Afro-Chileans achieved a significant step forward during the year when, for the first time in the country's history, Chile's National Institute of Statistics (INE) launched its first ever study of the Afro-descendant population in the Arica region. This will provide a valuable opportunity to gather information on a community that has never been recognized in Chilean society: previously, Chile's Afro-descendant population did not have the right to self-identify as Afro-Chileans in the national census as the government had not recognized their ethnicity. Currently estimated by community members to number around 8,000 people, Afro-Chileans are concentrated in urban areas of northern Chile.

Previously, community representatives had complained about the barriers that the lack of properly disaggregated data created in addressing their marginalization and discrimination. In 2011, John Salgado, representative of the NGO Oro Negro and the Chilean Alliance for Afro-descendant Organizations, described to the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights (OHCHR) the 'invisibilization' of their ethnicity, which meant that 'it is impossible to acknowledge problems … [as] you don't see the people who are suffering them'. As the Afro-Chilean Alliance's previous efforts to include questions on their ethnicity in the national census of 2012 had failed, their recognition this time is a significant milestone for the community.

Unlike elsewhere in the region, Chile's indigenous population is made up largely of a single people. According to the 2012 census, more than 1.7 million self-identified as indigenous: of these, 88 per cent were Mapuche, followed by Aymara (7 per cent) and other smaller groups (5 per cent). As with the Afro-Chilean community, there have been positive steps to improve indigenous data. Beginning in 2013 and continuing until 2018, Chile Indígena, an initiative of the government's national indigenous body, the Corporación Nacional de Desarrollo Indígena (CONADI), aims to improve the quality of life of indigenous peoples in Chile, respecting 'development with identity' and promoting 'horizontal dialogue' between indigenous communities and the government. The project began in 2013 and will continue until 2018.

While they have historically received greater recognition than Afro-Chileans, Chile's indigenous population nevertheless continues to experience discrimination in access to education and employment. In March 2015, the Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights Philip Alston visited Chile and in his end-of-mission statement reported that the government's response to the ongoing marginalization of the indigenous population 'has been piecemeal and especially reluctant to address the major issues of concern'. Among other measures, he highlighted the importance of adequate consultation with communities around the government's proposed plan to establish a Ministry for Indigenous Affairs, as well as the need to expand their political representation in a country where, despite comprising around 10 per cent of the population, there is currently not a single indigenous representative in the Congress. Finally, he drew attention to the domination of Chile's agriculture, forestry and mining industries by certain corporations, calling for these companies to adopt 'a set of human rights policies that conform, as a minimum, to the requirements of the UN's Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.'

Land rights and access to ancestral territory remain major issues for indigenous peoples in Chile, particularly in the south of the country, with protests continuing during the year. Indigenous activists continued to advocate for the protection of their ancestral lands from unsustainable development projects. In October, Chile's Supreme Court halted the development of the El Morro gold and copper mine owned by the Canadian conglomerate, Goldcorp, until indigenous communities are consulted. And on 17 March 2015, representatives from the Mapuche indigenous people appeared before the IACHR to bring attention to the extractive activities taking place on their ancestral lands, and the negative effects they have on their way of life and culture.

In a July 2014 ruling, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights found the state guilty of violating the human rights of members of the Mapuche people. The decision in the case of Norin Catriman et al. vs. the State of Chile related to the government's use of anti-terrorist legislation in 2002 and 2003 against indigenous protesters, some of whom received prison sentences at the time. As Jimina Reyes of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and one of the counsels in the case noted, the Court had concluded that 'it is illegal to criminalize the Mapuche quests for their ancestral land'.

Earlier in 2014, in response to concerns raised by a UN working group, the government committed to the restitution of indigenous lands within two years. Francisco Huenchumilla, a part-Mapuche politician, was appointed as Governor of the Araucanía region; he subsequently apologized on behalf of the government of President Michelle Bachelet to the Mapuche people for the dispossession of land that took place as part of the country's 'pacification' programmes in the nineteenth century. Indigenous commentators at the time noted, however, that the government's proposal only specified the Mapuche and land registered with CONADI; which left them wondering about what would happen to other communities and other lands.

Chile is a highly urbanized South American country, with 90 per cent of Chileans now living in towns and cities. This includes a significant proportion of Chile's indigenous peoples. According to the 2012 census, more than 585,000 indigenous people – over a third of the country's total indigenous population – now live in the greater Santiago metropolitan area, where they have formed indigenous associations, clubs, educational groups and political organizations. Yet many reportedly face continued discrimination and sub-standard living conditions in this context.

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