Statement of the OAS General Secretariat on the situation in Chile

25th Friday, October 2019 - 09:35 UTC Full article

We especially deplore the deaths, both those that have occurred due to the excessive and disproportionate use of force by the State, and those that have occurred in the context of the looting

The General Secretariat of the Organization of American States (OAS) supports and endorses the investigations and conclusions of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) on human rights violations in Chile.

We especially deplore the deaths, both those that have occurred due to the excessive and disproportionate use of force by the State, and those that have occurred in the context of the looting. The earliest possible reestablishment of full respect for human rights is vital.

We welcome the opening of the Chilean Government to invite international human rights organizations to visit Chile and assess the situation. It is essential to contemplate the legitimacy of the population's claims and to strengthen social policies, a process that has begun. It is also essential to strengthen institutional, political and social dialogue for the purpose of finding the best and most needed solutions.

But it is also essential to restore public peace. It is a fundamental task of the State to ensure the most complete constitutional guarantees, as well as public order. The State must never yield to violence within the framework of the State of democratic law; to yield to violence or criminality would be to stop guaranteeing that very democratic state of law, public order and fundamental guarantees.

The Bolivarian winds of Simón Bolivar brought freedom and independence to our peoples; the breezes of the Bolivarian regime driven by Madurismo and the Cuban regime bring violence, looting, destruction and a political purpose of directly attacking the democratic system and trying to force interruptions in constitutional mandates.

The attempts that we have seen documented in Ecuador and Colombia, we see the same pattern repeated in Chile today. The polarization, hatred, violence, bad practices, policies of systematic violation of human rights and crimes against humanity with which the dictatorships infused our political systems must be eradicated and isolated, wherever they come from. It is therefore essential to shut off the sources of violence that have their origin in external and internal efforts of institutional destabilization.

Attacks on democracy must be condemned in any case and the political system must be assured that the constitutional mandates granted by the people must always be respected.