Memory, Truth, and Justice!
Original Peoples’ Communities
May 28, 2020
To the peoples of Mexico and the world
To the Media
Family members of disappeared detainees commemorate the International Week of Disappeared Detainees to invoke and to fight for memory, truth, and justice for those who were disappeared by the Mexican State. In Michoacán, original peoples have suffered at least 20 cases of forced disappearance, detention, and torture for defending their territory and natural resources and for fighting for a better world.
Between 1974 and 1976, five members of the Guzmán Cruz family: José Jesús, Guzmán Jiménez, and his children Amafer, Armando, Solón Adenauer y Venustiano Guzmán Cruz, social fighters originating from the P’urhèpecha community of Tarejero, in the Municipality of Zacapu, were detained and disappeared by the political police, the Federal Security Directorate (DFS) and the Mexican Army, for seeking to transform the conditions of inequality, exploitation, and poverty in which they lived.
Later, on April 20, 2010, Francisco de Asis Manuel, from the Nahua community of Ostula, social fighter, president of the Santa Maria Ostula Commission of Communal Lands, in the Municipality of Aquila, was detained and disappeared by an armed paramilitary group for defending the territory and autonomy of his community.
Today, as their families continue their tireless search for the disappeared, we respectfully accompany them in their pain, their dignity, their journey and their search for memory, truth, and justice.
For our disappeared, we continue resisting and fighting.
Committee of Relatives of Detained Persons Disappeared in Mexico Raising Voices [Alzando Voces]
National Indigenous Congress – Indigenous Governing Council
Supreme Indigenous Council of Michoacán