New wave of repression and arrests of the Mapuche in Chile

A-Infos News Service, August 1999

Yesterday another thirteen Mapuches were arrested, amongst them the Mapuche lawyer, Jose Lincoqueo Huenuman, Head of the Legal Department of the Mapuche Inter-regional Council.

Jose Lincoqueo is the first Mapuche lawyer to discover the international treaties ratified between the Spanish Crown and the Mapuche nation and he argues that the laws of the southern territories and the laws relating to indigenous people lack a legal and constitutional basis from the Bio Bio River southwards because they do not take into account the 28 treaties and international conventions held between the Spanish Crown and the Mapuche nation.

In the last few days the Chilean military police force has taken violent and co-ordinated action in different parts of the ancestral territory of the Mapuche nation to expel Mapuche communities.

These recent occurrences provide extra justification for the Draft Resolution (at present under consideration), which was presented to the European Parliament by Mapuche organisations and support groups in other countries and which request Europe to condemn the Chilean government for violation of the rights of the Mapuche Nation.

In confronting this situation we, the Mapuches living in Europe together with our supporters, consider that it is imperative to press for immediate action by relevant bodies of the United Nations, requesting their immediate intervention by dispatching a top-level delegation to verify the complaints of the communities affected.