Demonstrations in Support of Mapuche Prisoners on Hunger Strike in Chile

Today in Chile demonstrations are taking place throughout the country in support of the now thirty hunger striking Mapuche prisoners and their cause. The strikers and their supporters are calling for an end to the government's application of the Chilean state's anti-terror laws and military jurisdiction to Mapuche people. Such laws were implemented during the Pinochet dictatorship.

Submitting the Mapuche to this jurisdiction transfers what the Mapuche see as legitimate resistance to the continuing manifestation of a centuries-old tradition of oppression, into the politically loaded context of terror and national security. Kaitlin Porter of the Council of Hemispheric Affairs suggests that one of the implications of this is that when or if such cases are brought to trial, the impartiality of the jury is influenced by the polemical nature of the word 'terrorism'. According to Porter, such laws allow the Mapuche to be held in custody for up to a year while pre-court proceedings take place.

The hunger striking began on 12 July with around twenty strikers, with another ten or so having joined the action at later dates. As of the writing of this, despite calls from the strikers and their sympathisers (including from Chilean Viviana Canibilo Ramírez who now lives in Queensland, Australia) upon President Sebastian Piñera to respond to the situation, no official announcements have been offered from Piñera or his government. This is despite his government having been vocal in its support of Cuban hunger strikers since inauguration in March.

Demonstrations were scheduled to take place today in Valdivia, Temuco and Concepción at 10AM, Valparaíso at 6.30PM and Santiago at 7.30PM.

More information here (in Spanish).

See also The Mapuche Struggle for Autonomy (by Kaitlin Porter, in English).