Carolina Plascencia, interim president of the Cuautla River Users Association, has been murdered.

MORELOS (apro).- Carolina Plascencia Carvajal, interim president of the Cuautla River Users Association (Asurco) and candidate for the presidency in the upcoming election, was shot in the municipality of Cuautla, just days before the committee's renewal, amid a water dispute with neighboring communities. Farmers and activists are demanding justice.

The attack occurred on Friday afternoon, around 3:30 p.m., on the Cuautla–Ex Hacienda El Hospital highway, near the Puxtla intersection. Carolina was traveling in a white Volkswagen Polo with Morelos license plates when she was ambushed by two men on a motorcycle and a vehicle, from which they shot her repeatedly. The bullets hit the car, and neighbors alerted authorities. Upon arrival, emergency services confirmed that the victim had already died.

The Morelos Prosecutor's Office cordoned off the area and opened an investigation. At the time of writing, those responsible had not been located, and the authorities had not provided any details.

Carolina had assumed the alternate presidency of Asurco after Antonio Domínguez Aragón—former mayor of Ayala and owner president—stepped down unexpectedly following an armed attack at his home in 2024.

The election for the renewal of the Asurco committee is scheduled for September 28. Carolina, an engineer by profession, has registered as a candidate for president to lead the group for the next three years.

This crime follows the one that occurred in February 2022, when Francisco Vázquez, a member of the Asurco Oversight Council and a member of the Abelardo Rodríguez ejido (communal land), was also murdered. Vázquez had joined the legal and social struggle against the Morelos Integral Project (PIM), which includes a gas pipeline crossing Tlaxcala and Puebla to connect with a thermoelectric plant and an aqueduct in the eastern part of Morelos.

River users and farmers in the region, who requested anonymity, link the attack to conflicts over water supply. They reported that Carolina cut off service to the community of Tenango, Jantetelco, where a concession existed for a company that has ceased operations for several years.

Members of the People's Front in Defense of Land and Water in Morelos, Puebla, and Tlaxcala issued a statement highlighting that ejidatarios (communal landowners) indicated that "Rogelio Plascencia was upset that he didn't want to include them on his list."

Rogelio Plascencia, former president of Asurco, led the period in which water was irregularly delivered to the CFE for the Huexca thermoelectric plant through an agreement signed in 2020. At that time, López Obrador ordered the eviction of the Apatlaco settlement with hundreds of National Guard troops. According to the statement from the ejidatarios, the operation was carried out "after a meeting with Rogelio Plascencia, Manuel Bartlett, and Cuauhtémoc Blanco."

Francisco Vázquez, president of the Asurco Oversight Board during Rogelio Plascencia's administration, stated that he received death threats from Plascencia the day before his own murder on February 11, 2022. Vázquez stated that he was seeking to remove Rogelio for "mismanagement of resources in the Asurco administration, mainly due to the income generated by the illegal delivery of water to the CFE."

The People's Front in Defense of Land and Water in Morelos, Puebla, and Tlaxcala also noted that, since the arrival of the Morelos Integral Project, "organized crime has been advancing in parallel in the conflict zones and opposition to the PIM in Ayala, Huexca, and Amilcingo, consolidating a narco-state in the area that, in fact, has served as an instrument of terror that allows the imposition of the thermoelectric plant, the gas pipeline, and the aqueduct."

Regarding the water dispute, the document indicates that the Ayala ejido members are still claiming their rights to resources granted by Asurco and the Cuautla Drinking Water System. However, the Sixth District Judge has improperly dismissed two of the injunctions, "dismissing all hydrological expert evidence presented, including that of the official expert, with the aim of denying the right of the Ayala ejidos."

The People's Front in Defense of Land and Water demanded that the motives for Plascencia's murder be clarified, that those responsible and mastermind be punished, and that the criminal groups seeking to seize water from the ejidos and territorial control in Huexca, Amilcingo, and other areas of the region be dismantled.

The statement concludes: "Justice for Samir Flores. Justice for Francisco Vázquez and Carolina Plascencia. Dismantle the narco-state. Cancellation of the Morelos Comprehensive Project."

Authorities and community members have reiterated their demand for justice for those defending the region's water resources.