Activists release manifesto, calling on civilians to set the institutions of the state on fire – ‘in a figurative sense’
Governments around the world are using the coronavirus as an excuse to step up repression and push back civil liberties, warns a new song by Pussy Riot, released alongside a new manifesto written with the Chilean feminist collective Lastesis.
Related: Chile security forces' crackdown leaves toll of death and broken bodies
Continue reading...Macarena Santelices has praised the ‘good side’ of the 1973-90 dictatorship in which over 300 women were raped under torture
Chile’s rightwing president, Sebastián Piñera, has prompted a firestorm of criticism after naming an open supporter of Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship as the country’s new minister for women’s rights and gender equality.
Controversy over the appointment of Macarena Santelices – who is also the dictators’s great-niece – has focused on a 2016 interview in which she praised the “good side” of the 1973-90 dictatorship in which more than 3,000 people were murdered or disappeared by security forces and many thousands more imprisoned and tortured.
Continue reading...Coronavirus arrives against backdrop of unresolved social tensions that fueled last year’s explosion of protests
For six months, Chile was shaken by a wave of protests in which millions took to the streets to protest against inequality. Residents of the capital, Santiago, grew accustomed to the raucous crowds thronging the main square to sing and chant against the government.
Now, with parts of the capital on coronavirus lockdown, wind rasps through an empty Plaza Italia as a handful of shoppers hurry past security forces enforcing the stay-at-home order.
Continue reading...Dramatic career took in escapes from Pinochet’s regime in the 70s, sailing with Greenpeace and writing books including The Old Man Who Read Love Stories
The celebrated Chilean author Luis Sepúlveda, who was exiled by the dictator Augusto Pinochet in the 1980s, has died from Covid-19.
Best known for his 1992 novel The Old Man Who Read Love Stories and 1996’s The Story of a Seagull and The Cat Who Taught Her To Fly, Sepúlveda died in hospital on Thursday. He first began showing symptoms from coronavirus on 25 February, after returning to his home in Spain from a festival in Portugal. On 1 March, it was confirmed that Sepúlveda was the first case of Covid-19 in the Asturias region, where he had lived for 20 years.
Continue reading...Inmates at Punta Peuco prison convicted of human rights violations could be included in bill to release low-risk offenders
Former Chilean military agents convicted of serious human rights violations under the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet could be freed by a controversial new ruling that seeks to halt the spread of the coronavirus among the country’s prison population.
Related: Chile doctors fear complacency over Covid-19 after initial successes
Continue reading...Passengers on cruise liner where four died and its sister ship hope to be flying home soon
Hundreds of passengers, many of them British, on a coronavirus-stricken cruise trip where four people have died are confined to their cabins awaiting the go-ahead to pass through the Panama Canal.
Dozens have fallen ill on the Zaandam cruise ship, which was stranded off the Pacific coast of Panama after several Latin American countries refused to let it into port. Some passengers were transferred to a second ship – the Rotterdam – on Saturday night.
Continue reading...Chilean lawmakers have voted to postpone a much-anticipated referendum on a new constitution as safety concerns around the coronavirus outbreak take precedence over politics.
The vote on rewriting the country’s Pinochet-era constitution was originally due to take place on 26 April – a date that the country’s health ministry now predicts will be the height of the virus outbreak in the country.
Continue reading...A Chilean man was arrested after he drove a truck into one of the famous Easter Island statues and toppled it. The mayor of Easter Island has called for vehicle restrictions to be introduced around its archaeological sites after the truck caused 'incalculable' damage
Continue reading...Mayor calls for vehicle restrictions around famous structures after Chilean man causes ‘incalculable’ damage
The mayor of Easter Island has called for vehicle restrictions to be introduced around its archaeological sites after a pickup truck hit one of the famous stone statues, causing “incalculable” damage.
A Chilean man who lives on the island, in Polynesia, was arrested after the incident on Sunday and has been charged with damaging a national monument, according to the Chilean newspaper El Mercurio de Valparaíso. The platform on which the statue stood was also damaged in the crash, it reported.
Continue reading...The Atacama in northern Chile is the driest desert in the world, and may be the oldest. It also holds 40% of the world's lithium – an essential ingredient in the rechargeable batteries used in green technology. Indigenous leaders and scientists say Chile's plans to feed a global green energy boom with Atacama lithium will kill the desert. As violent protests rock the country, they are fighting for the mining to stop
Experts welcome example of nation once drinking more per head than any other
The world’s toughest controls over the promotion of sugary drinks, brought in by a nation beset by obesity, have cut purchases by nearly a quarter in two years, research has shown.
