Stories Differ On Mexican Army’s Actions In Chiapas

The government boasts its army has shown great respect for human rights in Chiapas. But a peasant woman here says she watched soldiers shoot her unarmed husband and take his body off in a helicopter.

The death in this mountaintop village 60 miles east of San Cristobal de las Casas, one of the largest cities in this southern state, was the second confirmed by authorities since soldiers started moving into Zapatista National Liberation Army territory on Feb. 10. An army officer was killed the first day.

The government has called the army’s movement peaceful, respectful of human rights and designed to safeguard the population. But peasants throughout the valley accuse it of terrorizing the population.

Officially, Gilberto Jimenez Hernandez, about 40, and three other men were among 40 heavily armed rebels who attacked an army patrol near here on Monday. Jimenez was killed when soldiers returned fire.

The three other were flown out by helicopter, along with Jimenez’s body. Soldiers also reported capturing rebel equipment.

However, Jimenez’s widow Elena Gomez gave a different version.

Gomez was breast-feeding her infant daughter and sitting with her husband under a pine tree on Sunday morning when soldiers approached, firing into the air, the 35-year-old Tzeltal Indian woman said through a translator.

Soldiers beat Jimenez and Jimenez Gomez, the couple’s 19-year-old son, she said. Then they tied them up and threw them on the ground, she said.

Then, as Gomez and a young daughter watched, a soldier shot the elder Jimenez in the eye, she said.