Skirmishes Kill Mexico Officer, 6 Alleged Rebels

A police officer and six alleged Zapatista rebels were killed Wednesday in the bloodiest fighting between security forces and rebels in the southern state of Chiapas since a Mexican army offensive there in February 1995.

The violence broke out three days after Bishop Samuel Ruiz, the main mediator in the Chiapas conflict, resigned in protest over what he called government intransigence in the stalled peace negotiations.

The government has vowed to press ahead with peace talks and to avoid a military solution, but the new fighting raised fears that the conflict could escalate.

State Atty. Gen. Rodolfo Soto told reporters in Tuxtla Gutierrez, the state capital, that the violence Wednesday occurred in two small, remote villages in the El Bosque municipality about 25 miles north of the regional center of San Cristobal de Las Casas.

The area is one of several flash points where rival, “autonomous” local governments created by Zapatista supporters have challenged officials.

Soto said a group of attackers on Tuesday ambushed unarmed villagers riding in a pickup truck in the community of Los Platanos, killing one resident and wounding five others. Soto said that brought the number of civilian victims of violence in the area to three dead and 11 wounded since April.

In response, he said, the state asked for army support. A security force made up of army and police personnel moved into villages in El Bosque at 6:30 a.m. Wednesday.

Almost immediately, he said, the police and soldiers were fired on in separate attacks in the villages of Union Progreso and Chavajeval.

Human rights groups in Chiapas received a fax from “The Support Bases of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation” saying soldiers and police “massacred innocent families . . . and dropped bombs to destroy houses” in Chavajeval and that many people had disappeared from Union Progreso during the attack.

The gunfire in Union Progreso wounded three police officers; in Chavajeval, the attackers killed one police officer and wounded four, Soto said.

In returning fire, the security forces killed six attackers and wounded two.

“It is worth noting that five of the dead were dressed in military-type uniforms similar to those used by members of the Zapatista National Liberation Army,” Soto added.

The attackers in Union Progreso shot at a helicopter, wounding a police officer inside and forcing the chopper to make an emergency landing, the attorney general said.

Soto said that 56 people were arrested in the communities and that weapons and Molotov cocktails were confiscated.

There has been little direct fighting between Zapatista rebels and government security forces since a cease-fire was negotiated Jan. 10, 1994, ending the Zapatistas’ 10-day uprising in which more than 140 people died.

The military staged a short-lived offensive in February 1995, but President Ernesto Zedillo called off that incursion into Zapatista-held villages. A preliminary peace accord was reached between the two sides that sought to address the rebels’ demands for better treatment of the indigenous Maya people.

But disputes over the interpretation of the accords led to a breakdown in talks in September 1996.

While the cease-fire remains in effect, sporadic violence has broken out between surrogates for the two sides in many villages--including the massacre last December of 45 unarmed people from a pro-Zapatista village by alleged paramilitary members loyal to the government.

Sheridan reported from San Cristobal and Smith from Mexico City.