Héctor Llaitul, leader of the Coordinadora Arauco Malleco (CAM) was arrested on August 24 by the Chilean police in a qualitative leap in the repression of the Chilean state against the native ethnic group de facto led by Llaitul. It is not the first time he has been arrested. His life is marked by a long militant career, first in Chilean left-wing organizations and then in the Mapuche nationalists. In 1988 he was arrested by the Carabineros, for which he later filed a lawsuit alleging torture.
Then, in 2008, he was found guilty of frustrated homicide against prosecutor Mario Elgueta. However, the Supreme Court accepted an annulment appeal in favor of Llaitul, so he was released after 5 years in prison. In 2017, during the so-called "Hurricane Operation", he was arrested by , but later released for falsification of evidence and instrument by police personnel. Now he has been accused of violent usurpation, incitement to the destruction of private facilities and theft of wood by the left-wing "progressive" government of Gabriel Boric, which maintains the same line as the right against the Mapuche minority .
On August 31, the police arrested three other Mapuche Indians, among them Ernesto Llaitul, 26 years old and son of Héctor, in the commune of Carahue, Araucania region. In the investigation led by the regional prosecutor of Biobío, Marcela Cartagena, they were arrested, in addition to the son of the CAM leader, Ricardo Delgado and Esteban Henríquez, as authors of two fires and two thwarted homicides. dances of rustic crafts, such as chopping boards, bowls, coffee tables and flat line furniture making, demonstrating great skill in both trades with excellent work, enabling him to generate his own monetary resources for continue to develop in these areas, carrying out tasks with clear and own ideas, maintaining dedication to everything that is proposed personally".
Hunger strike in prisons, the case of Víctor Llanquileo
There are already dozens of Mapuche imprisoned by the Chilean state. On the prison front, the situation has also become very tense due to the growing repression of the Boric government. In particular, the hunger strike of Víctor Llanquileo Pilquimá, Yerko Maril and Esteban Carrera should be highlighted. The former announced on August 30 his decision to start a dry hunger strike while he is imprisoned in the Arauco prison, located in the Bío Bío region, where his relatives say that his state of health is getting worse with the passing of the hours. As he argued through a communiqué issued by the environment of Llanquileo itself, the measure was adopted as a way of pressuring and demanding his transfer to the Study and Work Center of the Cañete prison, located in the same region, and after carrying out a 15-day liquid strike (started on August 15 this year). Maril and Carrera started the liquid hunger strike on August 25 of this year.
Regarding Llanquileo's situation, it should be mentioned that he is currently serving a 21-year prison sentence following his participation in an assault with hostages in the municipality of Galvarino, registered in 2018. Llanquileo, 46 years old, he is the older brother of Ramón Llanquileo, ex-member of the Coordinadora Arauco Malleco (CAM) and of the lawyer Natividad Llanquileo, who was one of the members of the Constitutional Convention to which he reached within the quotas of seats reserved for the Mapuche people. In 2010, he was one of 35 members of the community in prison who carried out a widespread hunger strike in which the then Minister of Health, Jaime Mañalich, intervened, negotiating with the leader of the CAM, Héctor Llaitul, to end it.
Increasing armed actions on the ground
Shortly after starting his hunger strike, Llaquileo received support on the ground from armed groups. In an attack, claimed on August 22 by the Mapuche Lafkenche Resistance group, they shot the legs and arms of a man, who survived. The RML offensive happened after the Gendarmerie agreed to transfer 2 Mapuche prisoners after that another radical group, the Mapuche Malleco Resistance, threatened the warden of Angol. RML and RMM concluded in July of this year a strategic alliance with the Mapuche National Liberation (LNM) to oppose the state of emergency decreed in May by the government. They did it at the butra txawün (big meeting) held on July 22 at Lov Elicura del Biobío. RMM, LNM and RML would have agreed to oppose the "Bon Viure" plan promoted by the government to encourage dialogue in the area. Wallmapu is moving towards liberation is the message repeated on two banners found after the RMM and LNM attacks.
"We have gathered in a butra txawün inside Lov Elicura in order to analyze from our own Mapuche agenda the new colonial policies of the Chilean state promoted by the Wingka (foreign) government led by Gabriel Boric," he record the statement. We are talking about the 'Buen Vivir' plan, a design that includes money for the purchase of exclusive tax lands to pursue the Mapuche Resistance, the implementation of the state of emergency that today has the military deployed by Wallmapu and the holding of 'parliaments' with some Mapuche sectors, to give legitimacy to the plan".
