Dear Dionne and Denise,
We hope in this pandemic, you and your families are in good health and in good spirts.
When we found out about the terrible murder of George Floyd, and the protest movements against homicidal and racist violence by American police, we thought a lot about you. We thought about “BLACK LIVES MATTER”, the fight for your sons and daughters, justice and the rights of the African American community and how you visited us in the Nahua community of San Juan Volador in the south of Veracruz, Mexico where we organized as women of the National Indigenous Congress (CNI) in late July of last year.
We want you to know that our hearts are with you in this great fight against racism, patriarcal power, classism, and all forms of imperialism. We are also against those who believe they are the owners of this world, who violate civil rights, women’s rights and peoples’ rights.
In Mexico, we are also suffering from an onslaught of police violence; On May 4 of this year, in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and under the pretext of not wearing a face mask on the street, young Giovanni López was illegally detained, tortured, and killed by Jalisco state police; and on June 5, 16-year-old Melanie was kicked in the face by police officers in a protest against the murder of Giovanni in Mexico City. In addition to the long history of the Mexican police and army using excessive force and violating human rights, it is also a usual practice to torture, kill women, and carry out forced disappearances.
In addition to the above, the Mexican government is exploiting these times of the pandemic to impose the militarization of the country in a completely undemocratic way and its megaprojects of death such as the Mayan Train and the Inter-Oceanic Corridor, which seek to dispossess our indigenous territories and destroy us as a people.
We recognize ourselves as people of all colors of the Earth. The Earth does not belong to us. We, people of all kinds, belong to Mother Earth.
From our territories we join you, and we continue to fight for the Black Lives Matter movement together with the fight against patriarchal, capitalist and racist systems.
We will always have you in our hearts!
We send a strong collective hug to you both, your families and all your sisters and brothers.
BLACK LIVES MATTER!
Never again a Mexico without us!
No to the Maya Train! No to the Inter-Oceanic Corridor! #ElIstmoEsNuestro
WOMEN’S GROUP OF THE INDIGENOUS GOVERNMENT COUNCIL
NATIONAL INDIGENOUS CONGRESS (CNI)
This is a translation from the National Indigenous Congress and Indigenous Government Council and can be found in Spanish here.