La Via Campesina | Bagnolet | 24 June 2022
La Via Campesina Solidarity Statement
La Via Campesina expresses its full solidarity with people in Ecuador who are currently resisting repression and persecution, while struggling against the neoliberal policies that have dragged the entire country into a deep economic and human rights crisis. The mobilizations take place as part of a National Strike, which began on June 13 of this year and was called by a broad platform of social movements in which the indigenous and peasant organizations have a special leadership role.
As an international movement that gathers millions of peasants all over the world, including 5 national peasant and indigenous organizations in Ecuador, La Via Campesina supports their action and demand from the government an immediate response to the 10 claims that the mobilized organizations have submitted. The list of demands is as follows:
- Reduce fuel prices;
- Set a one-year moratorium on the financial system for families to pay their debts; public bank debt cancellation up to $10,000.
- Ensure employment and labor rights;
- Fair prices for rural products;
- No mining in indigenous territories;
- The respect of collective rights;
- Non-privatization of strategic services;
- Development of policies to control price speculation;
- Increase the budget for health and education;
- Take measures to improve security.
We consider this petition as fair, at a time when, according to official statistics, 5 out of 10 people in Ecuador who live in the countryside are living in poverty and 3 out of 10 are in extreme poverty. This is a hard reality that peasants and indigenous peoples and nations, as well as rural populations of the countryside, are going through; those who have been directly affected by the free trade policies that the government has implemented under the pressure of the IMF and other international organizations.
We call for an urgent suspension of the arbitrary use of force and repression that has already resulted in 3 people killed, dozens wounded and others disappeared. We call on international human rights organizations to continue to denounce and make visible these violations so these crimes do not stay unpunished.
La Via Campesina also call on the international community to extend solidarity and give visibility to the National Strike actions.
We express our full support to the indigenous and Afro-descendant peoples and nations who are currently giving us lessons in dignity and resistance facing the dangers that structurally affect the world’s peasantry.
Globalize the Struggle, Globalize Hope!
photo credit : CONAIE
