[WSF-Discuss] Open Letter to the World Social Forum - In Regards to the Presence of President Rafael Correa

[CACIM]

Open Letter to the World Social Forum
In Regards to the Presence of President Rafael Correa
CONAIE
February 10, 2009

@ http://www.ubnoticias.org/en/article/open-letter-to-the-world-social-forum
Quito -

Brothers and Sisters of the World Social Forum:

In regards to the announcement of the participation of the President of the
Republic of Ecuador, Rafael Correa in the World Social Forum to be held the
city of Belem, the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (
CONAIE) declares:

1. Its OPPOSITION and REJECTION of the presence of Rafael Correa, President
of Ecuador, in a space which has historically been used for the creation of
alternatives and to guarantee the rights and lives of the [Indigenous]
Peoples. It cannot be a pulpit for a President with positions full of
racism, machismo, paternalism, discrimination, sexism and violence. The
President of Ecuador violates our fundamental rights and deeply threatens
our indigenous organizations and institutions. The Correa regime promotes
the exploitation of oil in the territory of Indigenous Peoples in Isolation,
destroying the full exercise of their right to free self-determination and
creating a situation of genocide. President Rafael Correa, Minister of
Government Fernando Bustamente, Minister of Internal and External Security
Gustavo Larrea and Secretary for Indigenous Peoples Manuela Gallegos, have
taken divisive, racist and threatening positions against the fundamental
rights of indigenous peoples and their dignity. The end of the long night of
neo-liberalism announced by President Correa has not ended – to the contrary
the night has darkened and is getting much longer in Ecuador.

2. CONAIE denounced emphatically the repression that we—the indigenous
communities resisting privatization of our territories, biodiversity and
water—suffered. We have been the object of persecution and our right to
social resistance has been criminalized. When we demand respect and that our
rights be guaranteed, we the Presidency of the Republic and its ministries
have accused us of being “terrorists,” “ignorant,” “delinquents,”
“fundamentalists” and “infantile.” The repression has been exceptionally bad
in communities such as Dayuma, Molleturo and Cuyabeno, where the armed
forces used helicopters, tear gas and high-caliber weapons. They assaulted
women and children indiscriminately. The government of Rafael Correa imposes
laws favorable to large-scale mining in indigenous territories, repeatedly
ignoring and flagrantly violating the Law of Consultation established by the
Article 169 of the International Labor Organization and the UN Declaration
on Indigenous Rights.

3. CONAIE has opposed Rafael Correa regime laws favoring extractive
industries, such as the large-scale Mining Law and the project for a Law
regarding bio-fuel development and genetically modified products,
legislation that does guarantee food sovereignty. We alert the Forum that
the rhetoric and practices of the Citizens’ Revolution in Ecuador, is lifted
and imposed ignoring and violating fundamental collective rights guaranteed
by legally binding international institutions. We alert the forum that the
rhetoric Ecuador’s current regime—that of the Citizens’ Revolution, of
Socialism of the Twenty-First Century—is used an ideological argument in
whose name the dignity and rights of our peoples are repressed and
threatened.

4. The CONAIE, within the framework exercising our fundamental rights as
Peoples, urges the Global Indigenous Movement to call on the World Social
Forum to:

A. Within the spirit of the World Social Forum, declare the President of
Ecuador*persona non grata*. The Forum is beholden to the legitimacy of our
demands, our rights and those of the [Indigenous] Peoples of the World and
in this context we should not and cannot risk its legitimacy and
credibility.

B. Suspend any WSF events to be attended by Ecuadorian President Rafael
Correa Delgado and make public its condemnation of rights violations being
suffered by us and all the Peoples comprising Ecuadorian society.

5. CONAIE reinforces its democratic spirit, promoting peace and an
unrelenting defense of the rights of our peoples and of Mother Earth, and
reinforces its promise with the noble cause of the constructing of societies
that guarantee the rights of all the Peoples of the planet.

“We are like the straw of the *páramos* (highlands), when they pull us up,
we grow once more and, as straw, we populate the world.”

“We the Indigenous Peoples are not part of the problem, we are part of the
solution.”

“Racism is immoral and miserable in all of its forms, and those who practice
it are as well.”

*Presented and signed in Quito, January 26, 2009*

For the Governing Council of CONAIE

Marlon Santi
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