1653444977 An ambush on forest workers leaves one dead in Araucania

An ambush on forest workers leaves one dead in Araucanía, Chile

The Araucanía Air Section police are relocating the forest worker wounded by a bullet during an ambush this Tuesday, May 24, 2022.The Araucanía Air Section police transfer the forest worker wounded by a bullet during an ambush this Tuesday, May 24, 2022.CarabAraucania (RR.SS)

A week after Gabriel Boric’s government declared a “limited” state of emergency in the La Araucanía region and two provinces of Biobío in southern Chile, a new day of violence was witnessed this Tuesday in the Mapuche claim area. In a part of the country where Aboriginal demand for land has become more complex over time with the explosion of other crimes — such as roadblocks, timber theft, drug trafficking, high firepower and fatality attacks — a group of hooded men attacked Tomorrow a bus with about 30 workers from the forest company Mininco in the municipality of Lumaco. There were at least three gunshot wounds and one of them, precisely a 66-year-old worker of Mapuche origin, died this afternoon, Interior Minister Izkia Siches confirmed. Meanwhile, about fifty hooded men armed with firearms attacked a Carabineros base guarding a property in the Quidico area.

“My heartfelt condolences go out to the family and close friends of Juan Segundo Catril Neculqueo, a 66-year-old worker and father of four. There is no justification for such an act of violence. We’re getting to the bottom of the matter and looking for those responsible,” Siches wrote on Tuesday afternoon on social networks.

Shortly before, it was President Boric himself who pointed out this tragic day in the so-called southern macro zone. “We will not accept violence being imposed as a method of conflict resolution,” said the president, who, despite initial resistance and that of his own political forces, had to turn to the military last week to help control US streets help area and maintain free traffic.

“There are some who believe that by attacking humans themselves they can achieve ends they may deem noble. But be aware that if the means are not noble, the ends lose that end,” the left-wing president stressed, referring to other acts of violence of great consequence that have taken place in Chile in recent hours, such as the burning of buses by part of the secondary school students of the historical institutions of the capital.

In an activity with the Grand Lodge of Chile, Boric mentioned the worker who was then in a serious condition. “Today Arauco has a sentence and that sentence is called Segundo Catril Neculqueo, the name of a worker who was shot in the head today who is undergoing an operation and with whom from this solemn place I want to express all my solidarity and say that Our deepest duty is to do something very basic: to say and to repeat ad nauseam that violence is not the way”.

On behalf of the government, Minister Siches dismissed the day’s acts of violence and announced a criminal complaint to investigate the attack on workers in La Araucanía. “She is another victim of the violence that is taking place in our south,” said the doctor in charge of law and order. “Together with the prosecutor’s office, our police and our investigative police, we hope to get to the bottom of these events and look for those responsible who will effectively ensure that the rule of law reaches the entire national territory,” added the minister.

Siches used his intervention from La Moneda to “evaluate” the work carried out by the armed forces a week ago “to support and protect the routes for clearance and continuous supplies and transfers through the different routes” what “The release of the Carabineros forces should go into the prevention and control of public order,” said the head of the government cabinet.

Both the President and the political generation that arrived in La Moneda just over two months ago have criticized the opposition’s strategy of imposing constitutional states of exception in La Araucanía and the surrounding area, where the conflict over ancestral lands has become more complex in recent years, the appearance new crime. The right-wing Sebastián Piñera, his predecessor in office, deployed the military in October 2020, which was successively renewed with the approval of parliament.

But since taking office, President Boric has opted for a new strategy based primarily on political dialogue. Minister Siches herself was greeted in an unprecedented event in democracy with an attack on the Mapuche Temucuicui community when she first traveled to the area as head of the law enforcement agency. Nevertheless, on March 26, the de-escalation of the military occupation began. However, the back-to-back acts of violence made the new left-wing government’s bet untenable, and it had to resort to the uniformed men again last week to try to control the violence.

In La Araucanía and the adjacent areas, the situation is getting entangled with the hours. Lumaco Mayor Richard Leonelli said this afternoon: “We are witnessing a very worrying situation.”