The Mapuche conflict

A News Digest Of The Mapuche Conflict During July And August

The Santiago Times - Aug. 24, 2004.

Ed. Note: In the following article, Kurt Perry, a freelance journalist working for the Mapuche International Link - MIL -, gives an update on what is one of the oldest issues in Chile: the conflict between authorities and the Mapuches, Chile's largest indigenous people. This month's update also includes news regarding the trans-Andean Mapuche living in Argentine territory.

MIL is a British based international voluntary movement established in 1996 to campaign for social, economic, political and environmental justice for the indigenous Mapuche peoples of Chile and Argentina. The organization's work, based on the support and dedication of its volunteers, aims to bring about a just and peaceful resolution to the Mapuche conflict.)

Amnesty International Urges Protection For Mapuche Leader

On Aug. 12 Amnesty International (AI), the international human rights non-governmental organization, launched an urgent action campaign in support of a Mapuche community leader.

In its press release, AI described how Juana Calfunao Paillalef of Cunco, in region IX, had suffered a "campaign of intimidation, including the apparent murder of her uncle and an arson attack on her home."

AI believed the incidents were connected to a long-running land dispute between the Mapuche community and local landowners.

According to AI, a fire gutted Paillalef's house on June 26 and the charred body of her uncle, Basilio Conoenao, was later discovered in the ruins. Conoenao had not been staying at the house and many local people speculated that Conoenao had been killed elsewhere and his body then planted in the building in an apparent attempt to cover-up his murder. Both Paillalef and Conoenao were Mapuche community leaders (or Lonkos as they are known in the native Mapudungun language).

Paillalef and her family were reported to have endured threats and intimidation from local landowners, including guns fired into the air outside the family home, who allegedly wanted the family to abandon their home. The AI press release described how the family had reported to the police four incidents of threatening behavior during July alone. It was unclear whether or not the Carabineros had ordered any investigation or whether any measures were taken to protect the family. AI also said that Paillalef had been imprisoned for three days in May 2000 after a man attacked her in Temuco and that, whilst in custody, she was beaten by Carabineros which resulted in her suffering a miscarriage.

AI urged its members to write to the Chilean government to express concern for the safety of Paillalef and her family and to call for a prompt and impartial investigation into the alleged arson attack and the death of Conoenao. AI also urged members to ask the Chilean government to provide information on the progress of an investigation into the alleged torture that resulted in the loss of Paillalef's unborn child.

Chilean Ignores U.N. Recommendations As Mapuche Activists Are Found Guilty Of "Terrorist Crimes"

Five Mapuche activists have recently been convicted under Chile's counter-terrorism law (ST, Aug. 19). A total of 11 Mapuche activists had been accused of setting fire to property belonging to a multinational logging company following a long-running dispute over Mapuche ancestral land rights. Eight of the accused failed to present themselves before court claiming that Chile's judicial system "criminalizes the indigenous cause and has a racist bias against the Mapuche."

The use of Chile's counter-terrorism legislation, which had been passed into law under the Pinochet dictatorship, had proven to be controversial and had been criticized by the United Nations in a report published in November 2003. In the report, which covered an official U.N. visit to Chile in July 2003, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous people, Mr. Rodolfo Stavenhagen, said "under no circumstances should legitimate protest activities or social demands by indigenous organizations and communities be outlawed or penalized." He added that "charges for offences in other contexts ("terrorist threat", "criminal association") should not be applied to acts related to the social struggle for land and legitimate indigenous complaints."

According to Sebastian Brett, of Human Rights Watch in Chile, the Mapuche activists were not 'terrorists' because their crimes were "not against human life or liberty, but basically against property, and they stem from a wide sense of grievance among the Mapuches that they have illegally been deprived of their lands."

International Media Turn Attention To Benetton "Land Grab"

The reputation of Italian clothing giant Benetton was thrust firmly under the media spotlight during July and August amid claims that its policies were forcing greater impoverishment upon the Mapuche population.

Benetton had won a land dispute on May 31 when a court, in the southern province of Chubut in Argentina, ruled that Benetton legally owned 500 hectares of previously disused land in Patagonia that a Mapuche family had been farming (ST, July 1). Just weeks after the Curinanco-Nahuelquirs family moved onto the land, Benetton claimed it as their own and police forcibly removed the family from their ancestral land. The plot of land in question was just a fraction of the vast Mapuche territory given in 1896 to a British-owned business (later bought by Benetton) during the bloody military campaign that resulted in the slaughter of thousands of native Mapuche people. According to a report on Aug. 19 by The Inter Press Service News Agency, Mauro Millán (of the 11 de Octubre Mapuche-Tehuelche Organization) claimed he had evidence that a Benetton-owned business had recently discovered gold on the land from which the Mapuche family had been evicted. Millán said Benetton's "interest in the land is focused on the exploitation of minerals."

International media interest in the Mapuche dispute with Benetton erupted when The Guardian, The Observer and The Independent, amongst others, published articles that challenged Benetton's carefully crafted image as a progressive and compassionate business. Mapuche sympathizers who had been campaigning for the return of ancestral Mapuche territory from Benetton dubbed their campaign "The Invisible Colours of Benetton."

