Zapatista Rebel Leader Plans National Tour

Masked Zapatista rebel leader Subcommander Marcos unveiled plans to tour Mexico for six months to influence politics before the presidential vote in July.

“The aim is to listen and learn about the struggles, the resistance and rebel movements, support them and bind them together to build a national anti-capitalist, leftist program,” he said late Friday in La Garrucha in Chiapas state. A Zapatista spokesman said he wanted to set up branch offices of the movement around the country.

Six weeks ago, Marcos emerged from his jungle hide-out for the first time in four years and called political leaders, including leftist presidential front-runner Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, “scoundrels.” Many analysts believe Marcos wants to become the moral leader of the left in Mexico.