Valparaiso, Chile – At least 60 people were arrested here on Sunday during a protest by students and workers against the government while President Michelle Bachelet appeared before Congress, which has its seat here, to give a speech.
All the arrested people were participating in a demonstration mounted by the Communist Party that ended in a confrontation with the Carabineros militarized police.
Police said that a group of protesters threw Molotov cocktails and tear gas canisters that apparently had been stolen earlier from police.
Deputy Interior Minister Felipe Harboe told journalists that the police had to use water cannons and tear gas to control several violent demonstrators.
Harboe said that authorities will investigate how the tear gas grenades got into the hands of the protesters.
About 2,000 people congregated to complain about the country’s educational system and show their support for four Mapuche prisoners who on Saturday resumed a hunger strike to demand their sentences – handed down for violating the anti-terrorism law – be overturned. The four men had been sentenced to 10 years in prison for burning a forested area that belonged to a lumber firm.
The secretary general of the Communist Party, Guillermo Teillier, accused the security forces of acting “with uncommon violence and (arresting) people who were peacefully marching.”
Meanwhile, at her speech before Congress, Bachelet discussed her plans for her administration and said she planned to push for “crucial” changes to improve the country’s development.
In her 75-minute state of the union address, which Chilean presidents are required to make every May 21, Bachelet presented what she called a “road map” for her four-year administration.
She said her aim was to have Chile fully “converted into a modern country” by 2010, the 200th anniversary of the nation’s independence.
The planned transformations to improve health care, public safety and agricultural subsidies are to be financed, Bachelet said, in part from the windfall profits Chile is receiving from sales of currently expensive copper in the international market. The unexpected profits expected to amount to some $9 billion this year.
She said that her administration would give 1,225,000 of the country’s poorest families a $35 “winter bond” to alleviate the high cost of fuel. Chile imports more than 90 percent of its petroleum and gasoline prices recently have risen above $1.20 per liter ($4.55 per gallon).
She also announced a new price stabilization mechanism so that additional increases in the international oil price would not hurt consumers so much.
