The Free

Freedom NOW for Jorge “Yorch” Esquivel! Eng/Esp

The case of Mexican anarchist prisoner, Jorge “Yorch” Esquivel, marking the Week of Solidarity with Anarchist Prisoners. More info on Yorch’s case here.

/from thefreeonline on 3rd Aug 2023 by Its Going Down

Jorge «Yorch» Esquivel has been a hostage of the Mexican State within the walls of the Reclusorio Oriente prison for 259 days. 259 days and nights stolen from his life

The main reason he is behind bars is the very existence of the prison industrial complex, the repressive «security» apparatus of the State, and the forms of punishment that will never reintegrate, reform or heal anyone, but quite the opposite.

The specific reason in Jorge’s case is the fabrication of crimes as part of a set-up created by the UNAM university in order to criminalize the struggle as part of their twisted obsession with evicting the Okupa Che squat, but only with the approval of the community of people whose opinion is important to them in order to maintain their esteemed reputation in Mexico and abroad.

If they wanted to, the authorities would have every «right» to evict the squat and imprison whoever is inside the space at the time of a police operative with the legal claim of dispossession of their property,

But since that would damage said reputation, it has been more convenient for them to orchestrate what started with a media campaign of contempt that reduced Okupa Che and those who participate in it, to a space of violent pseudo-student criminals dedicated to selling drugs to the innocent saints of the UNAM student community, among other criminal activities.

For that, they found the perfect person to play the role of the main protagonist of their imaginitive yet totally false narrative, and that person was and continues to be our compañero Jorge, who is a punk and an anarchist, a cook

(his mixiote tacos are highly addictive, we’ll give you that!) and an artisan, a supporter of countless causes and struggles, one of which is the fight for the right to squat starting with the first squats in Mexico City to the Okupa Che (which he has been a part for almost its entire existence of more than 20 years), a compañero who was raised and schooled by the streets of the great Tenochtitlán from a very young age.

That’s right, Jorge is of the people from below, the same people who, according to the struggles won by UNAM students and teachers over the decades, should be included as part of their community, but in this and numerous other situations, we see that the opposite is true.