28th Meeting – 57th Regular Session of Human Rights Council
Geneva, 26 September 2024
Thank you Mr. President
It is an honour for our Mapuche Permanent Mission to the UN to begin this intervention by acknowledging the courageous resistance of our Mapuche nation people. We extend our thanks to all the peoples who, like us with their effort and sacrifice, made possible the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. We urge states to respect it in its entirety and application.
Our struggle, over the years, facing permanent genocide, prosecution and criminalisation is a testimony to our strength and determination. It is essential to make visible the injustices we have suffered, both from the Chilean and Argentinean state,
It is crucial that the rights of indigenous peoples are respected. We currently have a hundred Mapuche political prisoners, in pre-trial detention, without trial or unjust sentences, who in order to demand respect for their rights, which are guaranteed by the United Nations Declaration and ILO Convention 169, must go on long hunger strikes, exposing their health, their lives and their families, in order to be granted their rights, both collective and individual.
Thanks to the wisdom and struggle of our authorities, which concluded in bilateral treaties, with the Spanish Crown in 1641 and the Treaty of Tapiwe in 1825 that facilitated the recognition of the current state of Chile, then a de facto state and not a de jure state, who subsequently invaded Mapuche territory, destroying nature, killing children, women, men and old people.
History has taught us that resistance is to move towards a more just future, to maintain our traditions, knowledge and wisdom, it is the essence of a more supportive, humane life in harmony with nature, something that is often lacking in Western society, as can be seen in the conflict that the states of Chile and Argentina maintain towards our Mapuche Nation People, which pre-existed those states.
The rich culture of the Mapuche Nation offers us valuable lessons on coexistence, respect for nature and the importance of learning, which are essential to build a more just and equitable future.
Our Mapuche Nation believes that the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (adopted in 2007) is a fundamental framework for moving towards a society that respects cultural diversity in our territories.
In this act, we want to call on states for the importance of respect for the cultural diversity of indigenous peoples, full and effective participation, with more space to be able to partly summarize our situation of permanent violation of our rights by the states of Chile and Argentina, in our case.
Thank you!
Flor Calfunao Paillalef
Apo Werken-Ambassador
