Two Cities, One Cause

Protests before Consulates in El Paso and Juárez against Displacement

Residents from El Paso and Juarez held demonstrations in January 14, 2008 at the consulates of both cities in protest of human rights violations in Lomas del Poleo, Juarez and the proposed displacement of hundreds of El Paso's Segundo Barrio residents build a commercial zone.

While some of the members of the Committee in Defense of Lomas del Poleo held a demonstration outside the U.S. Consulate in Ciudad Juárez, some of the Lomas del Poleo residents joined the demonstration across the river in front of the Mexican consulate in El Paso.

The Committee's spokesperson Juan Carlos Martínez, said the demonstration in El Paso is to denounce the barbed-wire fence put up by the Grupo Zaragoza that surround the Lomas del Poleo neighborhood.

"It's a joint, simultaneous protest. We are supporting each other because this is a binational struggle against despojo—displacement and dispossession—by powerful developers, many who belong to the Verde Group," said Martínez while behind him demonstrators carried signs bearing the letters "Segundo Barrio" and shouting "La tierra no se vende, se trabaja y se defiende!" (Our land is not for sale, it is ours to work and to defend!).

Martínez explained that developers from the Verde Group and the Paso Del Norte Group plan to demolish hundreds of homes and businesses in the Segundo Barrio to build shopping malls and big-box retail stores.

The Paso Del Norte Group (PDNG) is made up of more than 350 business leaders from El Paso, Ciudad Juárez and New Mexico. (From article published in the Diario de Juárez)

For more information see www.pasodelsur.com.

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