Protests in Mexico City capitalize on World Cup celebrations to pressure government

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Teachers, families of Mexico's 130,000 missing people, animal rights groups and a range of other social movements in Mexico are capitalizing on impending FIFA World Cup celebrations next week to put pressure on authorities and make demands.

Protesters from the country's teachers' union, CNTE, blocked main throughways in Mexico City, bringing central parts of the city to a standstill this week to demand better working conditions. Demonstrators knocked down figures of World Cup soccer players, broke into a government building and on Friday played a soccer match on a blockaded street. At the same time visitors from across the world began flooding in to the Mexican capital ahead of the competition that starts June 11.

“The proximity of the World Cup places a lot more pressure on the government,” said Abel Escalante, a 52-year-old special education psychologist who traveled from the southern state of Chiapas to protest, who was blocking the street around the city’s iconic Angel de la Independencia monument on Friday.

The protests come just days before Mexico City hosts the tournament's opening ceremony, co-hosted by Mexico, the United States and Canada. In addition to kicking off the competition, the Mexican capital, Guadalajara and Monterrey will also host a number of matches.

They are joined by a range of other social movements that have jumped on the World Cup to increasingly place pressure on the government of Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum at a time when authorities seek to present a friendly face to the world.

“This isn’t an event for the Mexican people. Tons of people are going to come, but they’re going to be people with all this disposable income. It’s for the elites. The few average people who do go will have to scrape together all the money they have to live off of," Escalante added.

Sheinbaum responded to mounting protests on Friday morning, saying that “the door is open” for teachers to negotiate with the government over their demands for better retirement packages.

But she added groups of protesters, who broke in to a government building the day before, were trying to provoke a violent reaction from authorities, which she said was not going to happen. She promised that Mexico's main square known as the Zocalo, which the teachers tried to take over at the end of May to stage a sit-in, would remain open for World Cup events.

Sheinbaum's government has come under criticism by activist groups for prioritizing World Cup celebrations over pressing social needs, like addressing the soaring cost-of-living fueled in part by foreign tourism or the country's forced disappearance crisis.

More groups planned protests in the coming weeks as celebrations were slated to kick off. Building on top of all that is a robust protest culture in the Mexican capital, with unions and activist groups that regularly take over public spaces in demonstrations.

Protests of families searching for their disappeared and rural teachers pushing for better working conditions have mounted as the local government has made a push to beautify the city.

Local workers have painted bridges bright purple, planted orange Mexican marigolds across the city and plastered streets with cartoon axolotls, an endangered species that has become the sort of mascot of Mexico City.

Last weekend, families searching for their loved ones plastered the faces of the disappeared people across the city and sprayed graffiti next to one of those bright purple bridges now lining the city's streets.

“Mexico, champion of disappearance,” it read.

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Activists and families of the country's more than 134,000 disappeared people paste missing-person posters in Mexico City, Saturday, May 30, 2026, as Mexico prepares to host the 2026 FIFA World Cup. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

A person protesting the more than the 134,000 disappeared people, writes in spray paint, "Mexico, champion of disappearances" as Mexico prepares to host the 2026 FIFA World Cup in Mexico City, Saturday, May 30, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

Teachers eat by tents they set up during protests to demand salary increases in Mexico City, Tuesday, June 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

Teachers stage a protest at the Angel of Independence to demand salary increases in Mexico City, Tuesday, June 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

A World Cup statue, with graffiti that reads in Spanish, "The National Educational Workers Coordination lives" lies sideways during a teachers' protest for higher salaries sit in Mexico City, Tuesday, June 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Jon Orbach)

BEIRUT (AP) — Israeli airstrikes on southern Lebanon Saturday killed nine people including three members of the Lebanese military, the Lebanese army and state media said, days after the two sides reached a new ceasefire deal.

An airstrike on the road linking the city of Nabatiyeh with the town of Marjayoun occurred in the morning killing a brigadier general, a captain and another soldier, the army said without immediately releasing their names.

Another airstrike on the southern village of Saksakiyah killed six people and wounded four, state-run National News Agency said.

“The continued, deliberate, and repeated Israeli aggression against Lebanon, its people and its army only strengthens our resolve, faith and determination," the army said in its statement.

It said Israel's attacks aim to thwart all efforts “to reach a solution that would restore stability, establish a comprehensive ceasefire and lead to the Israeli withdrawal from the occupied Lebanese territories.”

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the airstrike that killed the troops.

The latest declared ceasefire came about through U.S.-brokered talks between Israel and Lebanon’s government, which accuses Hezbollah of dragging the country into war and had made efforts to disarm it before the latest hostilities. The Lebanese militant group has refused the truce.

The airstrikes came a day after Lebanon’s president and prime minister criticized Iran for opposing the latest ceasefire deal between the Lebanese government and Israel, saying their country should not be used by Tehran as a “bargaining chip” in its talks with Washington.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi responded in a post on X Saturday by saying that after President Joseph Aoun's comments “one would think it’s Iran that has occupied a fifth of Lebanon, displaced a quarter of Lebanese and is bombing his country on daily basis.”

“Had Lebanon been a bargaining chip for Iran, we’d have a deal long ago. Save Lebanon from your real foe, Mr. President,” Araghchi said in reference to Israel.

The war began on March 2 when Hezbollah fired rockets at northern Israel, two days after Israel and the U.S. began their attacks on Iran. Israel has since launched a ground invasion of Lebanon and carried out wide attacks that have displaced more than 1 million people.

Israeli troops have seized around a fifth of Lebanon, pushing further into the country’s south than at any time since the end of Israel’s 1982-2000 occupation.

More than 3,500 people have been killed in Lebanon since the war began. The fighting has killed at least 29 Israeli soldiers and three civilians.

A view of Beaufort Castle, southeast Lebanon, Friday, June 5, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)