The horrendous incident in which police officers opened fire on students killing 6 people and injuring 17 and then kidnapped another 43 and handed them over to a drug cartel, has brought out sharply the depth of the rottenness of the Mexican capitalist state, to what degree its structures are linked with those of the drug cartels, and finally, how they stop at nothing in suppressing anyone they perceive as a threat to their interests.

Since late July 2013, an important and radical sector of Mexican’s National Teachers Union has staged massive protests and called for a sectorial strike that, even if many times interrupted and not followed by the majority of the Trade Union, has shaken the ground in the country.

La manifestación que recordaba la represión contra el movimiento estudiantil en 1971 -cuando fueron asesinados decenas de estudiantes y trabajadores- terminó con una nueva represión. De una forma muy similar a los acontecimientos del 1° de diciembre, cuando tomó posesión Peña Nieto, una vez más fueron apresados compañeros de forma arbitraria.

The first national congress of Morena, the Movement for National Regeneration, was held on November 19^th. This is the new left-wing political formation promoted by Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), formerly the leader of the left wing of the PRD [the Democratic Revolutionary Party]. Here we provide a report by the Marxists of the Izquierda Socialista who took part in the congress.

The humble headquarters of a Mexican student organisation, CLEP-CEDEP, “accidentally” burned down on the morning of the 26th of October. As expected, no one has claimed responsibility and the police, as well as the authorities of the Instituto Politecnico Nacional (National Polytechnic Institute - IPN), have given up pursuing the investigation and have decided that a short-circuit caused the fire (a “short-circuit” in a building where power is turned off every night). Once again, what is clearly a politically motivated attack – possibly conducted by the police itself – against a left wing organisation, will be filed for all eternity as a simple accident.

Mass street protests have erupted against electoral fraud in Mexico. The official version of the results of the presidential election on 1 July gave Enrique Peña Nieto, the candidate of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) 38.21% of the vote, with 31.59% for leftist Andrés Manuel López Obrador of the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD), and 25.41% for Josefina Vázquez Mota of the conservative National Action Party (PAN). The small New Alliance party got 2.29%.