State and federal police attack Aguilera teacher training school in Durango

Students tortured with electric shocks, family members beaten

x Centro de Medios Libres – CML-DF

August 21, 2012. — In a new attack against the rural teacher training schools, known as “normal schools,” an attack of state and federal police was reported today against the J. Guadalupe Aguilera Rural Normal School in the state of Durango, which began at 9:30 in the morning in an attempt to reduce the rights won by students in decades of struggle. The attack is being reported rapidly in the social networks and video services such as YouTube, at the same time that the local commercial press carries stories that aim to justify the irregular postponement of the semester kickoff.

In Mexico City today there was a demonstration against the repression in front of the Durango state government building, and more demonstrations will be held tomorrow at the same place, Amsterdam #108 at 11 o’clock in the morning. At 5 o’clock in the afternoon demonstrators will gather at the federal Congress building.

Federal police participated in the attack using clubs, teargas and electric cattle prods. Students reported that all police were heavily armed. In several of the videos, there are scenes of students bearing wounds after having been interrogated and tortured with electric shocks by the police.  The violent entry of the federal police was filmed. In one video, police attacks can be seen against students’ family members who grouped together just outside the normal school. In one case, police beat a student’s mother with clubs and dragged her on the ground.

There are reports of 20 or 30 wounded students and 3 students being held in unknown locations with unknown charges.

Yesterday, the opening of the semester was postponed by agreement of the school principal and the state government, even as police forces blocked students’ entrance to the school. Today the students managed to get onto the campus. The subsequent police attack did not reduce the number of students who are still on the campus ready to begin classes.

The state of Durango is governed by Jorge Herrera Caldera of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), a party that has undertaken a number of repressive operations against students in recent years, leaving a trail of young people dead, wounded, tortured, disappeared and imprisoned.

In Facebook, it was reported that “Today, Tuesday, August 21, 2012, in the morning, the State Investigation Delegation (DEI) along with its contingent of riot police, forcefully entered the J. Guadalupe Aguilera Rural Normal School, ARMED… The students were able to repel the invasion at a high cost, but the number of students seriously beaten is still unknown… Students are still under siege, deprived of their freedom, with access blocked to food and medical attention….”

Images are still fresh of the attacks against the Ayotzinapa normal school and the House of Students in Morelia, which have been part of this new wave of attacks against the student organizational processes.

The morning before the attack, the following information had been published: “August 20, 2012 8:44. BY ORDER OF THE SCHOOL PRINCIPAL JAVIER REYES SOLÍS POLICE FORCES ARE FORCEFULLY BLOCKING STUDENT ENTRY. NO MORE INJUSTICE. IS THIS WHAT WE CAN EXPECT THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE COUNTRY?   WILL WE BE OPPRESSED AND DENIED OUR RIGHT TO STUDY OR WILL WE STRUGGLE FOR EVERYONE TO HAVE THIS RIGHT? FOR THE LIBERATION OF THE YOUTH AND THE EXPLOITED CLASS… VENCEREMOS!!!!!

COMBATIVE AUGUST.”

Some videos of the police entry are posted here:
megafono.lunasexta.org/node/475

Represion a normalistas rurales Aguilera Durango 21-08-12
http://youtu.be/klpv5cJ8LAg

Grupo Antimotines atacando a los Normalistas De Aguilera Durango
http://youtu.be/1xwxorMeXKE

Enfrentamiento entre normalistas y cuerpos policiaticos Aguilera Durango
http://youtu.be/fORvf-tW6tc

represion de estudiantes de aguilera
http://youtu.be/h4a8t_JMsDM

Estudiante Torturado por policias en la normal de aguilera
http://youtu.be/xYs5VCbbXXw

estudiante torturado por elementos federales Y Elementos de l DEI en la normal de aguilera
http://youtu.be/mh3UCJqIDaU

estudiantes torturados hace poco tiempo en la normal por federales
http://youtu.be/vp6TyKwEpMs

momento de la entrada de federales y estatales a la normal de aguilera a golpearnos
http://youtu.be/7PrUtZKMHBY

agresion de policias a padres de familia en la normal de aguilera
http://youtu.be/RnBLxlJbdBI

Entrevista con voceros de La Escuela Normal
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/24879179