Argentina’s Mapuche say they will challenge a hydrofracking deal with Chevron, the multinational scofflaw that refuses to pay $19 billion it owes indigenous Ecuadorans.
President Sebastián Piñera offered to have “consultations” with the Mapuche. Indigenous leaders responded by calling for self-government.
Plans for a major hydroelectric plant in southern Chile have been stalled by environmental concerns and oppostion from Mapuche communities fearing the loss of sacred sites.
Some 20 Mapuche protesters, including women and children, were assaulted and arrested as they demonstrated outside a hearing for a prisoner on hunger strike.
“It was painful to see him,” a Spanish legislator said about the imprisoned activist, who had been on hunger strike for 74 days. “Mr. Héctor Llaitul could die at any moment.”
The Chilean government prepared to step up repression against Mapuche activists after an elderly couple died in a fire set at their estate by some 20 masked men.
The Supreme Court quashed the convictions of two Mapuche prisoners for attempted homicide of police agents; the prisoners had protested their convictions with a 60-day fast.
Thousands marched in Santiago to demand respect for the rights of Chile’s indigenous peoples, while nine Mapuche prisoners maintained a hunger strike.
Five Mapuche prisoners began a hunger strike on Oct. 1 in Temuco, joining four Mapuche prisoners who have been on hunger strike in Angol since Aug. 27.
Huilliche activists blocked a highway, burning rubbish and setting up barricades to protest a Supreme Court decision denying them access to a sacred site.
Seven Mapuche activists went on hunger strike to protest what they consider the Chilean government’s repression of struggles by the indigenous group to regain ancestral lands.
Some 200 carabineros militarized police violently removed about 60 Mapuche on July 23 from land the indigenous people had occupied hours earlier near their homes in the Temucuicui community in the southern Chilean region of Araucanía. The carabineros threw tear gas grenades and fired… Read moreChile: Carabineros attack Mapuche children