Instead of a sugar tax, which the UK and other countries have chosen to impose, Chile has banned sales in schools and adopted stark black and white labels aimed at warning and educating families about the health dangers of junk food and drinks for their children.
Continue reading...The city’s theatre is emotional, indignant and polemical finds our critic on a whirlwind trip through a dozen shows
The sparky young performers on stage thank us for coming out tonight. There are so many other things we could have been doing, they tell us, before launching into their show, Too Much Sexual Freedom Will Turn You Into Terrorists. “Burning subways” gets the biggest laugh. We are, after all, in Santiago, where only three months ago people took to the streets and did exactly that. Even now, in spite of soaring summer temperatures, Chileans continue to protest every weekend. Their list of complaints ranges from inadequate private pensions to an out-of-touch president.
The graffiti creeping across every surface calls for an end to police violence, for the renationalisation of water and for the indigenous Mapuche people to fight back. Sprayed everywhere is the figure 6% – President Sebastián Piñera’s popularity rating.
Continue reading...Colombia was the bloodiest nation with 103 murders and the Philippines was second, followed by Brazil, Honduras and Mexico
More than 300 human rights defenders working to protect the environment, free speech, LGBTQ rights and indigenous lands in 31 countries were killed in 2019, a new report reveals.
Two thirds of the total killings took place in Latin America where impunity from prosecution is the norm.
Continue reading...Antofagasta, situated on the edge of the Atacama Desert, relies on a vast desalination plant which provides the city with drinking water – but the waste brine is killing wildlife, say fishermen
As Eduardo Muñoz drifts his ageing skiff into Antofagasta’s harbour, flecks of paint peeling from its prow, he looks disconsolate.
“I used to get twice as many clams from every dive,” he mutters bitterly, hauling two large sacks of shellfish on to the dock and ruffling the salt from his hair.
Continue reading...Wave of protests and violence against austerity measures and political corruption swept Bolivia, Venezuela, Chile and other Latin American countries
Continue reading...Investigators may never recover enough wreckage to know why the Hercules crashed, killing 38
The commander-in-chief of the Chilean air force has said that the struggle to recover the remains of a Hercules that crashed en route to the Antarctic two weeks ago could make it difficult to ever determine what happened to the plane.
The Hercules C-130 cargo plane, which was carrying 17 crew and 21 passengers, disappeared shortly after taking off on 9 December from the southern city of Punta Arenas in Chilean Patagonia.
Continue reading...Chileans are gripped by uncertainty – suspended between hopes of progress, and frustration over an elusive political solution
When a tsunami of unrest spilled into Santiago’s fashionable Bellavista neighbourhood in October, Daniel Gajardo, 33, was torn between sympathy for the protesters and frustration at the harm they were doing his fledgling business.
The recording studio and music shop he co-owns had been thriving, and moved to new premises just a day before the first major demonstration.
Continue reading...A Chilean protest song about rape culture and victim shaming has become an anthem for feminists around the world.
Un Violador en Tu Camino (A Rapist in Your Path) was first performed in late November as Chile’s nationwide uprising against social inequality entered its second month.
Here's a look at how the song, and its accompanying dance moves, have spread across Latin America and the world.
Continue reading...Musician reveals message painted on her chest in latest celebrity show of support for national demonstrations
The Chilean singer Mon Laferte exposed her breasts during a broadcast of the Latin Grammys, in the latest of a string of high-profile shows of support for anti-government demonstrators in her home country.
The 36-year-old singer-songwriter made her silent protest against police brutality on Thursday night as she walked the award ceremony’s red carpet in Las Vegas.
Continue reading...Other officers have been accused of a beating and sexual abuse as unrest enters third week, with 2,000 injured
A Chilean police major who shot two students during a school protest has been arrested as a wave of political unrest enters a third week and the number of injured in street violence topped 2,000.
Maj Humberto Tapia was arrested by detectives on Thursday and charged with illegally discharging his shotgun inside a public school that had been occupied by students on Tuesday. A call by the beleaguered principal led to a confrontation with students in which Tapia fired into the floor, sending buckshot ricocheting into the legs of students.
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