Oregonians caught up in Oaxaca violence

Travel to the Mexican state with Oregon ties is cut off, stranding a Portland medical team

Wednesday, November 01, 2006
JAMES MAYER and DANA TIMS
The Oregonian

Violence in the Mexican state of Oaxaca has stranded an Oregon medical
team there and sparked a rally Tuesday in downtown Portland as
Oregonians worried about friends and family members caught in the
chaos.

"Our greatest concern right now is disappearances rather than outright
killings," said Ann Miller, 54, a successful Oregon artist who has
lived in Oaxaca for the last 16 years. She tried to return to the area
Monday after a month in Portland, but her flight was canceled when the
military closed the airport there.

Trying to quell protests, the Mexican army stopped many airline flights
and bus routes this week, affecting Oregonians working, vacationing or
attending school in Oaxaca. Travel and document restrictions were also
affecting Oaxacans, who make up a large part of the Northwest's migrant
labor force. Two killings over the weekend prompted U.S. Ambassador
Tony Garza to issue a warning against travel to Oaxaca.

The unrest forced a Portland-based Northwest Medical Teams unit to
hunker down in a motel for the past day or so, said Brenda Porter, the
agency's international team coordinator for Latin America. The
nine-member team -- led by Cecelia Barry, a community education
coordinator for Portland Community College -- was scheduled to stay for
another week but is now trying to return to Portland on Saturday.

Even so, Porter said, team members reported that they were not in
danger and that news reports of widespread violence in the city may be
overblown.

"We've pretty much instructed them to stay away from any barricades and
to exercise extra caution," she said. "But they've never felt unsafe.
As long as they don't go out at night and always move around in groups,
it appears that they'll be fine."

Northwest Medical Teams sends units to Oaxaca every other week or so to
tackle projects such as installing latrines, drinking water systems and
other municipal projects in poverty-ridden villages near the city. The
next team to Oaxaca is slated to leave from Portland on Dec. 2 with a
mission to distribute Christmas gifts and food baskets.

"The unrest has definitely affected our volunteers and some have
elected not to go because they don't feel personally safe," Porter
said. "That's understandable, of course. But none of this is changing
our mission there."

Tensions remained high Tuesday as protesters in Oaxaca regrouped,
rebuilding some of the barricades torn down by federal troops only a
day earlier, according to the Associated Press. At least one federal
official said Oaxaca City, racked by five months of paralyzing strikes,
remained outside government control.

Federal police held the central square, or Zocalo, but schools and most
businesses remained closed.

Demonstrators who flocked to the capital city of 275,000 are demanding
the resignation of Gov. Ulises Ruiz, whom they accuse of oppressing
dissent and rigging the 2004 elections. Many residents, including
several thousand who marched in protest Tuesday, just want to return to
life as it was before the strikes began in May.

Mexico's Congress has joined the calls for Ruiz to step down, passing a
nonbinding resolution to that effect. Although striking teachers had
promised to go back to work Monday, only about 4,000 of the state's
13,000 schools had opened as of Tuesday, none in the capital.

A large number of Oregon's migrant workers come from Oaxaca. Felipe
Gonzalez, a Oaxacan who moved to Oregon in 1991, said more unrest could
impair the ability of workers -- both legal and illegal -- to come
north if it continues to drag down the area's economy.

"This is really taking a toll on everyone there, especially the poor,
who often have very few options even in the best times," Gonzalez said.
"It's tragic for everyone involved."

Gonzalez stays in touch with his relatives in Oaxaca through weekly
telephone calls. The younger members of his family haven't been able to
attend school for months due to ongoing strikes, he said.

"What needs to happen is that the governor needs to resign," Gonzalez
said. "If he does that, this can all end peacefully. If he doesn't,
it's going to come out very badly."

About 75 people attended a rally at the Mexican Consulate in Portland
on Tuesday afternoon to protest government treatment of Oaxacan
dissenters, including several killings attributed to paramilitary
forces.

"There's a lot of admiration for what's been going on in Oaxaca," said
Dan Denvir of the Portland Central American Solidarity Committee, a
rally organizer.

"A lot of people here have been there and met people involved in the
movement."

He said many Portland activists knew Brad Will, an independent
journalist who was shot and killed Friday.

Before the rally got under way, a man and a woman were arrested about 3
p.m. when they shattered the glass door of the consulate and chained
themselves to the door with bike locks. Portland police Commander Mike
Reese said the pair were arrested on a criminal mischief charge.

During the rally, Doug Sherman, a retired Portland high school teacher,
read an e-mail he received Sunday from his 23-year-old daughter, Kate,
who has been studying in Oaxaca for about a month. She wrote that she
could see helicopters flying high and low over the city and that she
was outraged by the killing of a 12-year-old child.

Sherman said he worried about his daughter. But he said that the
tensions in the city seemed to come and go and that it was calm at
times. "She understands the dangers," he said.

James Mayer: 503-294-4109; jimmayer@news.oregonian.com

©2006The Oregonian