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Subcomandante Marcos — Mexico's Che Guevara — Is No Longer a Wanted Man

The charges against the iconic pipe-smoking leader of the Zapatista indigenous uprising included terrorism, sedition, riot, rebellion, conspiracy, but they have all now passed their statutes of limitations.
Foto di Jorge Núñez/EPA

He was once viewed as the internet era's answer to Che Guevara, spreading revolutionary ideals to a new global generation from the jungle canyons of Mexico's southern state of Chiapas. Now, Zapatista rebel leader Subcomandante Marcos — once the bane of the Mexican government — isn't even wanted by the courts.

An arrest warrant from February 1995 detailed that Marcos was sought on charges of terrorism, sedition, riot, rebellion, conspiracy, and the illegal use of firearms, among other crimes.

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This week the federal judicial authority released a statement saying that the statute of limitations on all the charges has now expired. This means, it added, that the pale-skinned and mask-wearing leader of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation is no longer a wanted man — even though the EZLN's conflict with the state has never been formally closed.

"We put out a statement because of the media interest that Marcos had in his time," a source in the judicial authorities said of the decision to publicize the automatic matter.

And what interest there once was.

'All the rich ladies in Mexico fell in love with him.'

The world could not seem to get enough of Marcos almost as soon as he appeared at the head of the ragtag indigenous army that suddenly emerged from its jungle hideouts to storm major cities across Chiapas on New Year's Day 1994.

The fighting lasted 12 days and the Zapatistas were forced into retreat, when an outpouring of public sympathy prompted the government to call a ceasefire. It was nervous of using its obvious superiority of force to crush a rebellion that had so effectively highlighted the undeniable truth that indigenous people in Mexico had suffered intolerable exploitation and discrimination for centuries.

Marcos' personal charisma and poetry-laden political comuniques also helped capture the imaginations of both political idealists, and simple romantics, around the world.

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In the early months and years, big name journalists competed for a chance to be kept waiting for days in the jungle in the hope of an interview with the pipe-smoking cosmopolitan rebel who seemed at home chatting about everything from baseball to Spanish department stores.

Guadalupe Loaeza, a well-known chronicler of the Mexican upper classes, remembers every detail of the time she interviewed him early on in the conflict in the EZLN headquarters of La Realidad. Marcos greeted her at the door of a hut with a rose in his hand and the words "bonjour madame."

"He put a mirror in front of us and opened our eyes in so many ways, particularly about indigenous rights, and he was so well read," she said. "All the rich ladies in Mexico fell in love with him."

Much more earnest young activists, particularly from southern Europe, also flocked to Chiapas to spend months, in some cases years, working for what many described as the first postmodern guerrilla group, thanks to its savvy use of the internet, and relative lack of actual fighting.

The most acute act of related violence, after those initial few days of the uprising, took place in December 1997 when 47 people at a prayer meeting were massacred by anti-Zapatista paramilitaries.

Even though the conflict never fully flared again, Marcos' status as the new icon of Latin American revolutionary politics helped keep international attention on the movement, and international solidarity funds flowing.

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His literary comuniques also stoked indignation at continued small-scale agressions against Zapatista communities, as well as the government's failure to honor promises to implement peace accords recognizing indigenous rights that were negotiated early on, and then seemingly forgotten.

Related: Paramilitaries Are Still Murdering Zapatistas in Mexico

In 2000 the subcomandante led a caravan of the Zapatista indigenous leadership around Mexico where he spoke to packed plazas. Vendors sold t-shirts with his speaking venues and dates on the back, as if he were a rock star. The government provided a discrete police escort.

In 2006 Marcos was off around the country again. This time he began the trip by driving out of the jungle on a motorcycle and held smaller gatherings in which he sought to join the struggle for indigenous rights to those of other groups that felt excluded from the political process — from transvestite prostitutes to sacked electricity workers.

'He led an alternative movement that had an influence on lots of other recent protests.'

Over the years, Marcos also published hundreds of essays and over 20 books — including a detective novel and a foray into erotica. All the time he ignored the fact that 21 years ago the government had outed him as a former university professor called Rafael Sebastian Guillén, something that has slowly been almost forgotten. Even the statement released to announce that he is no longer charged with any crime called him "subcomandante Marcos" — with quotation marks.

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"Subcomandante Marcos had an impact on the left in the west where the discourse had been very dogmatic," said Laura Castellanos, who carried out the last high-profile interview with the rebel leader in 2008.

"He led an alternative movement that had an influence on other recent protests," she added, citing the occupy movements of recent times.

But Marcos' personal star, together with the relevance of the Zapatista movement, has all but faded away now. Mexico and the world have become far more concerned about other conflicts that typically involved less poetry, and much more blood and gore.

The Zapatistas also say that their decision to bow out of the limelight was deliberate — an effort to focus energy on ensuring the success of the communities the movement still controls in Chiapas that are held up by some as models of indigenous autonomy.

Marcos too explicitly dropped his former persona in a 2014 communique in which he announced that he would now be known as Sub-comandante Galeano.

Related: 'Subcomandante Marcos No Longer Exists:' Zapatista Leader Retires His Nom de Guerre

Today, while his image can still be found stenciled on walls or printed on clothes, Marcos/Galeano is mostly ignored. His last statement was sent out earlier this month, though few even noticed.

Castellanos, the journalist who is also the author of an exhaustive book on Mexican guerrilla movements, said it is too early to tell whether he will take advantage of the fact that he is now free of the threat of arrest.  "We'll have to wait to see how he responds to this new situation," she said.

But while it is now possible to start imagining sightings of Marcos in political gatherings, or perhaps on the Mexico City metro, will he ever take off that mask?

"I hope he never ever does that," says Loaeza, the social commentator. "The myth is so much more romantic."

Related: In Photos: Zapatista Army's 20 Years of War

Follow Jo Tuckman and Nathaniel Janowitz on Twitter: @jotuckman and @ngjanowitz