Mexico Arrests Man in Massacre

MEXICO CITY

Mexico has rearrested a man accused of ordering the killings of 45 Indians in the southern state of Chiapas, a massacre that shocked the country 10 years ago and which rights groups say remains unsolved.

The Chiapas government said in a statement on Sunday that it had arrested Antonio Santiz, a paramilitary suspect who had previously been imprisoned. The arrest was made Saturday, hours after the state appointed a special prosecutor for the long-running investigation of the killings.

Right-wing paramilitaries killed the Tzotzil Indians, including pregnant women and children, in the village of Acteal on Dec. 22, 1997. The Indians were sympathetic to the indigenous, armed Zapatista movement.

The state justice minister, Amador Rodríguez, said Mr. Santiz was considered to be “the intellectual author of the massacre at Acteal.”

Mr. Santiz was arrested for his suspected involvement in 2000, but a judge threw out the charges in 2001, ruling there was not enough evidence, The Associated Press reported.

Hundreds of people have been arrested in the killings since 1997 but only a few have been sentenced. Rights groups say those sentenced are innocent scapegoats and accuse successive governments of protecting the perpetrators.