Indigenous March Arrives in Buenos Aires in Defense of Land

The Third Peace Raid (Malon), a caravan made up of over 400 Indigenous communities from the province of Jujuy, is expected to arrive in Buenos Aires on Tuesday.

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The caravan left Jujuy on July 25 and passed through Tucuman, Santiago del Estero, Catamarca, and Santa Fe. Its arrival in the Argentine capital coincides with the commemoration of Mother Earth Day (Pachamama).

The members of the caravan traveled some 200 kilometers to make their demands visible, among which are respect for indigenous rights to land, water, life, and the future.

Their protest action also has the objectives of demanding that the Supreme Court rule on the unconstitutionality of the "express reform" that Jujuy Governor Gerardo Morales promotes to facilitate large-scale mining.

Besides referring to previous large mobilizations, the name of the march ("Malon") uses a Mapuche word that means surprise raid on an enemy settlement.

The first malon, which was carried out during the government of Juan Domingo Peron in 1946, sought to demand that the Argentine state restitute the territories to the Indigenous peoples. The second malon occurred in 2006 and sought to achieve respect for water and life.

"In this third malon, however, the central issue is Morales' unconstitutional reform," Okloya chief Nestor Jerez said, recalling that the Jujuy Indigenous peoples never received the land they demanded.

Last week, the National University of the Arts (UNA) publicly expressed its support for the Indigenous march and strongly rejected the repressive actions carried out by the Jujuy government against workers, students and farmers.