Mexico teachers clash with police in historic city

OAXACA, Mexico, June 14 (Reuters) Mexican police today forced out thousands of striking teachers camped in the heart of this historic city in the latest clash between protesters and government forces ahead of July elections.

Local radio said two people were killed and one was injured, although the report was not confirmed. Witnesses and press reports said shots were fired.

Before dawn, police on foot and in helicopters used tear gas to disperse the teachers, who have occupied Oaxaca City's main plaza and surrounding streets for 20 days to press their demand for higher wages. Colonial, highland Oaxaca City is the capital of the southern state of the same name.

Two police officers were being held hostage by teachers, said state officials.

President Vicente Fox's spokesman Ruben Aguilar said the incident, like May's riots in a town near Mexico City and a bitter, prolonged mining strike, was not a sign of instability around the July 2 presidential vote.

''In no way does the government consider them hot spots or insoluble problems, much less do they put at risk the electoral process,'' he told reporters.

State police guarded the leafy plaza today and burned tents and other camping equipment, while teachers hid in hotels around the historic center, a Reuters reporter saw. They vowed to continue the strike, which the federal and state government says is illegal and unjustified.

''We must resist, we are used to ... years of struggle and to the repressive government,'' Enrique Rueda Pacheco, head of the teachers' union, told local radio.

The teachers are at odds with Gov Ulises Ruiz, a powerful member of the Institutional Revolutionary Party which ruled Mexico for most of the last century.

Last month outside Mexico City, international and Mexican rights groups say police used repressive tactics to put down riots in San Salvador de Atenco. The demonstrators had opposed efforts to evict illegal flower vendors.

This week, several officers were punished for the brutal crackdown in which more than 200 people were arrested.

Earlier this year, two steel workers were killed in running battles with police sent in to break up a strike, part of a long work stoppage by miners and metal workers nationwide.

REUTERS SY BD2356