In what was another sign of increased media interest in the Mapuche conflict, the New York Times published an article on Aug. 12 addressing the land disputes between Mapuche communities and multi-national logging companies and the subsequent use of Chile's widely condemned counter-terrorism laws to suppress Mapuche dissent. According to Reynaldo Mariqueo, General Secretary of the U.K.-based Mapuche International Link, "coverage of the plight of the native Mapuche nation by western mainstream media is long overdue but very welcome. I hope the people of the world can now awaken their conscience to the grave mistreatment our people have endured for over a hundred years."

Nobel Prize Winner Sends Open Letter To Benetton

On July 13 former Argentine Nobel prize winner, Aldofo Pérez Esquivel, sent an open letter to Luciano Benetton (Benetton's chairman) accusing him of behaving "with the same mentality as the conquistadors." Esquivel claimed that Mapuche activists would continue to fight Benetton's land claims, at the inter-American court of justice or, if necessary, through other international human-rights institutions.

In a response, published in the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, Mr. Benetton, one of the world's wealthiest people, said "We Benetton have simply followed the economic rules we believe in." Esquivel, described by The Guardian as "one of the developing world's most authoritative figures", told Benetton "Life has disappeared, because everything has been reduced to its economic worth."

Judge Rejects Mapuche Eviction

It was reported on Aug. 19 that Argentine Judge Emilio Riat had ruled against an eviction notice served against a Mapuche community in the Rio Negro province of Argentina.

In his ruling, Riat confirmed that the national constitution "ultimately and categorically" recognized the "ethnic and cultural (occupation) of (land by) Argentine indigenous peoples." The case had been brought by an Argentine family who claimed possession of land titles, dating back to 1928, that had been given to them by a former governor of Rio Negro. The decision contradicted a May 31 ruling, which saw a Mapuche family evicted from ancestral Mapuche land, the legal ownership of which was deemed to rest with Benetton.

Mapuche Represented At International Day Of The World's Indigenous Peoples

Indigenous people from around the world gathered in Barcelona, Spain, on Aug. 9 to demand that governments include their communities in policy decisions affecting their traditional indigenous way of life.

The forum, called 'International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples', which included Mapuche representatives, denounced governments for having signed only two of the 45 articles contained within a draft U.N. 'Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples' which was due to have been adopted this year.

The United Nations has been in negotiations with member states over the draft declaration for a decade. According to Julian Borger, the director of the Office of Indigenous Peoples at the U.N. High Commission of Human Rights, the prospect of granting indigenous people the right to self-determination and the right to control the natural resources of their own territories were the main points of contention for governments.

Mapuche Help Inaugurate Hemispheric Indigenous Summit

Representatives from the Mapuche nation helped to inaugurate a hemispheric summit in Quito, Ecuador, on July 22. The summit began when several thousand indigenous people from around the Americas marched through Quito's main streets to the summit's venue at Salesian University.

The summit was described as a means to "study our problems and difficulties and to analyze our hopes and the road we need to take forward sharing and creating solidarity in each of our nations." Topics discussed at the event included indigenous land rights, the right to self-determination and the recognition of indigenous rights in national constitutions.

Economist Says Risk Of Conflict In Chile Remains Very Low And Localized

According to a report on Chile's political and economic risks, by the influential Economist Intelligence Unit, the risk of internal conflict in Chile remains "very low and localized." The report claimed the "main source of conflict is radical Mapuche Indian groups, who have used violent tactics to press their land claims in the past." A Mapuche spokesperson said the report "failed to take into account the history of the Mapuche conflict and ignored the violence meted out to Mapuche communities by the Chilean authorities."

Mapuche Delegation In Buenos Aires For Talks

On July 14 a delegation from the Mapuche Tehuelche nation arrived in Buenos Aires for six days of meetings with government officials and social organizations. The delegation delivered a proclamation to the National Congress (the national legislature in Argentina) demanding recognition of Mapuche rights in Argentina.

Mapuche New Year Celebrations

From June 21 to June 24 Mapuche people celebrated the beginning of the Mapuche New Year by bathing in cold rivers to purify their bodies and souls, an ancient tradition in Mapuche culture. The celebrations also included demands for constitutional recognition of their rights as the native peoples of Chile and Argentina. Jose Llancapa, a representative of urban Mapuches in the government agency CONADI (National Corporation for Indigenous Development), said "Despite the fact that we are natives, we are here, we are a people and we have a culture, the constitution does not recognize us."

Government Officially Recognizes Ancient Mapuche Sport

On June 23 Assistant Secretary for Sport, Ernesto Velasco, presided over a ceremony in a Mapuche community near the southern city of Temuco to officially recognize the ancient Mapuche game of palin.

Palin, which had been described as a game similar to field hockey, is a team game played on a rectangular field in which the players use wooden sticks to battle for a wooden ball. Unlike other modern sports, palin has no referees to oversee foul-play because this kind of behavior was deemed undesirable in Mapuche culture.


SOURCE: NEW YORK TIMES, THE GUARDIAN, THE INDEPENDENT, THE ECONOMIST, IHT, UNHCR.ORG, MAPUCHE-NATION.ORG
By Kurt Perry ( kurtperry@hotmail.com )

http://www.tcgnews.com/santiagotimes/index.php?nav=story&story_id=7148&topic_id=14

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