Feature Archives

In this eleventh installment in the series “Hidden in Plain Sight” Peter M writes about Maureen Gosling. Gosling is a documentary filmmaker who worked for many years with Les Blank of Flower Films. On her own she made the award-winning film Blossoms of Fire, which deals with a community in the Mexican Isthmus were women play a special role. She is currently working on a film about fabric hand-dyed by women in Mali that is becoming a cultural phenomenon.

The Internationalist Platform for Resistance and Self-Initiative Weaving Autonomies (PIRATA) organized a brigade for the observation and documentation of the violation of the rights of native peoples in the municipality of Santiago Xanica, Oaxaca, México. The brigade traveled through the municipality from March 14 to March 21, 2011. The task that the International Brigade set for itself has been to listen, understand, relate, and make public what is happening in the community of Santiago Xanica.

On the morning of September 24th, FBI agents served grand jury subpoenas and raided the homes of several anti-war and social justice activists in Minnesota, Michigan and Illinois. The federal law cited in the search warrants prohibits, "providing material support or resources to designated foreign terrorist organizations." The Supreme Court recently rejected a free speech challenge to the material support law from humanitarian aid groups.

A protest took place in San Francisco on Tuesday, September 28th at the Federal Building at 7th St. and Mission St.

Ké Huelga Radio writes: Mexico is bleeding. Along with the so-called "war against drug-dealers" we see the whole Mexican territory turn olive green. The militarization is part of the global war driven by the United States, which began with the 9-11 events and created new enemies: terrorism and drug trafficking. Attuned with the Lords of the north, the Mexican government has launched its own war creating a police-ruled state and criminalizing social protest.

On April 27th, people believed to be paramilitaries affiliated with the ruling party of Oaxaca ambushed an international aid caravan en route to the autonomous town of San Juan Copala, Oaxaca. At least two people are reported dead. The caravan was carrying food, water, and other basic necessities to the town, which has been subject to a paramilitary blockade that has prevented anyone from entering or leaving the community since January.

On January 28, at around 9pm Andrea Caraballo, Guadalupe Rodriguez Lopez, James Wells and Jennifer Lawhorne were eating ice cream in the zocalo of Oaxaca. At that time, one of them recognized the face of the governor of Oaxaca who was about nine feet away. A friend of Brad Will took advantage of the governor’s presence to ask him about the case of Mr. Will, which to this day remains unresolved.

Bradley Roland Will, a journalist with New York City Indymedia, was shot and killed in October 2006 during the six-month long uprising in Oaxaca. His assailants are believed to be local officials with ties to the ruling political party.

On November 29th, Honduras held elections and the next day Porfirio Lobo was announced as the next president. On the day of the election, a picket was held at the Honduran Consulate in San Francisco; protesters described the elections as a sham organized by a government installed by a military coup. They demanded that there be, "no recognition of the coup regime and its election." Brazil, Argentina and Venezuela, have refused to recognize the vote, and the UN, EU and the Carter Center, had condemned the electoral process as illegitimate and refused to send observers. The US, Peru, Panama, Colombia, Costa Rica and Israel are the only nations to have publicly indicated recognition of the electoral process and future regime.