MÉRID | Mayan indigenous people from the communities of the municipality of Tinum, in the state of Yucatán, southeastern Mexico, removed this Wednesday a blockade on the roads that lead to the archaeological zone of Chichén Itzá, after 10 days of protests.
According to figures from the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), during that period, the most visited archaeological zone in Mexico stopped receiving some 80,000 national and foreign tourists, causing serious economic losses.
“We have reached an agreement with the representative of the federal government Andrés Peralta Rivera so that we lift the blockade and get to work,” Arturo Ciau Puc, a rural teacher who mediated the conflict, told EFE.
The blockade of the federal highway Valladolid-Mérida, at the height of the Mayan communities of Pisté, Xcalakoop, and San Felipe Nuevo, began on January 2 due to the demand of peasants, artisans, and tourist guides to dismiss the director of Chichén Itzá, Marco Antonio Santos Ramírez, whom they accused of discrimination, mistreatment and attacking the Mayan culture.