May 23, 2019 - Issue: Vol. 165, No. 87 — Daily Edition116th Congress (2019 - 2020) - 1st Session

[Pages S3093-S3094]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            ALBERTO CURAMIL

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President I want to bring to the Senate's attention 
the story and the example of Alberto Curamil, an environmental activist 
who is a member of the indigenous Mapuche people in Chile's Araucania 
region. The Mapuche are Chile's largest indigenous group, and since the 
1800s they have struggled to protect their culture, territory, rivers, 
forests, and natural resources against encroachment and destruction by 
settlers and energy companies that have often acted with impunity and 
the backing of the government. Mr. Curamil has dedicated his life to 
this cause. It is the existential struggle of indigenous people in 
scores of countries as the insatiable global demand for energy, arable 
land, water, timber, oil, gas, and minerals threatens their ancestral 
lands and way of life.
  Several years ago, during a prolonged drought in Chile, the Ministry 
of Energy announced a plan for two large hydroelectric projects in 
Araucania, without consulting the Mapuche people who live there. The 
projects would reportedly divert more than 500 million gallons of water 
for power generation, severely limiting water flow and damaging the 
ecosystem of the Cautin River on which many of the Mapuche people 
depend for survival.
  Mr. Curamil, who has three children, lives on the outskirts of the 
town of Curacautin. He is a farmer who raises animals. His wife teaches 
the Mapuche language. Fearing what the harm to the river would mean for 
his people, he organized Mapuche and non-Mapuche, environmental 
organizations, lawyers, and academics to try to stop the projects. In 
public protests and in court, they argued that the government had 
ignored Chilean law which

[[Page S3094]]

requires free, prior, and informed consent of affected communities 
before approving such projects. Despite harassment, threats, and 
violent attacks, Mr. Curamil succeeded in uniting the opposition, and 
in 2016 the projects were canceled.
  But that was not the end of it.
  On August 14, 2018, Mr. Curamil was arrested by Chile's national 
police and imprisoned. He has been charged with assault during a bank 
robbery in which a guard was injured and hostages taken. An anonymous 
witness reportedly said that one of the robbers looked like a Mapuche, 
and they arrested Mr. Curamil. There have been no judicial proceedings, 
and Mr. Curamil remains in pretrial detention.
  Mr. Curamil and his family say that he is a victim of retaliation for 
his environmental activism, that he was attending a meeting in a 
different town at the time of the robbery, and that multiple people can 
attest to his presence there. At the time of his arrest, his house was 
ransacked by police and left in a shambles.
  In November 2018, another Mapuche, Camilo Catrillanca, age 24, died 
after being shot in the back by police. He was a member of the Mapuche 
Territorial Alliance, a grassroots organization that seeks to 
reintegrate the Mapuche people through reclaiming their language, 
territory, and rights that were fractured and repeatedly violated 
during the past two centuries.
  I mention these events to put in context the recent announcement that 
Alberto Curamil was selected as one of the 2019 winners of the Goldman 
Environmental Prize. The prize honors grassroots environmental 
activists from around the world, singling out individuals for their 
extraordinary and sustained efforts to protect the natural environment, 
often at great personal risk.
  Not only did Mr. Curamil lead a successful challenge to the unlawful 
decision by the Chilean Ministry of Energy, he is being subjected to 
what many suspect is a flagrant and vindictive abuse of the judicial 
process of the type that we have come to expect in countries with 
authoritarian governments like Russia but not democracies like Chile.
  If the Chilean authorities have credible evidence to support the 
charge against Mr. Curamil, they should produce it in a public trial 
and provide him with the opportunity to defend himself. Instead, nearly 
10 months since his arrest, he languishes in jail while his wife and 
children are alone fending for themselves.
  The attempts to intimidate and silence Mr. Curamil and the threats to 
his people and the natural environment are not unique. This is 
happening to indigenous people all over the world, and each year the 
prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize helps to call attention to 
those like Mr. Curamil who have risked their lives on behalf of their 
communities, wildlife species, rivers, lakes, forests, and oceans that 
are being threatened or destroyed.
  Mr. Curamil is an activist for environmental and social justice that 
Chileans should take pride in. Like the many hundreds in attendance in 
San Francisco and Washington who cheered when his daughter, Belen 
Curamil, received the prize on his behalf, the Chilean people should 
recognize Mr. Curamil for his courageous defense of Chile's natural 
environment and diverse cultural heritage.
  We should also be concerned that Mr. Curamil 's arrest takes place 
against a backdrop of escalating violence between the national police 
and Mapuche activists. At the heart of the dispute is land ownership 
and lack of consultation on legislation or investment projects that 
directly affect the Mapuche. Timber is Chile's second-largest export 
commodity, worth billions of dollars annually, and the political elite 
is deeply invested in the industry. Mapuche activists are engaged in a 
campaign against the timber industry and its defenders in the 
government. In response, prosecutors are using an anti-terrorism law 
originally introduced by the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet 
to stifle political dissent. The law allows for indefinite pretrial 
detention, investigations being kept secret for up to 6 months, and 
evidence admitted in oral hearings from anonymous witnesses, as in Mr. 
Curamil 's case.
  This situation is aptly described by Global Witness in its 2017 
report, Defenders of the Earth:

