Basic Human Rights

Pattern

As most of you know, Weaving for Justice is a volunteer, non-profit organization working in solidarity with Maya women’s weaving cooperatives in Highland Chiapas, Mexico. It was created to assist the members of the cooperatives to continue living on their ancestral lands in sustainable ways that respect their lands, language (Tsotsil), and traditions. Just as one of our basic human rights is the right to migrate, another of those basic human rights is the right to not migrate. However, the realities for people living in oppressed communities can be brutal, especially when violence is part of the picture (perpetrated by the government or organized crime). By assisting the families that make up Tsobol Antzetik and the members of the EZLN who make up Mujeres por la Dignidad to sell their textiles through fair trade, we work to protect their rights to not migrate and to stay on their lands.

Most groups of Original Peoples in southern Mexico and Guatemala live in a reality in which their basic human rights are violated on a regular basis. Many of you have heard of the murder of Claudia Patricia Gómez González, a young indigenous woman from Guatemala, at the hands of the Border Patrol. I am attaching a list of the 30 basic human rights, and in most indigenous communities that have not been able to develop some level of autonomy through resistance, people live in a situation in which they regularly deal with the violations of Articles 1,2,3,5,8,9,10,12,13,14,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25,26,27,28, and 30. This reality informs the work we do.

Many of us as individuals are working in a variety of ways to fight against the abuses of Customs and Border Protection (CBP), including murder, abuse, and family separation. As an organization we continue to listen to our friends in Chiapas who are part of the resistance movements there, and we do what we can to help. By continuing to support the work of Weaving for Justice, in a very concrete way you are taking action to fight for the basic human rights of all of the members of these cooperatives and their communities. Thank you.

http://hrlibrary.umn.edu/edumat/hreduseries/hereandnow/Part-5/8_udhr-abbr.htm

– Crystal Massey, 15 June 2018

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