JOINT STATEMENT CONCERNING THE REDUCTION OF CIVIC SPACE IN CHIAPAS, MEXICO, DUE TO THE DETERIORATION OF CONDITIONS FOR THE DEFENCE OF HUMAN RIGHTS
We, the undersigned organisations, express our deep concern for the shrinking civic space in Chiapas, Mexico, due to the deteriorating conditions for the defence of human rights. We urgently call on the Mexican State to fulfil its obligation to protect and publicly support human rights defenders and their work, and to carry out thorough investigations into the crimes committed against them. Moreover, we invite the international community to take concrete streps to make known, legitimise and protect human rights defenders and thereby protect and promote civic space for the defence of human rights in Chiapas.
This statement is issued following the recent break in, in the home of Ms Dora Roblero, director of the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Centre (CDH Frayba), as well as the persistent surveillance, intimidation and harassment against this organisation, which directly hinders its fundamental work in the defence of human rights in the state.
On 22 July 2025, Ms Roblero’s home in San Cristóbal de Las Casas was broken into. As stated by Mary Lawlor, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders, in her statement on the event, this break-in is part of a series of security incidents that members of the organisation have recently faced, in an increasingly difficult context for human rights defenders in Chiapas¹.
Throughout its history, the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Centre (CDH Frayba) has played a key role in accompanying communities, victims and communities in their struggle for peace, justice and truth, work that has led to numerous attacks and intimidations. For this reason, since 2010, CDH Frayba has been the beneficiary of precautionary measures MC 52-10, granted by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. The recent break-in constitutes a serious aggression not only against the personal integrity of the director of CDH Frayba, but also against her entire team. It is the second break-in in less than a year that the Centre has suffered, adding to the 46 registered security incidents it has suffered since 2024². We consider it particularly serious that some of these incidents have been carried out by the Federal State itself, such as the defamatory statements made by the former President of the Republic in April 2024³.
The break-in in the home of the director of CDH Frayba is part of a pattern of sustained and acute violations against human rights defenders in the state. Since January 2024, the Observatorio de Agresiones contra Personas Defensoras de Derechos Humanos y del Territorio en Chiapas – El Obse – has documented 156 attacks, including four murders and a total of 131 people attacked in reprisal for their work defending human rights4. The most frequent types of incidents have been surveillance, intimidation and defamation, while the most serious incidents have been the massacre in Nueva Morelia, on the border with Guatemala on 12 May 2024, the murder of the Tzotzil priest and human rights defender Marcelo Pérez Pérez on 20 October 2024, and the attacks against members of the civil organisation Las Abejas de Acteal in June 2025 in the community of Tzajalch’en, which included targeted armed attacks and detonations by criminal groups, as well as threats of criminalisation by members of state security forces.
The state of Chiapas is one of the poorest states in Mexico and suffers from structural inequality that mainly impacts indigenous peoples and their territories, as well as women and children. Since 2021, this has been compounded by violence generated by organised criminal groups, which has exacerbated the human rights violations already present in the state, including forced displacement, forced disappearance, human smuggling and human trafficking. Given the insufficient response to this crisis on the part of the state, despite the change of federal government and the deployment of its Security Strategy, the work of civil society organisations plays a fundamental role. According to the Espacio de Organizaciones de la Sociedad Civil para la Protección de Personas Defensoras de Derechos Humanos y Periodistas -Espacio OSC-, Chiapas is the state with the fifth highest number of human rights defenders and journalists at risk and with protection measures (124) in the whole country5.
