In the early 1860s, French lawyer Orelie de Tounens travelled to Araucania and established himself as King with the consent of the indigenous population. Contrary to the colonial agenda which would later massacre 90 percent of the Mapuche population in an invasion known as the “Pacification of Araucania”, de Tounens established a system based upon…
Tag: MAPUCHE
What happened after Chile withdrew from the Escazú Agreement?
In 2018, 16 Latin American and Caribbean countries signed the legally-binding Escazú Agreement, which sought to counter government and multinational corruption, exploitation of resources and violence against environmental activists in the region. Costa Rica and Chile had pioneered the agreement, the latter under former President Michelle Bachelet, even as, on home terrain, Mapuche activists seeking…
Delaying publication of the settlement blacklist exposes the UN’s false narratives on human rights
The UN is openly flaunting its priorities and, sadly, human rights are far from a major concern for the international organisation. Since its creation post-World War Two, and having established itself as the platform which determines what constitutes a human rights violation and which countries can be considered as perpetrators, several trends have emerged within…
Mapuche murders not just a right-wing issue
The killing of Mapuche youth Camilo Catrillanca earlier this month triggered outrage throughout Chile and the resurgence of a prevailing fear that the country is becoming increasingly militarised. President Sebastian Pinera has indeed acted upon his electoral promises, which included restructuring the dictatorship-era anti-terror laws in order to make it easier to criminalise the indigenous…
In Chile, dismissing Mapuche resistance as terrorism
Saturday marked the International Day of the World’s Indigenous People. In the U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon’s futile rhetoric, “The interests of the indigenous people must be part of the new development agenda in order for it to succeed … Together, let us recognize and celebrate the valuable and distinctive identities of indigenous people around the…
A Poetic Concept of Identity: An interview with Mapuche poet David Aninir Guilitraro
The culture of Mapuche poetry has evolved into three distinctive forms: traditional, intellectual and urban. David Aniñir Guilitraro, an urban Mapuche poet from Santiago, has created a literary realm which connects the history of the Mapuche struggle to the social problems which the people face today. Guilitraro describes his book, Mapurbe, as ‘a poetic concept of identity’…
A Repressive Status Quo
Chile’s president-elect, Sebastian Piñera of the right-wing party Renovación Nacional (National Renewal, RN) recently announced that he plans to “modernize” the country’s Anti-Terrorist Law when he takes office. This announcement builds on promises from throughout his 2017 Chilean electoral campaign, when Piñera said on multiple occasions that his new aministration would seek to perfect the law, which…
RAMONA WADI 