Evictions and violence used against indigenous communities in Northern Argentina

Call for sup­port from the CAPOMA col­lec­tive- Jujuy, Argenti­na, August 17 th 2008.
link to call for sup­port and back­ground his­to­ry

Oscar, a col­league from Salta and mem­ber of the Olga Are­des Cen­tre, CAPOMA, informs us on the severe situ­ta­tion tak­ing place in North­ern Argenti­na. There are con­ti­neous evic­tions tak­ing place and vio­lence being com­mit­ted to the inhab­i­tants which resist to leave there lands for soy. Soy pro­duc­ers are act­ing with impuni­ty against the inhab­i­tants of the guaraní com­mu­ni­ties, attack­ing them vio­lent­ly, while the gov­ern­ment and police jus­ti­fy their actions with the argu­ment that the soy pro­duc­ers are the “right­full” land own­ers.

update 18th of August, 2008

Good news from Jujuy: Act of land recu­per­a­tion of the com­mu­ni­ty JASY ENDY GUASU Lunes,
by Oscar, el Hijo de los Montes, CAPOMA, Jujuy

After more than 20 days of pre­car­i­ous occu­pa­tion with chil­dren, sick peo­ple and elders, yes­ter­day the evict­ed fam­i­lies of El TALAR received san­i­tary help brought by a truck of the local gov­ern­ment of Jujuy. With a lot of courage and indig­na­tion they turned the ofi­cial aid down, send­ing a mes­sage to the provin­cial gov­ern­ment that the lat­ter are in the first place respon­si­ble for so much injus­tice. Their mes­sage was direct — they were going to re-enter in their land what­ev­er it takes, as they have already suf­fered enough and it no longer mat­ters to them if they again start fir­ing at them.

Also, on August 17th, a group of Guaraní indi­ans went to the evict­ed site and noticed that soy pro­duc­er Strisich began defor­est­ing the site. Defor­esta­tion machin­ery and elec­tri­fied fences were present and noth­ing was left of the place.

On August 18th, from mid-day on var­i­ous social organ­i­sa­tion from Jujuy and Guaraní com­mu­ni­ties of the yun­gas of Jujuy, joint­ly went to the com­mu­ni­ty JASY ENDY GUASU, to retake their ances­tral lands. Between 1000 and 1500 peo­ple realised a sym­bol­ic act. All kinds of actions and fur­ther legal steps will con­tin­ue to demand from the gov­ern­ment that they respect and com­ply with the laws and the rights that have been thor­ough­ly been vio­lat­ed, insult­ing the his­to­ry and lifes of the native peo­ple.

Guaraní com­mu­ni­ties and social organ­i­sa­tion of Jujuy ask inter­na­tion­al sol­i­dar­i­ty and atten­tion for this case. They ask to con­tin­ue send­ing let­ters in order to pres­sure the provin­cial gov­ern­ment. Comu­niquees of sol­i­dar­i­ty are also appre­ci­at­ed.

Please send protest let­ters against the evic­tion:

Send in copy to: capoma_ddhh()yahoo.com.ar, Jasy-endy-guasu()hotmail.com, grupoaccionddhh()yahoo.com.ar

For more infor­ma­tion:
+54 (0)388–154036819 (Este­ban Coro­nel de la Comu­nidad El Talar)
+54 (0)388–415517754 (Diego Comu­nidad El Talar)
+54 (0)3877–15668410 (Oscar Del­e­ga­do CAPOMA)

On August 17th 2008, we were trav­el­ling to Embar­cación and from there on 50 km towards the inte­ri­or of the cha­co (the dry region with Cha­co woods, not the Cha­co Province) untill we reached Mis­ión Chaque­ña. There, var­i­ous Wichis com­mu­ni­ties are resist­ing the advanc­ing defor­esta­tion com­mit­ted by soy pro­duc­ers. The Wichi com­mu­ni­ties and oth­ers in the neigh­bour­hood of Mis­ión Chaque­ña are being sur­round­ed by a region­al soy pro­duc­er called Peñalver. The Wichis have lots of con­vic­tion to defend their lands and no longer accept attacks. The com­mu­ni­ty invit­ed us to par­tic­i­pate in a meet­ing to com­mon­ly try to save their ter­ri­to­ry.

Leav­ing from Embar­cación you face kilo­me­ters of areas that have been defor­est­ed over the past 10 years. Now there is only lone­li­ness and indi­ge­neous com­mu­ni­ties that migrat­ed and fled deaper into the Cha­co. But now soy is also reach­ing these places.

We also vis­it­ed to the Guaraní com­mu­ni­ty Jase Endí Gua­su in El TALAR, Depart­ment San Martín (Ledes­ma) Jujuy. This com­mu­ni­ty suf­fered an evic­tion on mon­day July 28th. They are furi­ous with the gov­ern­ment of Jujuy as they told them that they would take mea­sures con­cern­ing their prob­lems with water sup­ply and hous­ing; they would install water tanks and con­struct hous­es. Nev­er­the­less they don’t see them as the right­ful land own­ers, declar­ing that “they dont find any doc­u­ments of the peri­od between 1996 and 2000 — the peri­od in which the same gov­ern­ment gave them the lands — and there­for the legal papers that soy pro­duc­er Strisich was obtain­ing are valid”.

On the 14th of August, close to the zone where the evic­tion took place, a guaraní women in com­pan­ion of her chil­dren, was gath­er­ing the ani­mals that got saved from the evic­tion. She was attacked by Strisich and two gun­men at his ser­vice. Strisich, dressed in com­bat cloth­ing and wear­ing two guns in his belt, chased her with a knife.

When the com­mu­ni­ty want­ed to denounce this act in the local police office, they did not accept it, argu­ing that Strisich is the land own­er. Pablo Pelas­so, lawyer known for the cas­es he brings for­ward against vio­laters of Jujuys, in the end made a denounce of homo­cide intent and threaths to the woman.