Public Statement of the Mapuche Lof Rofue, on the beginning of the trial on October 8, 2013 against five members, including their Machi, Chile

Monday October 7, 201
Source: http://meli.mapuches.org/spip.php?article3093
By Commission of Communications / / Campaign to Free All Mapuche Political Prisoners

The Lof Rofue Ñi Wekeche Aukinko, before the beginning of the trial on October 8, 2013 against five members of our Lof, including our Machi, we wish to point out to our Mapuche People, the national and international society the following:

- On August 1, 2012 there was carried out a violent eviction at the San Fidel Greater Seminary corresponding to the Diocese of Villarrica, where five of our brothers were violently arrested and brought before courts initiating legal proceedings against them.

- In this process the Church and the prosecution have persevered in their intentions to criminalize our struggle which we started years ago to regain our territory, which the church appropriated through illegal processes, a situation that has not yet been been resolved even if the property in question is being reclaimed since decades.

- We condemn the attitude that the Catholic Church has adopted, particularly by the Bishop Francisco Javier Stegmayer and the Priest Andrés Marican, who to our legitimate demands for the territory that they hold usurped have responded by judicializing and persecuting our people.

- For the above, we call on the Mapuche People in general, to manifest a public rejection of the double standard attitude that the Catholic Church is exercising against the legitimate demands of our people, as it professes support and restitution of a historical debt to the native peoples, but in turn imprisons, prosecutes and especially colludes with the Chilean State in persecuting Mapuche ancestral authorities, violating an essential right as is the freedom in their territory.

- It should be remembered that the Church maintains various usurped territories within Wallmapu and therefore must start paying its historical debt as it has been recognized by the Church and returned to our people the land that is by ancestral right.
    
- It seems inconceivable that these situations are embraced under the umbrella of a religious, political and social institution, which today is so challenged by its corruption and sexual abuse against children and which also takes part of a new genocide of the Mapuche people and culture, which has been triggered by participating as usurpers within the territory under recuperation and subsequent criminalization of the struggle for national Mapuche liberation. 

ON THE ROAD TO THE LIBERATION OF OUR TERRITORY WE DEMAND THE CATHOLIC CHURCH TO IMMEDIATELY DE-OCCUPY OUR ANCESTRAL LANDS!!!!

FOR THE FREEDOM AND DIGNITY OF OUR PURSUED AND IMPRISONED
MACHI!!!!

AMULEPE TAIÑ MAPUCHE MOGEN!!!! ...... AMULEPE TAIÑ WEICHAN!!!!
MARRICHIWEW!!!!