The participants of the Third Plurinational Parliament of Women and Indigenous Diversities for Good Living, held last week, in the town of Chicoana, Salta, asked the Argentine State that the practice of chineo be declared and typified as a hate crime, and that it be imprescriptible. .
“It is time to give an ultimatum to the State, which has remained an accomplice of crimes such as the Chinese and has also reinforced impunity through its indifference”, expressed the parliamentarians from the statement released today by the Women’s Movement Indigenous for Good Living.
This declaration is a sort of conclusion of the Third Plurinational Parliament of Indigenous Women and Diversities for Good Living, which was held from May 21 to 25 in the town of Chicoana, located 40 kilometers south of the capital of Salta.
From the Movement, they explained that “the ‘chineo’ is not a cultural practice but a colonial systematized practice perpetrated by Creole men towards our communities.”
Chineo is a type of sexual violence that has persisted over the years, for which “Creole” men rape girls from indigenous communities, and it bears that name because the Spanish and later the Creoles called indigenous girls Chinese because of their eyes. torn.
“The word ‘chineo’ does not arise from ancestral indigenous thought, the word ‘chineo’ belongs to the oppressor, the invader, the rapist Creole. This word has a racist, misogynistic and genocidal charge,” emphasized the women, who chose to use this term to demonstrate the “racialization” of this type of gender violence.
“This aberrant practice of sexual violence against our children must end and, for this reason, our campaign #BastaDeChineo assumes a new stage: that of fighting for the #AboliciónDelChineoYa”, expresses the document issued from the third parliament.
In this sense, the more than 250 women from different indigenous nations of the country agreed to give an ultimatum to the Argentine State, for the abolition of chineo, and ask that it be “declared and typified as a hate crime”, and with it reach the penalties maxims.
“We understand Chinese as a criminal, racist and systemic colonial practice,” the women expressed in the Declaration, while requesting that it be an “imprescribable crime.”
They also requested that “companies that have employees who have committed this aberration be held accountable and disqualified from working in indigenous territories” and that “policemen, gendarmes and soldiers who violate indigenous children be prosecuted, convicted and dishonorably discharged.” “.
The agreed document requires that “religious institutions and groups that operate in indigenous territory and are complicit in these criminal practices be expelled and condemned,” and that “public officials and traditional authorities be tried and condemned without exception and without recognition of jurisdictions. of the indigenous peoples who are executors of these practices, accomplices or facilitators”.
On the other hand, they demanded “the seizure of all the rapists’ assets”, to cover “the economic containment and recovery of the victim”, in addition to an “economic sanction to the Argentine State, for the creation of a fund for prevention, recovery and support for the victims of the Chinese”.
“We, indigenous women and diversities organized in the Movement of Indigenous Women for Good Living, in a self-convened and self-managed manner, declare that we are certain that our union and organization as indigenous women and diversities constitute the basis of good living,” they pointed out. .
The participants specified that they came to Chicoana from the different indigenous latitudes to talk and listen to each other, they stressed that “the objectives were met,” and that they left “strengthened, recovering our ancestral spirituality.”
Meanwhile, they considered that “the main person responsible for these criminal practices remaining in force for more than 200 years has been the Argentine State itself, which in none of its successive governments has generated condemnation mechanisms or produced legal instruments for the prevention and treatment of Chinese cases”.
“To deactivate the scenarios of complicity that this crime generates, the mechanisms for dialogue and representation between indigenous peoples and the State must be reformulated,” they pointed out and demanded that the accessories “also be condemned and on the same scale as the material actors.”
Finally, they indicated that “the childhoods of the peoples of the world are sacred and in the face of the resurgence of governments and politicians who spread racist hatred, using all kinds of media to inoculate society with division, segregation and racism, we respond with tenacity , courage and love”.
During these days “we have also deepened our position regarding the terricide that occurs in all our communities and territories,” the document stated, after which it was delimited that “the occupying civilization has generated death and the affectation of all lives in the territories ancestral”.
“Chineo is one more expression of this terricide that has been imposed since the arrival of the colonizer to the present day, it is time for justice and healing,” they concluded.
The Chicoana Declaration was signed by indigenous women and diversities of the nations of the Avaguaraní, Aymara, Chané, Charrúa, Chorote, Chulupí, Diaguita, Guaycurú, Huarpe, Kolla, Lule, Mapuche, Moqoit, Purépecha, Qom, Quechua, Ranquel, Simba peoples. Guarani, Tapiete, Weenhayek and Wichi. (Telam)
Indigenous women demand that the Chinese be declared and classified as a hate crime