The battle between CNTE teachers and the Mexican Government took an ugly turn when eight people were reportedly killed on Monday.
The killings are the result of an altercation between police officers and protesters who disagree with the recently approved Education Reform.
“What we lived yesterday was something really brutal, something that has no name,” CNTE’s spokesperson Miguel Zurita told Reuters. “Police patrol members arrived, federal police members arrived, and they were already armed. They arrived shooting, they didn’t establish any dialogue.”
Hollywood actor Demian Bichir took to Twitter to publicly ask the government to stop this slaughter.
“To the Mexican Government, stop the massacre in Oaxaca. The whole world is watching,” the “Hateful Eight” star wrote on Twitter.
According to El Economista, President Enrique Peña Nieto has been dealing with serious difficulties to implement the new Education Reform, which implies evaluations and firings. Teachers claim the reform violates their labor rights.
Hours after the news broke, President Peña Nieto turned to social media to notify concerned citizens that needed measures were being taken to put an end to the riots, and medical assistance was being provided to those injured in the shooting.
“I am sorry for the loss of human lives. My solidarity is with their family members, and with the people who were injured,” he wrote on Twitter.
He continued, “I have given orders to governmental health institutions to support Oaxaca’s government with the attention to those injured.”
EPN added that he was doing everything in his power to take actions, within the frame of the law, to find a solution to the conflict.
In November 2014, Peña Nieto gave a similar speech to the families of the 43 missing students in Ayotzinapa.
“With firm determination, the Mexican government will maintain its efforts to obtain total clarity about the facts," he said. “The capture of the intellectual authors is not enough. We will detain everyone who participated in these abominable crimes. To the parents of the missing students and the Mexican society altogether, I assure you, that I will not stop until justice prevails.”
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