Alleging a frame-up, a coalition of Mexican and U.S. human rights and environmental groups is stepping up a campaign to free two indigenous Mexican anti-logging activists. Isidro Baldenegro and Hermenegildo Rivas were arrested in their Sierra Tarahumara homeland in March 2003 by members of the Chihuahua State Judicial Police (PJE) and accused of possessing illegal weapons and drugs. But supporters of Baldenegro and Rivas contend the men were detained merely for opposing destructive logging in their region. Observers are drawing parallels between the Baldenegro-Rivas case and the 1999 arrests of anti-logging leader Rodolfo Montiel and his friend Teodoro Cabrera in southern Guerrero state. In both instances, environmental activists charge that drugs and weapons were planted to justify the detentions. “Mexico is... [Log in to read more]