Translation by Diarmuid Breatnach
https://www.pagina12.com.ar/93239-en-cushamen-siguen-los-atropellos
Abuses against indigenous people continue in the Cushamen region.
Six months after the repression that led to the death of Santiago Maldonado, members of the (Argentine) Gendarmerie entered the Mapuche community this morning. They tied up several of their members and seized the horses, which were then taken to a van owned by businessman Luciano Benetton. They (the victims – translator) said that the operation was illegal and do not rule out that “planting evidence” was the purpose.
Members of the Mapuche Pu Lof community in Resistencia Cushamen, in Esquel (in Argentina – trans.), denounced that this morning Gendarmerie officers carried out a new raid ordered by Judge Graciela Rodríguez and prosecutor Díaz Meyer after a complaint from the Leleque ranch, owned by Italian magnate Luciano Benetton. According to the members of the community, the occupants were cuffed with plastic ties during the operation and their horses seized, these being taken to a van belonging to the Tierras del Sud (Southern Lands – trans.) company, owned by Benetton. A woman was injured and had to be taken to hospital. Yesterday was six months since the disappearance and death of Santiago Maldonado, victim of the police repression of that same community.
The reports of community members were disseminated through the Communities in Conflict Support Network, reporting that the troops arrived in the community at the first hour of the morning and “kept the members of the community under guard without even letting them go to the bathroom.” They reported that the officers took the horses that they had in the community, which they loaded on to a truck of the company Tierras del Sud, owned by Benetton. After the operation, a woman named Vanesa Millañanco had to be transferred to the hospital in Maitén and the community maintained that her health status is unknown.
“We denounce this new outrage at Pu Lof Resistance Cushamen as totally illegal because it was not supervised by witnesses, that is to say that the repressive forces did what they wanted during the time when they could incriminate members of the community through planting false evidence,” the community statement declared. The community also targetd the Security Minister, Patricia Bullrich, as responsible for a “hunt against the Mapuche people and a truly unscrupulous media defamation campaign.”
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