
              Conspiracy Nation -- Vol. 9  Num. 13
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                    ("Quid coniuratio est?")
 
 
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"NOTHING IS HAPPENING"
======================
 
Apparently, to watch  the  "news,"  "nothing"  much is happening.
Clinton is (yawn) doing a tough guy routine with Iraq.  Bob Dole,
the straw man from  Kansas,  is  pretending  to  be  running  for
President.    Congress   is  "considering."   About  whatever  is
*really* occurring: "mum's the word."
 
So we turn to our new  NAFTA neighbor, Mexico, where at least the
whole country is not all "looking the other way"  and  pretending
there is no news.
 
A  new  Special  Prosecutor has been appointed to investigate the
1994 assassination  of  PRI  presidential  candidate Luis Donaldo
Colosio.  The new Special Prosecutor, Luis Raul  Gonzalez  Perez,
replaces  Pablo  Chapa  Bezanilla.   It  is  being  demanded that
Gonzalez Perez subpoena  Mexico's  ex-president Carlos Salinas de
Gotari.
 
Past Special Prosecutor Bezanilla has refused to respond to  more
than 60 written questions on the Colosio case delivered to him by
law school students at Mexico City's UNAM university.
 
According  to  *La Jornada*, "The dimunitive figure of the former
Special Prosecutor in the Colosio case could be seen scurrying at
top speed through the halls of  the UNAM Law School.  Behind him,
about 20 reporters were earnestly trying to make him  respond  to
diverse  questions  regarding  the  investigation.   As  his only
response, Pablo Chapa Bezanilla gave a little smile."
 
Bezanilla's  "little  smile"   came   immediately  following  his
participation in a meeting  during  which  he  had  stressed  the
necessity  of  the  current investigation's recovering its public
credibility.   But  Bezanilla  lamented  to  reporters  that  "he
prefers to reflect on their questions," then exited at full speed
from the building.
 
The Mexican mass media, unlike our own here in the united states,
has been aggressive in  its  demand  for the truth.  Says Alfonso
Molina Ruibal, president of  the  government  commission  charged
with  investigating  the Colosio assassination, "If there had not
existed such a firm position by  the media... it is possible that
the temptation to cover up would have prevailed."
 
According to Mexican journalists, the Carlos  Salinas  connection
has  not been sufficiently looked into and it could shed light on
just who  might  be  the  "intellectual  author"  of  the Colosio
assassination.
 
Meanwhile, elsewhere  in  sunny  Mexico,  two policemen connected
with something called "Transformacion 2000" shot at  hundreds  of
pedestrians in Mexico City's Historic District who were trying to
lynch  them.   This  occurred  after  the  two policemen tried to
rescue the actor  Carlos  Bracho  who  had  run over a 4-year-old
child with his Jeep Cherokee automobile.
 
According to witnesses, the actor had tried to escape but  dozens
of pedestrians stopped him.
 
At this point the two policemen, Victor Manuel Mindez Fuentes and
Israel  Zarazza  Robles,  arrived.   They  tried to take away the
actor, but  were  confronted  with  protests  and  outrage by the
pedestrians.  With shouts, and  with  some  of  them  armed  with
sticks  and bottles, they surrounded the trio and prevented their
leaving.
 
The policemen, to clear the  way, tried driving through the crowd
and injured several of them, one of whom had to be  hospitalized.
With  this,  the  anger  of the crowd increased and they began to
destroy the policemen's automobile.   In the meantime, the police
and the actor attempted to escape the ugly  scene  on  foot,  but
were  cut  off  and  captured  at the corner of Costa Rica and El
Carmen streets.
 
Here, the  policemen  shot  at  their  pursuers,  wounding Felipe
Acosta Suarez in the leg.  But the shots did not deter the  angry
crowd  which,  more  furious  than  ever,  chased  the  uniformed
officers to the Worker's University, where they took refuge.
 
