Mexico City - August, 2017

Greek political prisoners join the struggle for the appearance alive of Santiago Maldonado

The disappearance of the anarchist Santiago Maldonado by the Argentine police

Santiago Maldonado, being in solidarity with the struggle of the indigenous peoples, participated in the struggle of the Mapuche people in Cushamen, province of Chubut, Argentina. There, the land of the Mapuche has been sold to the colonialists Benetton, and a struggle has been carried out by the re-appropriation by Mapuches, who have occupied and live there. In Cushamen, a protest was held with the block of the route between Argentina and Chile. The action was carried out to free the leader of the group, Facundo Huala Jones, who was arrested last June and an extradition is required by the Chilean government.

On August 1st, the protest suffered state repression with rubber bullets and lead bullets at the hands of the National Gendarmerie under a federal court order. Several witnesses confirm that nine-millimeter bullets were used by the gendarmerie, that Santiago was arrested, adding that they saw him surrounded by policemen who overcame him and loaded him into a van. However, the National Gendarmerie denies having arrested Santiago.

All this in a context of savage repression and slander against the Mapuches' struggle by the Argentine government, which calls them terrorists, which conceals the role of the Gendarmerie in the disappearance shortly before the Argentine elections.

Also the Argentine repressive forces have history of disappearances of militants, from the military dictatorship of Videla.

Both in Argentina and in neighboring countries there have been several demonstrations demanding the return of Santiago Maldonado alive, remembering the disappearance of students who were demonstrating in Mexico and the search for bodies of some of them that occurred much later.

The dangerous practice of abductions and disappearances of government must be stopped.

Comrades of Santiago and his family call for international solidarity. The request for the release of the disappeared vibrates with Santiago. It is connected with the demands of Mapuche prisoners and indigenous peoples in Latin America, and with their right to live in the land of their ancestors that capitalism stole to exploit and destroy it. This struggle is a conflict with the interests of States and companies like Benetton, and solidarity goes to the embers.