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The huge demonstration on October 2, 46 years after the massacre of Tlatelolco n the Plaza of 3 Cultures in Mexico City, was marked by mourning.

First was the recent death of Raúl Álvarez Garín, student leader of the ’68 movement and central to conserving the memory of the movement and the fight to punish the assassins. To that was added the lethal attack on the education students of  Ayotzinapa.

And although there wasn’t a formal contingent of students from the Polytechnical Institute, on strike against top-down reforms to their curriculum, the Polytech flags waved and the school cry could be heard all along the march.

Youth in Mexico feel under attack. Their slogans, banners and signs expressed their outrage: “If they harm one, they harm us all!”, “Pain and rage for the dead of Ayotzinapa”, “We will not let history repeat itself!” “They were taken alive, we want them back alive!” “Stop the repression of students”. One hand-written sign said,  “We are not rebels, we are revolutionaries. We will keep on fighting, and we will march whenever we feel like it”.

Many signs showed the pictures and names of the disappeared students and demanded they be returned alive.

Around 6 p.m., two hours after the march began, the protesters passed Tlatelolco-scene of the 1968 massacre-toward the Palace of Fine Arts and then down 5 de mayo to the central plaza. There the main speaker, Félix Hernández Gamundi, announced that the march had filled the plaza and marchers continued to pour in. The leader of the historic movement demanded that the trial for genocide for the massacre of 400 students in Tlatelolco against former president Luis Echeverria be reopened.   

The Mexican Electricians Union joined the youth protest. The SME, by its Spanish initials, has been fighting for five years to protest the elimination of the city light company and the loss of their jobs. A group of members of the Yaqui tribe from the northern state of Sonora also joined, calling for a boycott of the companies Apasco, Ford, Coca Cola and Pepsi, beneficiaries of the illegal Independence aqueduct that drains the tribe of its water supply.