstrators. Those
demonstrations essentially disrupted, for the time being, U.S.
imperialism's efforts to force its agenda on its imperialist
rivals as well as on the exploited nations. These protests were
watched with enthusiasm around the world.
The Mexico City demonstration also coincided with protests
in Philadelphia and other cities in the United States demanding
a new trial for Mumia Abu-Jamal. Abu-Jamal, a journalist and
former member of the Black Panther Party, was convicted of
killing a police officer in a trial his supporters charge was
marred by racism and political vendetta.
Abu-Jamal's case has received worldwide attention. Groups
around the world point to the hypocrisy of the U.S. government
posing as a defender of human rights while it railroads
political prisoners like Abu-Jamal.
The UNAM General Strike Council (CGH) condemned the attack
on the Dec. 11 demonstration and charged that the Mexican
government has sent provocateurs into the student
demonstration.
According to the Dec. 13 La Jornada, the CGH cancelled talks
with the government aimed at ending the strike until the
arrested students were released.
"This is the policy that we students, as well as all
Mexicans, face: with one hand [the authorities] offer talks,
with the other they strike, repress and jail," read a Dec. 11
CGH statement following the arrests.
The CGH also announced plans to stage a "megamarch" past the
U.S. Embassy on Dec. 16. In addition to calling for an end to
government repression and the release of the demonstrators, the
students will protest the U.S. government's policies toward
socialist Cuba.
This article is copyright under a Creative Commons License.
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