Mexico Student Strikers Chide Govt. Fri, 4 Feb 2000 08:21:31 -0500 Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit Mexico Student Strikers Chide Govt. By Johanna Tuckman Associated Press Writer Wednesday, Feb. 2, 2000; 4:31 p.m. EST MEXICO CITY - Radical students occupying Latin America's largest university accused the government Wednesday of declaring "war" against them after campus security guards and striking students fought a bloody skirmish with sticks, pipes and rocks. Relatives and supporters of the strikers gathered inside the university's main campus to demand the immediate release of 251 students arrested during the fighting Tuesday between strikers, anti-strike students and university guards. Thirty-seven guards were wounded. "A war has been declared, and it's against us," said a striking art school student who identified himself only as Carlos. He was manning the barricade of logs, wires and window frames that has blocked the campus gates for the last nine months. Public pressure has been mounting for an end to the strike, in which a small group of increasingly radical students have prevented 260,000 of their classmates from entering the campus. The strike also has shuttered a dozen high schools operated by the university. The battle Tuesday occurred at Justo Sierra High School, which is affiliated with the university and has been held by the strikers since April 20. About 200 students opposed to the strike forced their way onto the campus and, tossing rocks and waving sticks, forced the strikers out. By late afternoon, more strikers arrived, retook the campus and battled security guards called in to hold it. Police arrested 251 of the strikers and took them to jail or juvenile detention facilities, depending on their ages. Most were booked on disorderly conduct or riot counts. Prosecutors have 72 hours to file formal charges against them. The scenes of bloody violence added to mounting pressure to end the strike. In a poll published by the Mexico City daily Reforma, 63 percent of respondents said either police or non-striking students should take control of the university campuses. The poll of 420 city residents had a margin of error of five percentage points. Relatives of the arrested strikers gathered inside the university Wednesday to demand their release, saying the government had sparked the skirmish. Many strikers said they believed the government wouldn't risk an assault on the main campus because of memories of a 1968 massacre that left hundreds dead. But some said that if the strikers were evicted, they would resist police ? or continue the struggle by taking over other campuses. "We would have to continue the movement and retake the university," said humanities student Rogelio Aguilar, 20. Interior Secretary Diodoro Carrasco on Wednesday denied a report that one person, apparently a guard, had been killed in the previous day's skirmish. Ambulance driver Antonio Ramirez told The Associated Press on Tuesday night that a man died of stab wounds to the chest, and an AP photograph showed a man with his head and torso covered in a blanket, being removed on a stretcher. Ramirez could not be reached on Wednesday. Strikers remained in control of the university's huge main campus, and refused to reopen it until officials meet their demands for guaranteed admissions and a loosening of academic standards. The strike began in April to protest plans to raise annual tuition from a few cents to $140. Administrators withdrew the plans for the fee increase, but strikers later demanded sweeping policy changes. Copyright 2000 The Associated Press ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nytcamer-02.04.00-08:21:29-31799