The drug trafficking organization known as the Familia Michoacana distributed a series of flyers and hung banners throughout the state last week offering a truce with the Mexican governement, reports the Mexican daily El Universal.
In the message, the Familia offered to abandon its armed activites and return to “productive activities” in exchange for a promise by local, state and federal officials to “take control of the state” and safeguard the security of its citizens. "If the government accepts this public compromise and follows it, the Familia Michoacana will withdraw,” reads the statement, “in order to stop serving as the flag with which federal authorities continue to violate the human rights of the people Michoacan.”
This is not the first such offer by the organization, which, despite its involvement in drug trafficking, brands itself as a resistance movement against cartel and state violence. Last year, Servando Gómez Martínez, alias "La Tuta," one of the Familia’s leaders, called in to a radio program and offered a “national pact” with the Federal government. In response to the most recent offer, the Mexican Attorney General’s Office issued a statement dismissing the prospect of negotiation with criminal elements, adding that “the law is not negotiable.”
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