Esquel, Puelmapuche, 16th March 2003
Some 20 local police from Chubut remain in Vuelta Del Rio, while members of the community are gathered there ready to prevent the eviction of the Fermin family.
At around 11am yesterday, 20 policemen from Chubut, from the Cushamen and El Maiten detachments came to the home of the Fermin family, in the Vuelta Del Rio Mapuche community in the north east of Chubut. The police were led by a member of the landowning El Khazen family who believe they have a right to this land. On arrival the police claimed they were following an order of eviction from the examining magistrate, Judge Jose Colabelli, but our pu peñi ka pu lamuen (Mapuche brothers and sisters) confirmed that at no stage were they shown nor read any legal warrant, despite having asked for one.
The police then began to dismantle the Fermin family's house and released their livestock onto the land so they would ruin all the crops. The police also threatened one of Mr. and Mrs. Fermin's sons in an attempt to stop him trying to tell the rest of the community what was happening. He was told that if he opened his mouth both he and his father would be arrested.
There are seven people in the Fermin family - three adults and four children. They have been in conflict with the usurping El Khazen family for decades.
This new outrage is part of a new wave of repression against our People: in October last year the Curiñanco family was forced off their land (the conflict with Benetton in Leleque); in February the lamuen Fidelia Ayllapan was tried for usurpation (in Mallin Ahogado, Rio Negro); at the beginning of March the Argentine army began to get the legal mechanisms in motion to forcibly remove the Tehuelche community Prane de la Legua 4 (Boquete Nahuelpan); also, two brothers from the Pillan Mahuiza community in Corcovado are being charged with sedition.
However, it is not only the Mapuche Tehuelche people that the repressive Argentine state has in its sites, but also many other friends from non-Mapuche society: the members of the assembly of Vecinos Autoconvocados de Esquel por el No a la Mina (the people of Esquel against the Meridian Gold Mine proposal) in our city; the picketers in the federal capital and in Gran Buenos Aires; the peasants from Mo.Ca.Se, in Santiago del Estero; the potters from Zanon, in Neuquen; and many more.
For this reason, now more than ever we reassert:
THE RESISTANCE OF THE OPPRESSED IS THE END OF THE TYRANTS
Marici Weu! (For every one person that falls, ten will rise in his place)
Organisation of Mapuche Tehuelche Communities 11th
October
puelmapu@terra.com.ar
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Translated by Kitty McCarthy
Mapuche International Link