Monday, January 13, 2014

PUBLIC STATEMENT by Jaime Marileo Saravia, of the Mapuche community in resistance Boyen Mapu of Ercilla

I Jaime Marileo Saravia, of the Mapuche community in resistance Boyen Mapu in Ercilla, declare to the Mapuche nation and the national and international public opinion, the following:

On Tuesday January 14, 2014, starts the trial where I am unjustly accused of armed robbery, as a new setup which was created by the Anti-Mapuche Fiscal Luis Chamorro, where the Administration and the Government of the Region IX have adhered without any evidence that truly accuses me of the facts.

I denounce that this accusation which falls down on me, is nothing more than a political persecution by the Chilean government and the big businessmen of this country, in response to my decision that I have taken as Mapuche to fight for the liberation of our territory from landowners and international corporations.
 
For the foregoing reasons, I call on the Mapuche people and social organizations, and on those who believe that the struggle of the Mapuche people for the recovery of the water and the territory is not something that concerns only to us, to join me on Tuesday, January 14, 2014, at 9.00 hrs. in the Oral Criminal Court of Angol, to see together how the setups created by the prosecution fall to pieces again.

FREEDOM TO ALL MAPUCHE POLITICAL PRISONERS
JAIME MARILEO SARAVIA
11 - 01-2014
ERCILLA
 

Saturday, January 11, 2014

PUBLIC STATEMENT BY MAPUCHE POLITICAL PRISONER GABRIEL VALENZUELA FROM THE PRISON FOR MINORS IN CHOL-CHOL, CHILE



To all communities in resistance, the entire national and international public opinion, organizations that support our struggle for reclaiming ancestral lands and autonomy, I, Gabriel Valenzuela Montoya, Mapuche Political Prisoner of the community Wente Winkul Mapu, unjustly condemned by a political setup, denounce that once again the NATIONAL SERVICE FOR MINORS, has violated my rights:

Kiñe: That a week ago I requested respectfully of the management of this Center:
- To authorize me to consume
mate daily and with the visits that I receive.
- That I get authorization to receive silverwork materials and tools donated by a representative of the Jesuit Catholic church, to learn a trade (Mapuche silverwork), with the possibility that a lamgen can come to teach me the art.
- To maintain the professional who has been with me since my entry, because SENAME wants to replace her with a person I do not know and in whom I have no confidence, and this person is not interested in my culture's worldview.

Epu: SENAME has given me no response or outcome of the complaint of abuse I was the victim of, by Mrs. Lorena Kaechele, who last summer was the technical chief, and is now awarded making her the director of the center.

Küla: That on January 8 students from a university in the city of Santiago were forbidden to visit me outside the regular hours without giving any reason, so they had to wait for long hours to enter, which had never happened before. This shows a lack of consideration and flexibility for those who with effort come to see me, so SENAME is isolating me from people coming to give me their support and energy in difficult moments for me because my legal issues still have not been cleared.  

Meli: Thus, the state through its institutions intends to break my spirit, not respecting my cultural customs, and again putting up various obstacles for activities that allow me to resist this unjust imprisonment. SENAME says to look after the conditions and rights of young people, but all it does is to keep me locked up looking to terminate my spirit. 

Kechu: I publicly denounce the Director of this center (Lorena Kaechele) and the Regional Director of SENAME (Claudia de la Hoz) for their racist behaviors and decisions, without arguments for reasons behind their actions, just revealing their lust for power over the integrity of any person. 

For all of this I ask the support of all individuals and organizations, to join in the fight to end the discrimination, violations and abuse that affect me and that may in the future affect other peñi facing the repression and persecution of the Chilean state.

I, Gabriel Montoya Valenzuela,
young Mapuche Political Prisoner, say goodbye from juvenile prison, with my head always held high and my hands clean. 

  Marrichiweu!!!!
Newen!!!! 
Wewaiñ!!!!

Friday, January 10, 2014

Mapuche Leader Daniel Melinao Absolved of All Charges for Alleged Murder of Chilean Police Officer



January 9, 2014

The Criminal Court of Angol absolved Werken Daniel Melinao of the charges that accused him of Sergeant Hugo Albornoz’s murder in April 2012, during a violent raid in the Wente Winkul Mapu Community in Lof Chekenko. Mapuche community members gathered outside the court house to carry out a ceremony.

