CHILE MEDIA REPORT - AUGUST 13

UNCLAS SANTIAGO 000775 SIPDIS STATE FOR R/MR, I/PP, WHA/BSC, WHA/PDA, INR/IAA E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: KMDR KPAO PGOV ECON PREL SNAR EFIN CI SUBJECT: CHILE MEDIA REPORT - AUGUST 13 Lead Story -------------- ¶1. Three different polls -- CERC, Imaginaccion, and Direct Media -- show that Sebastian Pinera is ahead in the presidential race in either a first round or a runoff election with Concertacion candidate Eduardo Frei and independent Marcos Enriquez-Ominami (El Mercurio, conservative, influential, 8/13). Honduras -------------- ¶2. Foreign Minister Fernandez will meet in Washington with A/S Thomas Shannon and OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza to discuss Manuel Zelaya's return to office. Some of Fernandez' counterparts in the region have told him that they believe that the Obama administration has been too passive with the Micheletti government. Fernandez will transmit that message to Washington (El Mercurio, 8/13). ¶3. President Bachelet will receive President Zelaya today in La Moneda. Zelaya will also meet with party presidents and the chairmen of the foreign relations committees of the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies. Foreign Minister Fernandez said that Chile has canceled the accreditation of the Honduran ambassador who defended Micheletti after the coup, Eduardo Martinez, as requested by President Zelaya two weeks ago (El Mercurio, 8/13). ¶4. Foreign Minister Fernandez said Zelaya's visit to Chile, "falls in the framework of the Chile's efforts to promote the restoration of democracy in Honduras and of its constitutionally elected president" (La Tercera, conservative, independent, 8/14). ¶5. Editorial on Honduras: "Chile must support democracy in Honduras and its legitimate government, but it cannot disavow Zelaya's responsibility in the events that have developed (in that country)" (La Tercera, 8/13). U.S.-Colombia agreement/Unasur -------------- ¶6. Unasur presidents, including Alaro Uribe, will meet in Argentina on August 28 to discuss the Colombia-U.S. agreement in depth, said Argentine news agency Telam (El Mercurio, 8/13). Indigenous Mapuche Conflict -------------- ¶7. The owner of an estate in Angol called the Carabineros police to evict a group of about 50 Mapuches armed with shotguns who had seized a part of his land early morning. There was a shoot-out and indigenous activist Jaime Collio was killed. Members of Collio's community tried to stop the Forensic Service from lifting the body, which resulted in a new clash. Collio is the third Mapuche to die in clashes with the local authorities in six years (La Tercera, 8/13). Science -------------- ¶8. Chile has one of the most valuable skies, if someone were to assess the value of skies worldwide. The reason is that US$2.5 billion will be invested by foreign companies to build several telescopes over the next two years. There is the GMT, one of the most modern telescopes in the world; the Atacama Large Millimeter Array Telescope (ALMA),the Visible Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy (VISTA),the VLT Survey Telescope, and the U.S. LSST Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) that will have the largest photographic camera in the world (El Mercurio, 8/13). SIMONS