       It is increasingly clear that, globally, governments and 
     business are failing in their duty to protect activists at 
     risk . . . Ironically, it is the activists themselves who are 
     painted as criminals, facing trumped-up criminal charges and 
     aggressive civil cases brought by governments and companies 
     seeking to silence them. This criminalization is used to 
     intimidate defenders, tarnish their reputations and lock them 
     into costly legal battles.

  Chile's police have intervened violently on the side of private 
companies, intimidating Mapuche communities. The UN Special Rapporteur 
on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples warned that the government and 
police are increasingly targeting activists who are campaigning to 
protect their land from mining, logging, and dams. The Inter-American 
Court of Human Rights has condemned the Chilean Government for applying 
anti-terrorism laws against Mapuche leaders.
  According to Amnesty International, ``Although violence against 
defenders is a constant in the region, little is known about what is 
happening in Chile, especially in relation to the historical context of 
criminalization and stigmatization of the Mapuche and their leaders. 
The Chilean authorities have an obligation to guarantee conditions that 
enable human rights defenders to carry out their work and to establish 
protection mechanisms for environmental defenders and Indigenous 
leaders who face constant criminalization and stigmatization.''
  Again, these circumstances are not unique to Chile. Similar 
confrontations are occurring in many countries. But Mr. Curamil's 
receipt of the Goldman Environmental Prize should cause everyone to pay 
attention, and to ask, Should not these issues be handled better? Is it 
acceptable for the Chilean Government to label these largely 
defenseless, mostly impoverished people as ``terrorists,'' for trying 
to protect their territory and way of life? Should not the Chilean 
Government act as a convener of a dialogue that recognizes the 
legitimate rights of its indigenous population, that ensures they are 
consulted in a timely and meaningful way, as the law requires, about 
decisions that affect them, and that their views are properly reflected 
in those decisions? Is that not the government's responsibility? To 
listen to its citizens who have traditionally been ignored and whose 
way of life is threatened and to find creative, sustainable solutions?
  I join others in congratulating Alberto Curamil for setting an 
example at a time when the natural environment is under siege due to 
human development; recklessness, and greed. We see the consequences on 
every continent--tropical forests cut down for oil palm plantations, 
coral reefs destroyed, rivers polluted, dammed and diverted, fish 
populations depleted, and other wildlife species facing extinction.
  Earlier this month, a UN assessment of the world's biodiversity 
compiled by 145 experts from 50 countries over 3 years, reported that 
``the health of ecosystems on which we and all other species depend is 
deteriorating more rapidly than ever. We are eroding the very 
foundations of our economies, livelihoods, food security, health and 
quality of life worldwide.''
  This is true in Chile as it is in virtually every country. 
Complacency is not an answer, and I hope the Chilean Government will 
recognize that people like Alberto Curamil should be listened to and 
supported, not threatened and jailed.

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