Currently, I chair the Witness for Peace Mid-Atlantic region's steering committee. At our November 2006, meeting the national director, Melinda St. Louis, asked if anyone would join her on a delegation to Oaxaca. Having been born in Mexico City, I couldn't say no when so many people were calling for witnesses to the state's oppression of a basically nonviolent movement.

Villa, (whose real name I am not using to protect him from possible retaliation for working with us) a teacher who had worked in the United States, hosted some of our delegation at his home in Oaxaca. Over a cup of hot chocolate and bread, he explained that for the past 26 years the teachers of Oaxaca have gone on strike annually for decent wages.

The roots of the situation go back to the 1980s when the educational and social budgets for Mexico were cut because of the Structural Adjustment Plan demanded by the United States. SAP imposed economic cuts on indebted countries like Mexico as conditions for loans.

Then came the North American Free Trade Agreement, which hit southern Mexico hardest by wiping out subsistence farming, especially corn. Mexico now imports over one third of its corn from the United States (our taxes go towards more than $10 billion a year in agricultural subsidies to U.S. producers, forcing Mexican farmers to immigrate north and creating social devastation by having an almost genocidal effect on corn based religions in the region).

Among the other unintended consequences of SAP and NAFTA is that there is very little money left in the Mexican government budgets for teacher salaries and other educational and social needs.

In May 2006, teachers began camping out in the Zócalo (town square) of Oaxaca City to press for more funding for education. On June 16, in the middle of the night, the encampment was tear-gassed by police on orders from Oaxaca's Governor Ulises Ruiz. The 70,000 teachers, along with sympathizers and other allied groups working for social change, forced the police back. In four days civil society formed the Popular Assembly for the People of Oaxaca (APPO in Spanish) to give a unified voice to their call for reform.

The protests continued throughout the summer and fall. On Oct. 29, 2006, former President Vicente Fox, who transferred power to current President Felipe Calderon on Dec. 1, 2006, ordered the paramilitary Federal Preventative Police to clear the Zócalo and occupy it. This was two days after the barricades were assaulted, leaving three Oaxacans and U.S. citizen and Indymedia reporter Bradley Will murdered. The latest reports say that the PFP have turned over control to the state police in Oaxaca.

President Calderon has promised an "iron hand" for demonstrators. The APPO's main demand is the resignation of Governor Ruiz, accused of electoral fraud and oppression. More than 300 people have been arrested in Oaxaca since the June 16 crackdown.

"Our movement is at crisis stage," Villa reported. "We don't know which teacher will receive an arrest warrant next," he added as he looked over at his two very young sons.

There is also the threat of another mass repression, as when the PFP violently drove the APPO out of Oaxaca City in November. Since that action, activists in the community that hosted the delegation take turns at all-night vigils at the municipal hall bell tower to warn the townspeople in case of the return of government-sponsored thugs, police or PFP. These vigils are especially necessary since, in this town, the APPO chased out the corrupt mayor and his police. The APPO now administers the town.

Villa's wife, a kindergarten teacher, took us to the town assembly. I told her the streets look clean, but she said that they could be cleaner.

"Our new street department has to ask for a peso when they pick up your trash because the mayor took all the money when he left town," she explained. The council APPO formed has filed papers in court charging the mayor and the governor with a long list of acts of corruption, but no one will investigate. At the town meeting one of the newly elected councilmen asked us not to photograph him because he had just received an arrest warrant. A very old woman asked to speak and permission was granted.

"I have received an arrest warrant too," she said. "My actions were legal and our cause is just!" She also granted us permission to photograph her determined resistance.

A couple laid a topographic map on the table and talked about a developer of expensive housing, Casa GEO, that didn't consult the town before taking water rights, dumping sewage in the rivers and creating new garbage dumps.

We took the bus back to Oaxaca City where the PFP had driven out the APPO and still occupied the Zócalo . The Zócalo was open, but to get in we had to walk pass riot police with tanks that had water cannons mounted on them. When we held a meeting in our hostel, there appeared to be plainclothes policemen sitting around listening to us, so we moved our meetings to a church center in town. This is where we met with the Mexican League for the Defense of Human Rights.

Jessica Sanchez Maya, one of the League's investigators, told us Mexico wants to appear democratic. Social movements are seen by the government as disruptive and therefore criminal. This enables the government to say that there are no political prisoners in Mexico.

The League had two teachers talk to us about their experience looking for another teacher that they thought had been detained by the police. When they drove through a rich neighborhood they were stopped by plainclothes security with high-powered rifles. When the security detail searched the car and found APPO information, the scene quickly turned ugly.

The security officers became very aggressive, bound the teachers' hands tightly and put them in the back of an SUV where they were beaten on the face and back. One was struck with a bottle and then the bottle was used to gash a cut in his ear. The security guards then transferred them to the police.

When the teachers protested their treatment, the police charged them with having guns and having been beaten by other assailants. In court, the judge said that she believed the police because the teachers were looking for a teacher in the APPO movement and that therefore they must have had guns.

The League told us that they have investigated many incidents where people involved in innocent actions had been charged with criminal offences. We had a meeting with two business leaders who agreed that the corrupt governor should leave but when they called for a dialogue about the situation, Governor Ruiz almost had them arrested. They told us the governor makes it clear that either you are for him or you are the enemy.

Governor Ruiz postponed the latest assembly election because he knew his PRI party would lose. The APPO has been pushed underground. In Oaxaca we could see where the APPO's calls for an end to the corrupt rule had been painted over and whitewashed off the sides of buildings.

It was hard to leave this beautiful land knowing that some of the brave people who had shared their stories with us risked being jailed. It took me back to another land where another corrupt ruler, King Herod, tried to slay the innocent to protect his power.

The official delegation report will be on the Witness for Peace Web site, along with opportunity to join delegations to Latin America, at www.witnessforpeace.org.

Some of the recommendations Witness for Peace have made to the U.S. government, based on the firsthand observations of the situation in Oaxaca:

• Make Oaxaca a priority issue for all U.S.-Mexico dialogue. Talks by the U.S. Secretary of State and Ambassador to Mexico should include insistence on working towards a peaceful solution in the conflict
• Suspend all U.S. government programs providing training, equipment and intelligence to police forces operating in Oaxaca except for the purpose of human rights investigations
• Report and disclose U.S. policies and practices on training and equipping of police and military in Mexico
• Conduct an extensive evaluation of the impact of NAFTA on the poor in Oaxaca, as economic violence caused by reduced government support for agricultural production, resulting in forced migration and other detriments to the social fabric, has deep roots in the current conflict situation in Oaxaca. Do not extend this failed model to other trade agreements.

Ray Torres [who is a member of Northwest Greens] lives in Mt. Airy in Philadelphia and is the chair of Witness for Peace's Mid-Atlantic region's steering committee.