Two prisoners crucified themselves in southeast Mexico ahead of Easter after claiming to have been tortured to confess crimes, a state official said on Tuesday.
The prisoners tied themselves to wooden crosses made in a carpentry workshop and nailed holes in their hands until they bled, remaining there all day on Monday, the official said, requesting anonymity.
The two, who were later untied by fellow inmates, are part of 23 prisoners involved in two-week demonstrations at El Amate prison in Chiapas state, seeking a review of their cases and demanding to be freed.
The demonstrators, members of farmers’ unions, claim to have been tortured and forced to confess to murders and other crimes.
Last week four of the prisoners sewed their lips together, and eight others are on hunger strike.
Members of their families said police had removed them on Monday from their own two-week protests outside state government buildings.
The government said that those protests had stopped after talks in which they agreed to revise all the cases within 45 days.
This week, Semana Santa, is Mexico’s second most important holiday season of the year, behind only Christmas, and runs from Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday.
In related news, the lawyer for the family of slain US journalist Bradley Will accused Mexican prosecutors on Tuesday of harassing him with false accusations of leaking confidential information.
Miguel Angel de los Santos said prosecutors were trying to intimidate him because he had criticized the investigation into Will’s death in 2006.
Will, a 36-year-old from New York who worked for Indymedia.org, was shot as he filmed a clash between protesters and state government supporters during the five-month political uprising in southern Oaxaca state.
Two supporters of the protest movement have been arrested in the killing, despite the belief of Will’s family that pro-government forces were behind his death. One of the two was ordered to stand trial on homicide charges last year.
The suspects are supporters of the radical movement known as the People’s Assembly of Oaxaca, which seized control of Oaxaca city for almost five months in 2006 to push for the ouster of Governor Ulises Ruiz.
De los Santos, who has represented the Bradley family in Mexico, said the federal Attorney General’s Office had summoned him twice for questioning over allegations that he leaked confidential information from the case to the news media.
He has not been charged with any crime and denied wrongdoing.
The Attorney General’s Office did not return requests for comment.
People with missing teeth might be able to grow new ones, said Japanese dentists, who are testing a pioneering drug they hope will offer an alternative to dentures and implants. Unlike reptiles and fish, which usually replace their fangs on a regular basis, it is widely accepted that humans and most other mammals only grow two sets of teeth. However, hidden underneath our gums are the dormant buds of a third generation, said Katsu Takahashi, head of oral surgery at the Medical Research Institute Kitano Hospital in Osaka, Japan. His team launched clinical trials at Kyoto University Hospital in October, administering an experimental
‘GOOD POLITICS’: He is a ‘pragmatic radical’ and has moderated his rhetoric since the height of his radicalism in 2014, a lecturer in contemporary Islam said Abu Mohammed al-Jolani is the leader of the Islamist alliance that spearheaded an offensive that rebels say brought down Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and ended five decades of Baath Party rule in Syria. Al-Jolani heads Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which is rooted in Syria’s branch of al-Qaeda. He is a former extremist who adopted a more moderate posture in order to achieve his goals. Yesterday, as the rebels entered Damascus, he ordered all military forces in the capital not to approach public institutions. Last week, he said the objective of his offensive, which saw city after city fall from government control, was to
IVY LEAGUE GRADUATE: Suspect Luigi Nicholas Mangione, whose grandfather was a self-made real-estate developer and philanthropist, had a life of privilege The man charged with murder in the killing of the CEO of UnitedHealthcare made it clear he was not going to make things easy on authorities, shouting unintelligibly and writhing in the grip of sheriff’s deputies as he was led into court and then objecting to being brought to New York to face trial. The displays of resistance on Tuesday were not expected to significantly delay legal proceedings for Luigi Nicholas Mangione, who was charged in last week’s Manhattan killing of Brian Thompson, the leader of the US’ largest medical insurance company. Little new information has come out about motivation,
‘MONSTROUS CRIME’: The killings were overseen by a powerful gang leader who was convinced his son’s illness was caused by voodoo practitioners, a civil organization said Nearly 200 people in Haiti were killed in brutal weekend violence reportedly orchestrated against voodoo practitioners, with the government on Monday condemning a massacre of “unbearable cruelty.” The killings in the capital, Port-au-Prince, were overseen by a powerful gang leader convinced that his son’s illness was caused by followers of the religion, the civil organization the Committee for Peace and Development (CPD) said. It was the latest act of extreme violence by powerful gangs that control most of the capital in the impoverished Caribbean country mired for decades in political instability, natural disasters and other woes. “He decided to cruelly punish all
RSS