By
The Associated Press
MEXICO CITY - An Indian rights bill approved by Mexico's Senate seems unlikely to win its goal of ending a rebellion in southern Mexico. Instead, it could end up affecting workplaces across the country by banning nearly all forms of discrimination.
The bill, approved Wednesday night by a 109-0 vote, was sent yesterday to the lower house of Congress.
Born in efforts to end the rebellion in southern Mexico, it was drafted to enact a 1996 agreement between the government and the Zapatista National Liberation Army signed in the Indian village of San Andres Larrainzar. Masked Zapatista leaders marched into Mexico City last month to lobby for the bill.
There were increasing signs that the new bill might not meet one of its key goals: satisfying the Zapatista rebels and ending their simmering seven-year revolt. Rebel supporters said the version passed by the Senate backed away from rebel demands.
But the bill could have dramatic implications far beyond Indian rights.
It would ban discrimination based on ethnic origin, gender, age, capacity, social class, health, religion, marital status or "anything else that violates human dignity with the object of annulling or reducing the rights and liberties of people."
Mexican employers commonly specify the age, gender, appearance and even marriage status of people they want to hire.
Rebel supporters praised the bill as a significant advance, but said it failed to comply with the agreements reached in San Andres. That raised strong questions about whether the rebels would accept it.
"Without doubt, it is a triumph" for the rebels, said Sen. Demetrio Sodi, whose Democratic Revolution Party has allied itself with the rebel demands.
But he warned that because of changes that watered down wording on Indian control of resources and legal rights, "it will not resolve the Indian problem and it probably won't resolve the problem of peace."
The five-year delay in implementing the San Andres agreements has been the main barrier to restarting peace talks.
Former President Ernesto Zedillo balked at the original bill that congressmen drafted to enact the pact, saying it could create legal conflicts and raised questions about Mexican sovereignty.
New President Vicente Fox, pushing to settle the rebellion, made the bill his first proposal to Congress in December, and Zapatista rebels last month staged a dramatic caravan to Mexico City to support the measure.
After several weeks of debate and drafting, the bill is being raced through Congress in an attempt to get it approved by both houses by May 31, when the current session of the legislature ends.
As a constitutional amendment, the bill would then have to be approved by a majority of state legislatures.
Even that would meet only some of the rebel conditions for peace, though it is often considered the key issue for the largely Indian Zapatistas. Indian rights was only the first of several subjects Zedillo's government agreed to discuss with the rebels.
More than 145 people died during two weeks of fighting immediately after the Zapatistas seized several towns in Chiapas state on Jan. 1, 1994.
A cease-fire has held since then and the rebels have moved increasingly toward political rather than military action.
But the unresolved conflict has created instability in Chiapas, where more than 200 people have died since the cease-fire in clashes over land or power between rebel supporters or opponents.
