PBI-Canada joined with PBI-Mexico as they accompanied four days of activities in Mexico City, Amilcingo, Cholula, Calpan, and San Miguel Xoxtla by the People’s Front in Defence of Land and Water – Morelos, Puebla, Tlaxcala.
The People’s Front and Samir Flores Soberanes
The People’s Front is an organization of Indigenous Nahuatl communities in the states of Morelos, Puebla and Tlaxcala, that has been working since 2012 to defend their territory and exercise their self-determination.
Samir Flores Soberanes was a member of the People’s Front, one of the founders of Amiltzinko community radio, and a land and environmental defender opposed to the Morelos Integral Project (PIM).
Flores was murdered outside his home in Amilcingo, Morelos on February 20, 2019 because of his opposition to the PIM.
Pie de Pagina explains: “The PIM is an infrastructure project designed to generate electric energy through thermoelectric plans, a gas pipeline, an aqueduct, and a network of energy transmission via high tension towers.”
THURSDAY FEBRUARY 19 – MEXICO CITY
Somoselmedio reports: “At the headquarters of the Ministry of the Interior (Segob), the National Indigenous Congress (CNI), the People’s Front in Defense of Land and Water Morelos-Puebla-Tlaxcala and groups of relatives of the disappeared, announced the start of the National and International Day ‘Justice for Samir and self-determination for the peoples’, seven years after the murder of community communicator and defender of the territory Samir Flores Soberanes.”
That article adds: “Amira Flores Vázquez, daughter of Samir Flores, said: ‘Samir did not die, the government killed him.’ In his speech, he framed the murder within a context of militarization, forced displacement and structural violence that, he said, has turned the country into ‘a great mass grave.’”
Previous article: Indigenous land defender killed in Mexico days before referendum on controversial gas pipeline (Brent Patterson, Rabble.ca, February 22, 2019).
FRIDAY FEBRUARY 20 – AMILCINGO
El Sol de Cuautla reports: “To commemorate the anniversary of the death [of Samir Flores], a mass was held at the activist’s home and later a march that concluded at the community’s primary school, in the center of Amilcingo. There they placed a wreath at the foot of the bust that is located in the campus. The march continued to the community cemetery, where the remains of Flores Soberanes rest.”
Previous article: PBI-Mexico accompanies activities in Amilcingo on the 6th anniversary of the murder of Indigenous Nahua defender Samir Flores Soberanes (Brent Patterson, PBI-Canada, February 21, 2025).
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 21 – CHOLULA, CALPAN
El Sol de Puebla reports: “Members of the Union of Peoples Against the Garbage Dump and in Defense of Water built a sports field on the property [to stop the expansion of] the intermunicipal garbage dump of Cholula – closed in 2024… Through different WhatsApp groups and other social networks, an invitation [was] shared to inaugurate Saturday, February 21, the community site located on the Cholula – Calpan highway, in which they will also plant trees to reforest the area.”
Angulo 7 also reports: “[On February 11, a] fire caused the destruction of the crops of the ‘Free Palestine Forest’, whose work of months was lost. The objective of this project was to counteract the damage of contamination on the land with leachate from the landfill and other solid waste.”
And El Sol de Puebla reports: “Untreated wastewater travels approximately seven kilometers through farmland and on the side of the road that leads to Calpan, to concentrate in an excavation located meters from the San Pedro Cholula landfill, which was closed in 2024 due to environmental damage and contamination of aquifers. The lack of a sewage treatment plant is part of a problem that, according to residents, has been going on for about 20 years and that, with the increase in population, has worsened mainly in recent months, since the liquid not only gives off bad odors, but has stagnated in properties where the owners have stopped planting corn and tejocote due to the effects caused to the fertile lands.”
Peace Brigades International was also shown the pathway of a gas pipeline associated with the Morelos Integral Project (PIM) megaproject.
In February 2021, Proceso reported: “Experts from the UNAM [the National Autonomous University of Mexico], the Meritorious Autonomous University of Puebla (BUAP) and the National Center for Disaster Prevention (Cenapred) have warned about the dangers of a gas pipeline network being installed in an area considered at risk due to its proximity to the Popocatepetl volcano. …A key destination [of the pipeline is the] the Combined Cycle Power Plant in Yecapixtla, Morelos, known as the Huexca Thermoelectric Plant. …On February 20, 2019, Samir Flores Soberanes, one of the leaders of the resistance against the plant, was murdered; it is not the only case of aggression against the opponents of the PIM, says Teresa Castellanos Ruiz.”
Previous articles: PBI-Mexico accompanies Peoples’ Front in Defence of Land and Water at highway blockade at Cholula garbage dump (Brent Patterson, PBI-Canada, March 22, 2024) and PBI-Mexico accompanies the Peoples Front at media conference on the torture of PIM megaproject opponent Jaime Dominguez (Brent Patterson, PBI-Canada, December 12, 2023).
SUNDAY FEBRUARY 22 – SAN MIGUEL XOXTLA
The People’s Front posted on social media about a Forum on the San Andrés Accords in Pavigi Park in San Miguel Xoxtla, Puebla. The sessions at this forum were titled: “Thirty years after the San Andrés Accords were violated and the war of extermination began, what comes next?”; “How have we progressed toward autonomy in practice and the defense of our rights?” (that the People’s Front spoke at); and “The right to self-determination of peoples in the context of the new General Water Law”.
Contrastes 12 reports: “A group is opposed to the projects to drill water wells in the demarcation [of Pavigi Park].”
And El Sol de Puebla has previously reported: “[On November 11, 2025] residents of the municipality of San Miguel Xoxtla demanded that municipal authorities return to the citizens the control of the wells based on uses and customs. Therefore, they created a drinking water committee so that it is in charge of ensuring that the vital liquid stays in the demarcation and no longer profits from it.”
Previous article: PBI-Mexico accompanies the Peoples’ Front as community assembly creates drinking water committee in Xoxtla, Puebla (Brent Patterson, PBI-Canada, November 25, 2025).
Watch for further updates and follow-ups to these accompaniments.
Peace Brigades International has accompanied the People’s Front in Defence of Land and Water – Morelos, Puebla, Tlaxcala (FPDTA-MPT) since early 2020.
Additional situation
The afternoon of the Forum in San Miguel Xoxtla, CBC News reported: “The Secretariat of National Defence said in a statement that Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, as ‘El Mencho’, the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), died from injuries while he was being transferred to Mexico City following a clash with military special forces. A federal official told The Associated Press that the Mexican army killed El Mencho during a military operation in the western state of Jalisco, where the cartel that traffics huge amounts of fentanyl and cocaine into the United States is based.”
The Globe and Mail notes: “The current turmoil in Mexico is taking place after Ms. Anand’s cabinet colleagues, Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc and Agriculture Minister Heath MacDonald, led a massive trade mission with 370 delegates to Mexico last week. The mission ended on Feb. 20.”
The Team Canada Trade Mission was in Mexico City from February 15 to 17, then in Guadalajara and Monterrey from February 18 to 20. Two days after that mission, Global Affairs Canada is advising Canadians to “exercise a high degree of caution” in those parts of Mexico.
Global Affairs Canada posted this map urging caution. San Miguel Xoxtla is near Puebla. PBI-Canada is now in Mexico City.
More to come.