The decision was presented this morning after reading the verdict. The verdict was divided, two against one, in which the judges could not sustain the absurd set-up that was raised by the prosecution together with the Interior Minister to punish the struggle of Went Winkul Mapu.
We are now awaiting a rebuttal on behalf of Anti-Mapuche Prosecutor, Luis Chamorro, to have the case appealed to the Chilean Supreme Court, or have the trial annulled all together.
Daniel Melinao was charged as the co-author in the murder of GOPE Special Forces Officer Hugo Albornoz, in which young Eric Montoya, remains as the principal accused. Eric had to go underground (before he knew about being charged in the homicide case) after being convicted of charges relating to the reclamation of Mapuche territory, occupied by settler and entrepreneur, Juan de Dios Fuentes; as well as the constant harassment he and his family had suffered by the Prosecution.
According to the Prosecution, Eric Montoya had received ammunition from Daniel Melinao. However, since the case against the Werken in the murder of the Sergeant could not be proven, the second case could also be potentially dismissed by the Courts. This moreover strengthens the arguments made by the Wente Winkul Mapu Community, in that the death of the Sergeant was caused by friendly fire; in other words, by another police officer.
The Prosecution was asking for a 20 year sentence for first degree murder of a Police Officer, solicited a sentence of 10 additional years for attempted murder of other police officers during the events that took place that day, as well as a year for misdemeanor. Daniel Melinao was absolved of all charges and subsequently set free to reunite con his family and return to his community. 


Thursday, January 9, 2014

PUBLIC COMPLAINT BY THE ÑIRRIPIL PEREZ FAMILY. LOF MUKO - Chile 04/01/2014

TO THE NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL PUBLIC OPINION

Faced with the unfair and discriminatory sentence of three years 15 months determined last November 19, 2013 by a Chilean court against our community member JOSÉ ANTONIO ÑIRRIPIL PÉREZ, imputed in the year 2009 under the Anti-Terrorism Act, as a minor, for an alleged attack on the Estate Brasil, we, as the ÑIRRIPIL PÉREZ family of LOF MUKO denounce:

1) The false accusations made ​​by the prosecution to the community members of our Lof, of having carried out terrorist attacks against estates in the area, that are the culmination of a long and sustained campaign of repression and persecution initiated after the just demands for the recovery of our ancestral territory. Thus, the State of Chile maintains the criminalization as a repressive strategy against our political and territorial claims, applying the Anti-Terrorism Act as a way to undermine our procedural rights and deny our access to justice, as demonstrated in this first sentence.
 
2) In 2010, after a prolonged hunger strike where José Antonio and other prosecuted community members of our Lof participated, the Chilean state pledged internationally the inapplicability of the Anti-Terrorism Act against minors. However, José Antonio Ñirripil was charged in 2009 as a teenager, prosecuted as such, and sentenced on November 19th having as SOLE PROOF the statement of a witness with protected identity who acted under the guise of paid informers, only made ​​possible by a special law like the Anti-Terrorism Act. This witness acknowledged even to having been drunk at the time of participating in the alleged attack against Estate Brasil. Therefore, we denounce the failure of the Chilean State to comply with the national and international law, violating our most fundamental rights and procedural guarantees.
 
3) We denounce the biased and racist attitude of the judges who formed the subrogation of the Oral Tribunal that condemned our community member so arbitrarily and with a weak and induced proof. The presiding judge, Judge Mauricio Torres Contreras, having functioned first as a Prosecutor, was in charge of cases of persecution against Mapuche in 2006 [1], the judge Viviana García Utreras was banned in 2010 as a Judge of Warranty by the Court of Appeals of Temuco in the trial against 7 Mapuche community members [2], and the judge Francisco Boero Villagran, appears in 2006 as a plaintiff attorney for Forestry Mininco in trials against Mapuche community members in the region of Ercilla [3]. To this we add the lack of specialization of these judges in the application of the law in cases where minors are judged. [4]
 
4) For all these reasons we denounce the State of Chile for breaching its international commitments and the recommendations made ​​by UN rapporteurs on the rights of indigenous peoples and human rights in relation to the implementation of the Anti-Terrorism Act as a way to criminalize and prosecute our territorial claims, and we also emphasize how the Chilean government continues to implement this law of exception against Mapuche minors through the use of evidence like the protected witnesses and paid informers.  

5) We also denounce the discriminatory and racist actions of the State of Chile against our community members, criminalizing our fair territorial claims and maintaining against our communities a violent and repressive action, preventing our access to justice and the exercise of our rights and causing serious psychosocial consequences in our communities and our children, women and elderly. In the particular situation of our family, we have suffered persecution, discrimination and stigmatization of all our members, with particular emphasis on the severity of impact and traumatization of our children and the abuse and torture José Antonio was subjected to, BEING A MINOR, during arrests by the Police Department, added to the long period of incarceration in the CIP of Chol Chol, as a detention center for adolescents. At this point should be considered the severe psychological consequences caused by the preventive detention, which constitutes a form of deprivation of freedom.

Therefore, we call on the national and international civil society to demand that the State of Chile fulfills its commitments on the human rights of the Mapuche people and to speak out regarding the request for revocation filed with the Supreme Court, whose decision will be read next January 9, 2014. We emphasize that this new and unjust condemnation of our community member José Antonio Ñirripil Pérez, tried as a minor, also makes us distrust the effective implementation of procedural safeguards in the coming trials against our community members tried as adults.