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Ecumenical pilgrimage in Mexico: Churches call for an end to violence
Mexiko-Stadt - Mexico has a major problem with organised crime. Critics are often threatened with death or actually killed. An ecumenical pilgrimage has now reminded people of these victims of the mafia.
Published on 14.09.2024 at 11:13 –In the Mexican city of Tuxtla Gutiérrez on Friday (local time), around 30,000 believers of various denominations demonstrated against organised crime. The ecumenical "Pilgrim's March for Peace" in the capital of the state of Chiapas was organised by the Catholic Church. Various Protestant churches joined the mobilisation, as reported by the news platform "Chiapas Paralelo".
"Stop the organised crime, stop the violent displacement, stop the murders, stop the narco-politics," chanted the demonstrators, most of whom belonged to indigenous communities. Networks of influential politicians and drug gangs are referred to as "nakopolitics".
According to a statement from the churches, the pilgrimage march was intended to make visible the victims who were murdered "because they refused to collaborate with the criminals". Eleven believers from the Chicomuselo community, who were massacred in May because they had denounced the illegal exploitation of a mining site, were remembered.
Major problem of violence in Chiapas
The fight between criminal groups over drug trafficking routes and the smuggling of migrants is just one of the causes of the wave of violence that has led to the flight of entire villages in the border region with Guatemala. The expropriation of indigenous peoples through mining projects, oil extraction, the construction of motorways and water privatisation are also contributing to the spiral of violence.
The people, most of whom were dressed in white, made a ten-kilometre pilgrimage from the outskirts of Tuxtla Gutiérrez to the cathedral in the city centre, where they celebrated an ecumenical prayer. The Mexican government has repeatedly denied the urgency of the problem of violence in Chiapas. (epd)