At  this point, hundreds tried to break down the door in order to
drag out the policemen and set fire to them "in the middle of the
street, like dogs," shouted  some.   Others proposed to hang them
from a post and the majority favored just to throw  them  in  the
sewer.   The  two  officers stayed hidden in a room on the second
floor, where they  tried  to  find  different  clothes to put on.
Around 8 pm they were rescued by officials who,  amid  struggles,
managed  to  move  them  to  the  primary  agency  of  the Public
Ministry.  Even still, some of  the inflamed crowd followed after
them.  Others went to the hospital to try and prevent the  escape
of actor Carlos Bracho and to "throw him in the sewer when we see
him."
 
*La Jornada* gives a different perspective on the Iraq situation;
it allows us to hear more of the Iraqi position regarding current
tensions.  Iraq rejects the legality of the "zones of exclusion,"
i.e., the "no-fly zones," imposed on them.  The legality of these
"zones of  exclusion"  has  not  been  recognized  by  the United
Nations Security Council.
 
This past May, an agreement had been reached  to  allow  Iraq  to
export  oil  in  return  for  food.   Now,  with  this  agreement
apparently  on  hold  due  to  renewed  hostilities, the price of
"October crude" oil  has  gone  up  63  cents.   So it looks like
"somebody" is making a profit.
 
Elsewhere  in  Mexico,  directors  of  banks  and  businesses are
urgently making known to Mexican president Ernesto Zedillo  their
great  worries over the violence generated by the Popular Army of
the Revolution  (EPR,  Ejercito  Popular  Revolucionario)  and to
demand greater efficiency in the government's  actions  meant  to
counteract   the  growing  popular  unrest,  a  phenomena  having
negative impact on economic  activity.  They are demanding prompt
solutions.
 
Respecting the offer made by  U.S.  Ambassador  to  Mexico  James
Jones  to help combat the EPR, the general feeling is that, while
grateful for the offer, Mexico must solve the problem itself.
 
While  admitting that massive unemployment is fueling unrest, the
businessmen and bankers refute  those  who sustain that Zedillo's
neo-liberal economic policies are the cause of current troubles.
 
Meanwhile, orders of arrest have been issued against  leaders  of
PROCUP   and   the  FAC-MLN  (see  CN  9.05).   They  are  to  be
interrogated regarding any knowledge they may have about the EPR.
 
Regarding  the  Zapatista  Army  of  National  Liberation  (EZLN,
Ejercito Zapatista de  Liberacion  Nacional), the government says
it remains favorable to continued talks with the rebel army.  Yet
Commandante Ramon of the EZLN warns,  "Every  day  there  is  the
danger  of  a confrontation because the federal Army continues to
search for us in the mountains...  From what we can see, at least
from this side, is that  an  attack  is coming -- even though the
government says not.  When the government says it's not going  to
attack, it is because it is going to attack.  If not, then why so
much troop movement in the mountains?"
 
Finally, the Mexican state  of  Nuevo  Leon  is  gearing up for a
plebiscite on the separation  of  that  state  from  the  federal
union.   The  apparent  motivation is the unequal distribution of
fiscal resources between Nuevo Leon and the federation.  The wish
is to halt tax payments  and  divert those funds toward the state
economy.
 
In the beginning  of  July,  Mexican  president  Zedillo  met  in
Monterrey  with  leading businessmen of Nuevo Leon.  The dialogue
was sharp, with  complaints  of  not  receiving  support from the
federal government rising  in  tone.   In  exasperation,  Zedillo
responded:   "If  it weren't for federal support, you wouldn't be
here."
 
It is argued that those  who  seek  to divert more funds to Nuevo
Leon do so not for the state's development so much as to  enlarge
their  own  enterprises  and  personal  fortunes.  The problem in
Mexico is the distribution of wealth, says *La Jornada*.
 
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Aperi os tuum muto, et causis omnium filiorum qui pertranseunt.
Aperi os tuum, decerne quod justum est, et judica inopem et 
  pauperem.                    -- Liber Proverbiorum  XXXI: 8-9 

