Mapuche prisoners have been on hunger strike for more than 100 days demanding restitution of rights

August 18, 2023: The website Resumen posted Nicolas Salazar Maleras’ article “Mapuche prisoners have been on hunger strike for more than 100 days demanding restitution of rights“.

The following excerpts are from the article (originally posted in Spanish). Please note that the quotations have been translated using Google Translate and may not be exact:

• 17 Mapuche community members are on a hunger strike that has been going on for more than 100 days. 10 of them began a dry hunger strike on Tuesday, August 16, 2023. The hunger strike was triggered by a reduction in the political prisoners’ rights while being held in the prison.

• The prison institute argued that, on May 7, 2023, a riot at the prison ended with wounded gendarmes and an alleged kidnapping by the Mapuche community members.

• Rodrigo Kuripan, spokesman for the political prisoners on hunger strike, stated:

“this is happening because of the government’s lack of will to respond to our demands… …on May 7, 2023, the Gendarmerie began to restrict a series of agreements and rights that we had achieved. These consisted of guarantees of visits, food, and we had the right to a place to generate cultural and spiritual spaces. All this is being prohibited by the Gendarmerie.”

• Kuripan stated that on May 7th:

“there were Mapuche injuries inside the prison as a result of ballistic impacts. In addition, there was a dispersal, where 6 peñi were sent to the prisons of Rancagua, Concepción and Puerto Montt. Thanks to a Supreme Court ruling, the peñis were able to return to the region, and today they are in the Temuco prison.”

Regarding the demands of the strikers, Rodrigo Kuripan stated:

“the petition consists of two points. The first is that the peñis that are in the Temuco prison return to the Angol prison because we believe that it is the place where they should be, because it is the prison that has the best conditions for them. The second is that the conditions of visits, food and cultural spaces be restored…  …we want to maintain the same conditions that existed until May 7, when the Gendarmerie eliminated them… …we also demand that the relatives of the prisoners do not have such humiliating conditions when visiting their loved ones, and that the children can see their parents.”

The full article can be read on Resumen’s website.