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News > Chile

Chile: Human Rights Violations May Lead to Piñera's Impeachment

  • Citizen is detained by military police during a protest against President Sebastian Piñera in Santiago, Chile, Nov. 18, 2019.

    Citizen is detained by military police during a protest against President Sebastian Piñera in Santiago, Chile, Nov. 18, 2019. | Photo: Reuters

Published 19 November 2019
Opinion

The "Constitutional Accusation" requires a favorable vote of both the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate.

Eleven opposition lawmakers on Tuesday filed a "constitutional accusation" against Chile's President Sebastian Piñera for his responsibility in hundreds of human rights violations recorded since October 14.

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"He is responsible for brutal human rights violations... His decisions led to military and police actions and he has to answer for his actions," Communist Party (PC) lawmaker Daniel Nunez said.

"We're going to use democracy's weapons so that Sebastian Piñera assumes the political responsibility he eludes."

The 110-pages accusation "has long been worked with the parliamentarians' teams," Democratic Revolution (RD) lawmaker Jorge Brito emphasized and explained that Piñera "has been hiding behind the police and the military to deny democracy.”

For it to be processed, however, the constitutional accusation requires a favorable vote of half-plus-one of the representatives in the Chamber of Deputies.

If it passes this test, the accusation will require that two-thirds of the senators approve it. If this also happens, Piñera may be dismissed.

Chile: Isolated girls are imprisoned without water or food. Sexual abuse, torture, deaths. They denounce serious police human rights violations. The meme reads, "Arbitrary detentions, under-16-year minors in cells without water, food, and access to talk to their families. Forced nudity in detentions and other more serious forms of sexual violence. Tortures, excessive use of violence, deaths, and disappearances."

In Chile, protests began a month ago when students rejected a 30-cent increase in the metro fare. In a country mired in social injustice, however, discontent quickly shifted against "30 years" of neoliberal policies, which have seriously affected health, education, wages, and pensions.

"It's not 30 cents, it's 30 years," citizens shouted to summarize their requirement of a Constituent Assembly, which can deeply transform the economy inherited from the dictatorship (1973-1990). 

Until Monday night, police brutality in Chile had left 22 dead, 2,200 injured and 6,300 arrested, according to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR).

The constitutional accusation related to these human rights violations was presented by lawmakers from the Wide Front (FA), the Communist Party, the Socialist Party and the Party for Democracy (PPD).

In the Chilean political history, constitutional accusations were raised against Manuel Montt in 1868 Carlos Ibañez in 1931 and Arturo Alessandri in 1939.

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