SANTIAGO, Chile — Agents from the equivalent of the FBI in Chile were rebuffed Friday in an attempt to carry out a raid on a national police barracks as part of an investigation into the arrest of members of the country’s largest indigenous group, officials said. Prosecutors accuse some members of the national carabineros police of altering evidence by creating incriminatory chats on WhatsApp, which were allegedly introduced into the phones after they were seized from eight Mapuche activists who were arrested in September and later released. Officers of Chile’s FBI-like investigations police tried to raid the carabineros’ barracks in the southern city of Temuco on Friday but failed because the officers inside argued they needed an advance warning. Most of the indigenous there now live in poverty on the fringes of timber companies or ranches owned by the Europeans’ descendants. Marta Herrera, a spokeswoman for the national prosecutor’s office, said Friday the investigations police will attempt to carry out the raid on the carabineros barrack in Temuco, the capital of Araucania, as soon as possible.

Source: National Post January 26, 2018 20:48 UTC