Ecuador: CONAIE DENOUNCES SEIZURE OF THE WIFE OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE CONAIE

Via Ukhamawa noticias/23 February 2008

The Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador CONAIE announces its objection, before the country, public opinion, international agencies, and the media, to the abduction, and psychological and verbal assault committed against Compañera Miriam Cisneros 28 years, spouse of President Marlon Santi.

While Compañera Miriam was prepapring to travel to Puyo, she was intercepted by two men in civilian clothes at approximately 4:30 pm, Friday 22 Febryuary, 2008, and immediately carried in a van heading south of Quito, where she was repeatedly interrogated with 5 questions:

1 .- Who are the advisers to the CONAIE?
2 .- What is President Marlo Santi's agenda?
3 .- What are the plans of the CONAIE against the government of Rafael Correa?
4 .- Who are the advisers of the CONFENAIE? (Confederation of the Amazon Nationalities of Ecuador. The Amazonian regional organisation of CONAIE)
5 .- Who were the women who were leading the march against the FTA?

When they saw that she would not respond to their questions, they took her several times to the front of the offices of the MICC ("Indigenous and Peasant Movement of Cotopaxi", a subsidiary organisation of the CONAIE), intent on subtle psychological manipulation, while continuing the brutal physical assault, and a series of death threats if she publicised the fact.

In late hours of the night in Shell parish and in the Mera Control near the town of Puyo, the hijackers, after crippling and torturing the victim with cold water, stopped in this area and abandoned the victim almost unconscious, claiming to be carrying out the orders of the government of Rafael Correa. They quickly ran away.

The unconscious body was transferred to a health care facility in Puyo, where Marlon Santí went immediately from Lago Agrio and received a telephone call in which an unknown person threatened him with death if he made any allegation of that fact.

The CONAIE confirms its position to defend every form of life, and flatly rejects any kind of violation of human rights. It calls upon national and international society to be aware of such facts, and demands the immediate investigation of the case, as well as their authors.