Since the Zapatista uprising in 1994, Chiapas and the struggle of its indigenous people have received extensive attention from all over the world. Thousands of foreigners have traveled to Chiapas, many of them as human rights observers. The international presence and attention have played a vital role in Chiapas, helping to prevent human rights abuses and constituting a counterweight to the military and paramilitary threats facing many communities in the conflict area.

Nonetheless, there has been a good deal of ambiguity regarding international presence in Chiapas, as well as in other conflicted regions of the country, such as Oaxaca and Guerrero. This has been due on one hand to the fact that until recently, Mexico did not provide specific and clear regulations for the activity of international observation. In addition the different forms of international presence in Chiapas have led at times to confusion between the non-partisan activity of observation and the generally partisan solidarity activities, both legitimate but characterized by different tasks and modalities.

In June 1997, an internal circular of the National Immigration Institute (INM) established regulations for the activity of international observation, including a special visa for human rights observers. These regulations have been applied in an inconsistent manner, depending upon the particular Mexican consulate at which the visa is solicited.

Theory and Practice

The Mexican Government has repeatedly affirmed its commitment to respect human rights. Besides having signed several international conventions on human rights, Mexico explicitly recognized the legitimacy of human rights promotion with the ratification on April 3, 1998 (during the 54^th session of the Human Rights Commission of the UN) of a resolution that asks the General Assembly of the United Nations to approve a declaration that will protect and legitimize the human rights work of individuals and organizations around the world.

In practice, however, the Mexican government obstructs effective international observation and treats with a firm hand those who aim to accomplish this task. Last year, representatives of several international organizations, among them the International Human Rights Federation, were expelled or invited to leave the country. During the first four months of this year, Mexico expelled some 30 foreigners, most of them human rights observers. In May 40 Italians were expelled after making a prohibited visit to a community. Many of these expulsions involved procedural irregularities that violated the right to due process, detaining the observers incommunicado during hours or even days and denying the right to a lawyer and to a hearing.

Article 33 of the Constitution and Other Obstacles

Article 33 of the Mexican Constitution, which allows the expulsion without trial “of any foreigner whose stay [in Mexico] is judged to be inconvenient”, is a strong weapon in the hands of the Mexican government. Various national and international human rights organizations, among them the governmental National Human Rights Commission and Human Rights Watch, have strongly criticized this standard as contradicting universal values and agreements in the area of human rights. To defend this position, the Mexican government has formally stated reservations to certain clauses of international treaties which it has signed regarding human rights — clauses which guarantee due process to foreigners — indicating thereby that the fulfillment of these treaties shall be limited.

The issuing of special visas that allow for human rights observation has been rare and arbitrary and usually limited to certain activities and specific places, even though the Mexican Constitution grants freedom to travel throughout all parts of Mexico to everyone, including foreigners. The INM places checkpoints at the entrances to counties with a strong Zapatista presence. These are in addition to the numerous military checkpoints. Moreover, at some of the military checkpoints, foreigners are checked for immigration papers, names and passport numbers are registered, and pictures or videos taken of the foreigners, although the military is not authorized to perform such tasks. Dozens of foreigners have had to go to INM offices where they are interrogated for hours. Sometime they are forced to leave the country within a stated period of time and other times they are advised not to visit the conflict area.

Troubling Tendencies

At the end of May, the Mexican government implemented new regulations that significantly restrict the framework for international observation. The new requirements limit the time for visits of human rights workers to Mexico to ten days with a maximum of ten observers per group. The government will now require an application with 30-days advance notice and a detailed itinerary. Members of the observation groups must further provide verification of their observation experience, and the non-government organizations they belong to must either have recognized status before the United Nations or more than five years in operation.

Amnesty International stated that these restrictions, “without precedent in the Americas,” clearly impede timely reactions of human rights observers to emergencies. Moreover, the requirement of revealing the areas, people and institutions that will be visited might create security risks for the local human rights groups that collaborate with the observer delegations.

Mexican non-governmental organizations interpret these immigration policies as a new expression of the counterinsurgency strategy the government maintains in the conflict zone. Many fear that the intention of the government is to get rid of inconvenient witnesses in order to harden its military offensive against indigenous communities. Affirmations by the Mexican government of its continued commitment to respect human rights seem rhetorical to the degree that, in practice, it continues to undermine the work of international observers in conflict areas — a restrictive policy that is employed not only in Chiapas, but also in other parts of the country, such as Oaxaca and Guerrero.