Serapaz defines itself as a peace-building organization. We work on three levels. We help individual victims organize and defend their rights and help them manage the risks they incur by doing so. At the national level, we advocate for policy change, but Mexican authorities are usually reluctant to take bold action. That’s when we seek international solidarity as additional “persuasion power.”  

We also use a variety of tools. Within communities, we discuss methods for conflict resolution to stop abuses before they happen. As guides and protectors, we accompany people as they explore avenues for justice. We work to pass and enact policies, as developed by those who have been affected by violence, to prevent further abuses.

One example: We accompanied El Movimiento por Nuestros Desaparecidos en México to Washington, D.C. in October 2022 when they received a human rights award from the Institute for Policy Studies. We all met with US government officials and asked that the dialogue on human rights between the US and México be resumed — it halted during the Trump years — since the US also indirectly bears responsibility for the violence.

Serapaz has focused on indigenous rights for many years. Has there been an expansion of indigenous rights and protections under Morena?

Bishop Don Samuel Ruiz García founded Serapaz in 1996, after he was asked to serve as a mediator between the Zapatistas and the Mexican government. We continue to work with indigenous peoples and not just in Chiapas.

Unfortunately, with Morena, we have not seen substantial changes. It may be that because we had greater expectations, we also feel greater disappointment. Some of Morena’s new programs have had unintended consequences. Programs aimed at protecting the environment, for example, have actually led to more deforestation.

We placed our biggest hopes in a 2019 constitutional reform proposal guaranteeing the self-determination of indigenous peoples as well as Afro-Mexican communities.

This proposal was developed through an inclusive process. But, for the past four years, the proposal has remained just paper in a drawer.

“Here the people direct and the government obeys.”
Photo: Connor Radnovich

Forced disappearances have caused a profound human rights crisis. Has there been progress to stop this scourge?

The failed military strategy for fighting crime has seen 106,000 registered as disappeared over the past 16 years. An average of 22 people still disappear every day, almost one person an hour. “Forced disappearances” involve state actors. But in México differentiating between “forced disappearances” and private acts of abduction can be really difficult, given the pervasive collusion between authorities and criminals, coupled with their widespread impunity.

That new law mandates a special network of institutions, everything from commissions to search for victims and national registries of the disappeared to specialized prosecutors and Citizens Councils. But the law has been minimally implemented, and the pace has been far too slow. Only 36 perpetrators have ever been convicted. We met with US officials in October and asked them to call on the Mexican government to fully implement this law.

One positive: México has accepted the competence of the UN Committee on Enforced Disappearances to investigate individual cases and invited the Committee to visit the country. The Committee has made a report with 86 recommendations, another tool that families of the disappeared can use.

How effective has the Commission set up to investigate the disappearance of 43 students at Ayotzinapa been?

Serapaz has a seat on the Commission, as do five parents and four NGOs, together with various Mexican officials. We felt hopeful when Omar Gomez was appointed as the special prosecutor in 2019. He had been part of a team of international investigators during the previous administration, and they did such good work finding government involvement that they were kicked out of the country and their own lives endangered!