Likewise, the three armed organizations rejected the collaborationist path of some local indigenous chiefs with the visit made in June by a group of Mapuche leaders to the presidential palace of La Moneda - "these lonkos (chiefs) do not represent kimun (knowledge) nor the rakiduam (thought) of the Mapuche resistance. We make clear our irrevocable decision to follow the path of weichan (struggle) inherited by our kuivikecheyem (the ancients) and we support without any moral fixation all the Mapuche political prisoners kidnapped in the various prisons of the south, especially the PPM (Political Prisoners Mapuches) of Lov Elicura recently convicted", they wrote in reference to the 8 convicted for the murder of Eleodoro Raiman. The 69-year-old Mapuche worker died in December 2019 after he was hit on the head with a weño (wooden stick for playing palí or Mapuche hockey), when he objected to his campsite being taken. The RML had previously vindicated those convicted after various attacks. "We understand that territorial control and Mapuche resistance are the fundamental axes for Mapuche national reconstruction. This is why we value dialogue and unity from the weichan and invite other Mapuche sectors organized under this idea to continue joining forces and generating strategic alliances against the same common enemy: the state and the capitalist system”
RMM was the author of the attack on an airfield that month when an indeterminate group of armed hooded men went to intimidate the wardies and burned the 3 aircraft that were in the hangar, before fleeing by firing shots into the air. Wallmapu advances liberation,' read part of the text on a sheet found at the site. RMM has been operating since at least 2016 in the province of Malleco, it includes religious temples among its targets and the police link it to the autonomous community of Temucuicui in the commune of Ercilla. They are currently being investigated for the March ambush of Interior Minister Izkia Siches, which prevented her from entering Temucuicui and thwarted plans to open a broad dialogue amid the crisis of violence in the south.
LNM burned down an employer's house leaving the same message as the previous organizations. LNM appeared on the radar of the police after an attack carried out in July 2021. In June of this year they were awarded an arson attack perpetrated in the Nilpe de Galvarino fund, where the president of the Confederation of Production and Commerce, Juan Sutil, produces cherries for export. “In defense of the lewfu (river). Fora Sutil", said part of the banner found then and signed LNM.
Another group, Weichan Auka Mapu has also carried out attacks in recent days. About fifteen hooded men entered the Futrún de Panguipulli estate in Los Ríos and burned 4 cabins, a Catholic chapel, 2 dining rooms and a cellar, said Valdivia prosecutor Alejandro Ríos. "2 pamphlets were found, one for the award by a group called 'and a second in which it pointed out and asked for the freedom of the Mapuche Political Prisoners,'" said the prosecutor. Llaitul has maintained antagonistic positions with WAM. "If at some point someone made a definition so that there are targets in evangelical churches, in Catholic temples or in their community centers or in schools as symbols of colonialism, alienation and intolerance towards the Mapuche, we still understand it as very solid arguments, but we don't attack these kinds of targets," he said in a video released on July 25. Both the RMM and the Weichan Auka Mapu (WAM) include Catholic and Evangelical temples among their accepted whites.
Finally, Resistencia Urbana Autónoma has appeared, with an anarchist orientation, which on September 4 demolished three high-voltage towers in the Biobío river demanding the freedom of the Mapuche prisoners. At the same time, the CAM has carried out several burnings of vehicles following the arrests of the Llaituls.
What is the Coordinadora Arauco Malleco (CAM)?
In February 1998, in the Tranaquepe area, in Tirúa, Bío Bío region, there was a meeting between Mapuche communities in conflict, which concluded with the creation of the Coordinadora de Comunitas a Conflicte Arauco-Malleco, better known as in CAM. This organization founded its bases in the "claim and occupation of historically Mapuche territories, under the jurisdiction of the State of Chile, together with the establishment of a sovereign Mapuche state".
For more than two decades, the CAM has been responsible for a series of attacks and criminal acts, from the Bío Bío region, to the Lakes region, through Araucanía and Los Ríos. Among its targets, there have been attacks on different types of installations of forestry companies, farmers, transport and basic resources such as electricity and water, in addition to cabins and tourist and private estates. Even between 2021 and 2022, in the areas where the Coordinadora operates, the crime of wood theft escalated, a fact that the CAM was also awarded, to do business, through its historical leader, Héctor Laitul.
