Today, November 23, 2019, the Venezuelan Program of Education Action in Human Rights (Provea), with the approval of Pemon representatives, wishes to denounce before national and international public opinion that on November 22, 2019, approximately between 7 and 7.30 pm the Pemón Ikabarú indigenous territory community, mixed indigenous and non-indigenous mining community in Sector Pemón No. 7, Gran Sabana Municipality with an approximate population of 2,500 people, was a victim – according to several testimonies – of an armed group allegedly belonging to the Blind union that controls the Paragua, (who would arrive to take control of the area in search of a man named “Cristóbal,” head of a mine called “La Caraota”) who would have shot the town of Ikabarú.

In fact, according to testimonies, GNB Sergeant Antonio Perera would have been killed, and at the time this note is written, three other presumed deaths have yet to be confirmed. Testimonies that, for security reasons we will conceal names, confirm what happened, as well as the terror and fear to which the inhabitants of Ikabarú are subjected today:

“I was in the church in front. That was at Tomedes’, there was a group of people, we began to hear shots, and despair … and people running. And then there was a boy who entered with a shot in the head and he is there and everything. I asked a man at the airport, he named me his son, he said he was injured, that he was in a corner but that he was injured. And they passed by, these people passed by here in front of the house, and they passed by saying “look, this guy arrived, the unions and what not” and after that, they walked through all those houses. They went through all the places searching but it is not known if that is what it is … but they did kill ”.

“Dani’s business is open, and there are the dead laying on the street, and that business is with dead. It is not known if there are dead inside, because they said they had gone inside. ”

“I was in the church and a man was there with a boy who was wounded with a shot in the head and people seeking refuge in the church. I don’t know if these people can see those dead, I don’t know, what are we going to do?”

“A tremendous misfortune happened here. Here there is a death toll here. I will confirm you once, Perera was killed. It was true, everything was true. It was true”.

“That was a seven o’clock shot. They burst in, suddenly arrived all over the front of Dani Tomedes’ business, and began firing. Well, Perera tried to defend himself, took out the revolver and was shot. ”

“That boy came almost dead because of how scared he was. He said, “Oh my God, I left the flip flops, I came barefoot because the government came, a bunch of black people, dressed in black, shooting, throwing lead.” And the boy arrived very scared, and there the blasts were heard. But from there I have not known anything else. ”

It is important to highlight how there is tolerance of these actions by state agencies since according to testimonies, the community had been warned of a possible incursion of armed groups a week before the event, also known by the Bolivarian National Guard, which was not present in the community for surveillance and protection. What happened yesterday in Ikabarú has been a frequent practice in spaces with mining territories, where criminal groups called “unions” take over the use of violence to then put in place an exploitation system in the area with State collusion, which then with the excuse of control takes the areas for “controlled exploitation.”

The approval and expansion of the Orinoco Mining Arc is causing consequences in indigenous territories, not only for the destruction of their territories but for the appropriation without consultation of their lands, the submission to parallel structures of domination that act with State support, the violence, forced displacement and the loss of their customs and cultures. Since its approval, Provea warned of the fatal consequences for indigenous people, the environment, and the displacement of violence and destruction to territories even outside the boundaries of the project because they are near the borders.

Since 2017, from Provea we have accompanied the denunciations of the Pemón People in what has been the raid of armed groups and the militarization of their territories, causing the loss of their organizational forms and of ancestral peaceful coexistence, and whose anthropocultural exercise of the Indigenous artisanal mining had never wreaked havoc on their lands or deaths.

We remember on 26.09.2018, in the municipality of Gran Sábana, the murder of commander of the GTP, indigenous Pemón José Vásquez, who had managed to maintain security in indigenous territories – in his charge – of crime. On 08.12.2018, the DGCIM, carried out an armed incursion in the Canaima Municipality, killing 21-year-old Charlie Peñaloza Rivas Pemón and leaving two others injured: Carlos Peñaloza Rivas and César Sandoval. Pemones managed to arrest three officials and held them for days, afterwards handed them over to the security forces and the Public Ministry.

On February 22 and 23, 2019, at trunk 10, in KumaraKapai (San Francisco de Yuruany), 68 Kms from Santa Elena de Uairén, FANB convoys arrived on their way to the border with Brazil. When the community left to prevent their passage, they fired indiscriminately and then fled the scene. The massacre of Santa Elena de Uairén left an unfortunate balance of 7 people killed by state security forces. Reporting about 1,200 forcibly displaced, figures similar to those reported by UNHCR [1]

To this one adds the criminalization of indigenous leaders who live in their territories and who criticize the policy of extractive mining exploitation by the Venezuelan State. The policy of allowing the incursion of armed groups for the appropriation and mining exploitation of indigenous territories with state consent and the subsequent militarization of their territories represents a disastrous practice that structurally affects the life, culture, and heritage of new indigenous peoples in addition to violating rights of indigenous peoples and communities guaranteed in international conventions and in our Magna Carta.

We request the investigation of the facts, punishment for those responsible and measures to prevent their repetition.

We demand immediate action to protect against violence and domination of irregular armed groups in Pemón communities and the subsequent return of the system of relations and organization to their legitimate authorities without co-optation or state intervention, respecting and guaranteeing the full exercise of their rights to self-determination, prior consultation, and consent.

We alert this form of colonization and extermination of ancestral cultures, of the territories and their traditional forms of relationship, the murders by state action and inaction and the breach by the Venezuelan State in its obligations in terms of the guarantee, promotion, and protection of rights of indigenous peoples and communities in Venezuela.[1] UNHCR: FACT SHEET April: Online] https://www.acnur.org/op/op_fs/5ce481cd4/unhcr-venezuela-factsheet-april-2019.html?query=pemon

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