Mexico's Zapatistas Prepare For Sea Mission To Europe

Isla Mujeres , Mexico, May 1 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 1st May, 2021 ) :A delegation of Mexico's Zapatista demobilized guerrilla group boarded a sailboat Friday for a transatlantic voyage to Europe to meet fellow anti-capitalists and raise awareness of the plight of indigenous peoples.

Seven members of the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) will set off from the Caribbean island of Isla Mujeres on Monday, the organization said.

They expect it to take six to eight weeks to reach the port of Vigo in northwest Spain and hope to visit around 30 European countries.

The delegation members raised their fists and their comrades shouted "Zapata lives, the fight continues!" as they prepared for the long journey ahead.

The "invasion has begun," the EZLN declared earlier on its website -- a symbolic phrase alluding to the Spanish conquest which began when three ships crossed the Atlantic more than 500 years ago.

Taking its name from 1910 revolution hero Emiliano Zapata, the EZLN appeared the same day that the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) came into force on New Year's Day 1994.

Led by their mysterious masked leader Subcomandante Marcos -- now known as Galeano -- the rebels rose up in the impoverished state of Chiapas to fight for more rights for the indigenous population.

The insurgency sparked a 12-day conflict with the Federal government that left dozens of people dead, mostly Zapatistas.

A peace pact was signed in 1996 but the EZLN says its demand for constitutional reform that would guarantee its autonomy was never met.

Instead the Zapatistas created their own autonomous health and education systems in their southern territory.