Monday, May 5, 2008, from http://mywordismyweapon.blogspot.com/

Two years ago, on May 3-4, 2006, federal, state, and municipal police violently invaded San Salvador Atenco, leaving two people dead and 218 people imprisoned. To date, only a handful of police have been prosecuted for very minor crimes, and many of those convicted have since been exonerated. However, sixteen activists remain imprisoned, some with life sentences.

The invasion incurred because a handful of Atenco residents attempted their yearly ritual of selling flowers in a local market before Mother's Day despite plans to build a Wal-Mart on that site. Police told them to leave the area despite a previous agreement with local authorities that they could sell flowers there, but only for the holiday. The Popular Front in Defense of the Land (FPDT), adherents to the Zapatistas' Other Campaign, arrived to support the flower vendors in resistance. The police attacked, and more adherents to the Zapatistas' Other Campaign arrived in Atenco shortly thereafter from surrounding states to support the FPDT, because an injury to one adherent to the Other Campaign is an injury to the entire Other Campaign.

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