Mexico Protesters Willing to Negotiate

by WILL WEISSERT
OAXACA, Mexico
Protesters said Thursday they were willing to enter negotiations to end the monthslong conflict that has paralyzed this colonial city - one of Mexico's premier tourist destinations - but insist the state's governor resign.

The protests that started as a teachers' strike in May have turned into a political battle against state Gov. Ulises Ruiz, with 40,000 teachers, as well as leftists, student groups and anarchists, seizing the city's central plaza and covering historic buildings with graffiti.

They have burned buses, taken over radio and television stations, blocked government buildings and forced many downtown businesses to close. Two protesters have been shot to death.

On Thursday, the U.S. State Departement told Americans that rising political violence might make Oaxaca too risky to visit.

Protest leader Roberto Garcia told The Associated Press on Thursday that demonstrators would accept an offer earlier this week from President Vicente Fox's government to sit down at the negotiating table in Mexico City but only if state officials are not included.

"We want a dialogue with the interior secretary and his officials and no one else," he said.

Garcia said protesters still demand the resignation of Ruiz, whom they accuse of election rigging and using force to repress dissent. He added that negotiations would not take place before Friday.

Fox's government has sent two sets of envoys to Oaxaca in recent months to negotiate a settlement, but the dialogue broke down.

Cerves Nunez, a striking teacher who is overseeing operations at the Radio Ley radio station seized earlier this week in Oaxaca City, said Thursday that even if the state meets the teachers' demand for a 20 percent salary increase, Ruiz still must go.

"The community is organizing against Ulises Ruiz exclusively," he said.

Ruiz became the protesters' central target after June 14, when state police unsuccessfully attempted to disperse protest camps in the central plaza. The governor belongs to the Institutional Revolutionary Party, which has governed the state since 1929.

On successive nights this week, masked gunmen opened fire on a radio and television station occupied by protesters, killing a 52-year-old architect and prompting demonstrators to fortify their street barricades of sheet metal, boulders and burned-out cars. Earlier this month, one of the protesters was shot dead after arguing with local residents during a demonstration.

Night after night, the demonstrators burn tires on the streets to keep police away.

Classes began for students across Mexico on Monday, but public schools remained closed for 1.3 million children in Oaxaca, even as striking teachers continue to draw state salaries. Some private schools have reopened, but others remain shuttered following warnings broadcast by protesters via seized radio stations.

Adan Acosta, a 22-year-old architectural student, said he supported the teachers' strike in the beginning but "things have gotten out of control."

"The movement has turned so political," said Acosta, who has been living with his girlfriend downtown because no buses are running to his home on the city's outskirts. "It's not about education."