MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Protest intensifies in support of Mapuches held under law from Pinochet time

Antiterrorist laws from Pinochet times are still enforced in Chile

Four Chilean deputies were forcefully removed last week from a jail where hunger striking indigenous Mapuche prisoners are being held. The deputies had announced they too would join the strike.

All four deputies are on the Human Rights Committee in Chamber of Deputies – Hugo Gutiérrez, of the Communist Party (PC); Tucapel Jiménez, of the Party for Democracy (PPD); and Manuel Monsalve and Sergio Aguiló, both of the Socialist Party (PS). All belong to the coalition of opposition parties, the centre-left Concertación.

“Their actions were irresponsible and do not help us reach a solution to the problem,” said President Sebastián Piñera. He ordered the deputies to be removed from the prison after they announced they would stay as a symbol of their solidarity with the strikers. They were escorted out of the jail by 20 police officers after a brief struggle.

The strike is in protest over the application of Pinochet-time antiterrorist laws to the Mapuche people. More 100 Mapuche have been arrested as terrorists and are held in jails in southern Chile. Their crimes range from armed assault to arson, carried out in a campaign to reclaim ancestral lands that were sold by the government without the Mapuche’s consent.

The Mapuche are demanding a direct dialogue with the Chilean government, but the government has refused to talk with them until the hunger strike ends. Instead of direct dialogue, leaders from the Catholic and Evangelical churches have said they will negotiate for the two groups.

The 34 Mapuche men are held in four different jails in southern Chile and have been joined by two Mapuche adolescents held in a youth detention centre. Seven of the men were arrested under the anti-terrorist laws since Piñera became president. The others were arrested under the administration of the previous President Michelle Bachelet, who belongs to the Concertación.Carolina Tohá, president of the Party for Democracy (PPD) and the former spokesperson for Bachelet’s administration, said this weekend that the Concertación government made a mistake in applying the anti-terrorism laws to the Mapuche.

The anti-terrorism laws have been criticized for their severity and indiscriminate application to Mapuches, and because they were created during the dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet. Reforms of the laws are currently being reviewed in Congress, part of the government’s effort to persuade the Mapuche to end their hunger strike.

Two Mapuche hunger strikers were hospitalized over the weekend, joining two others that had already been hospitalized. About 20 protesters attacked the vehicle that transported the prisoners to the hospital. Thirteen people were arrested.

The health of the all the strikers is deteriorating, many having lost up to 40 pounds. Health Minister Jaime Mañalich is acting as strike regulator and will coordinate their daily health evaluations. The strikers are being force-fed intravenously by court order.

Ten of the strikers in a jail in Angol announced that they would go on a dry strike today, Monday, and begin to refuse water as well as food.

By Kara Frantzich – Santiago Times