Chiapas: Two more prisoners join the hunger strike; concentration of family-members at sit-in In a press-conference on 28 October, it was reported

In a press-conference on 28 October, it was reported that the
commission would soon leave to visit Professor Alberto Patishtán
Gómez, who was taken to the Federal Center for Social Readaptation
(CEFERESO) No. 8 in Guasave, Sinaloa, with the hopes of learning about
his present situation, given that his family-members have not been
allowed to communicate with him to date.

Cecilia Santiago Vera, representative of the Movement of Solidarity
with prisoners on hunger strike, reported that they are awaiting the
authorization of the directors of the Guasave prison for the visit of
five persons to Patishtán Gómez in the coming days. The commission is
comprised by her, a relative of the prisoner, two lawyers from the
Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Center for Human Rights (CDHFBC), and
Sacario Hernández Hernández, who after being imprisoned from 2003 to
2008 was released as a result of undertaking a hunger strike.

The CDHFBC reported that it requested that the Inter-American
Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) solicit from the Mexican government
the establishment of precautionary measures so that Alberto Patishtán
be returned to prison in Chiapas. Víctor Hugo López Rodríguez,
director of the CDHFBC, said that the IACHR petition also includes a
request for precautionary measures in favor of the ten prisoners who
continue fasting and on hunger strike since 29 September in the
prisons of San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Cintalapa, and Motozintla.
López Rodríguez indicated that the CDHFBC has requested before the
International Committee of the Red Cross that it carry out a visit to
the Guasave prison so as to document the conditions in which Patishtán
is being held, in addition to visits to the other imprisoned
individuals fasting and on hunger strike.

On last Saturday the 29th, the organizations of the Other Campaign in
Chiapas called for a public meeting in the Cathedral Plaza of San
Cristóbal de Las Casas. The Group of the Network against Repression
“We are not all here” indicated that “dispersion is also a form of
psychological torture and a strategy of social and political
disarticulation,” referring to the transfer of Patishtán 2000 km from
his home. In a public denunciation they declared, “On 29 and 30
October, access to the prison was arbitrarily denied to a brigade for
medical attention that includes health personnel from Mexico City who
traveled there solely to learn about the health-status of those
comrades and to afford support. On Sunday 30 regardless, a day that
is for general visits, their entrance was also impeded; moreover, on
this same day authorities of the prison prevented by various means the
visit to the prison by relatives and friends.” During that afternoon,
there was made a call for a new mobilization on 7 November in front of
the palace of governance in Tuxtla Gutiérrez.

Of the eleven who are protesting, two who were previously fasting have
taken on a hunger strike: Juan Collazo Jiménez, in the Motozintla
prison, and Andrés Núñez Hernández, from Cereso 5 in San Cristóbal.
These account now then for 8 prisoners on hunger strike for 34 days.

In a public letter that was read at the press-conference, the hunger-
strikers express that “Today our comrade Alberto finds himself in the
maximum-security federal prison Cefereso No. 8 in Guasave, Sinaloa,
Mexico. He was taken in the moment that we found ourselves on hunger
strike, he fasting, which we began on 29 September so as to demand
justice and our release. Today we cry for help because the government
would like to see us die in prison for crimes we have not committed.
Today we complete 29 days on hunger strike and we are unsure when we
will be granted our liberty.” They added: “Similarly we say that our
health-situation is in decline; some of our comrades already suffer
from memory loss and dizziness, among other symptoms, as in the case
of our comrade Rosario Díaz Méndez, who finds her situation very
complicated, given that her glucose levels are excessively high. For
our state of health we hold the State responsible.”