We, the undersigned organisations, are deeply concerned about several aspects that reflect the lack of effective guarantees for the exercise of the right to defend human rights in Chiapas. Firstly, lack of public support by the authorities for the legitimate and fundamental work of human rights defenders, which can contribute to their stigmatisation, delegitimisation and vulnerability. As the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has stated, a comprehensive protection policy is indispensable, based on the recognition of the importance of working for human rights defense for the consolidation of democracies and the rule of law.6
Secondly, we also note that the commitments made by the Mexican State in terms of protection, embodied in the Law for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders and Journalists approved in 2012, and in the corresponding Protection Mechanism, have not been effectively fulfilled. As highlighted by the Working Group for the Strengthening of the Protection Mechanism, despite the progress made, the technical and financial resources available to this institution are insufficient, as is the application of comprehensive, collective and intersectional approaches in the tasks of investigation and analysis, as well as in the design and implementation of protection plans7. In this regard, the difficulty of state authorities to collaborate in the implementation of the Mechanism’s plans is of particular concern, as well as the recent tendency to process protection requests from organisations, collectives and groups of defenders on an individual basis, without considering the collective dimension of the risk.
In light of this, we urgently call on the Mexican State, at the federal and state levels, to fulfill its obligation to protect human rights defenders, guaranteeing their physical and psychological integrity, as well as their right to carry out their work free from threats, aggression and unjust arrests and detention. Furthermore, we would like to encourage public displays of support for the right to defend human rights, as well as thorough, impartial and effective investigations that prevent impunity and guarantee access to justice for victims and their communities.
We also urge the international community remain attentive to the situation in Chiapas and to take concrete actions, within their respective mandates, to legitimise the defence of human rights, to actively support those who defend human rights, and to encourage the Mexican state to comply with its international obligations to protect human rights defenders, as well as to investigate and punish attacks against them.
We look forward to hearing from you in response to this letter and thank you in advance for your attention.
Yours sincerely,
Amnesty International | Asociación por la Paz y los Derechos Humanos Taula per Mèxic| Centro por la Justicia y el Derecho Internacional CEJIL | Front Line Defenders | Swedish Fellowship of Reconciliation – SweFOR | World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT), in the framework of the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders | Peace Brigades International PBI| International Service for Peace SIPAZ |Protección Internacional Mesoamérica | Federación Internacional por los Derechos Humanos (FIDH), en el marco del Observatorio para la Protección de las Personas Defensoras de Derechos Humanos
1 – Mary Lawlor, UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders. 30 July 2025. Available at https://x.com/MaryLawlorhrds/status/1950570307690889336.
2 – The Observatorio de Personas Defensoras de Derechos Humanos de Chiapas, accessed 29 July 2025. Available at: https://elobse.org/
3 – SweFOR, VV.OO. 26 April 2024. “Letter of Concern from international organisations about the delegitimisation of the CDH Frayba. Available at: http://VV.OO
4 – Observatorio de Personas Defensoras de Derechos Humanos de Chiapas, accessed 29 July 2025. Available at: https://elobse.org/
5 – Espacio de Organizaciones de la Sociedad Civil para la Protección de Personas Defensoras de Derechos Humanos y Periodistas (Civil Society Organisations Space for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders and Journalists). 25 July 2025. “Espacio OSC exige garantías de protección para directora del Frayba tras allanamiento”. Available at: https://espacio.osc.mx/2025/07/25/espacio-osc-exige-garantias-de-proteccion-para-directora-del-frayba-tras-allanamiento/
6 – Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. 27 June 2023. “CIDH: Persiste la violencia contra personas defensoras en el primer cuatrimestre de 2023” (IACHR: Violence against human rights defenders persists in the first four months of 2023). Available at: https://www.oas.org/es/CIDH/jsForm/?File=/es/cidh/prensa/comunicados/2023/138.asp
7 – Espacio de Organizaciones de la Sociedad Civil para la Protección de Personas Defensoras de Derechos Humanos y Periodistas (Space of Civil Society Organisations for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders and Journalists). 24 September 2024. “Entregan informe a dos años del Grupo de Trabajo para el Fortalecimiento del Mecanismo de Protección para Personas Defensoras de Derechos Humanos y Periodistas”. Available at: https://espacio.osc.mx/2024/09/24/entregan-informe-a-dos-anos-del-grupo-detrabajo-para-el-fortalecimiento-del-mecanismo-de-proteccion-para-personas-defensoras-de-derechos-humanos-y-periodistas