Indigenous rights advocate Juana Calfunao Paillalef is currently imprisoned in a women’s penitentiary in Temuco, Chile, and is reportedly on a hunger strike, according to the Mapuche nation Web site. Paillalef is the lonka, or chief, of the Mapuche people in the Cunoco district of the Araucania region of Chile. According to human rights group Front Line Defenders, Paillalef was arrested in her home on January 4, and was charged with threatening police officers and obstructing public property during two separate protests in December 2005. Paillalef was refused bail at a preliminary hearing on the grounds of being a security threat. Her trial is scheduled to begin February 13.
