Sebastián Piñera confirms he will not hold summits in November and December, as government struggles with massive protests.

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Chilean president cancels Apec and climate summits amid wave of unrest.

Protesters in Chile clash with riot police as unrest grows – video
▼ Chile’s embattled president has been forced to cancel two major international summits after government concessions failed to defuse weeks of violent protests that have seen thousands of arrests, left at least 20 dead and sent shock waves across Latin America.
Sebastián Piñera made the  announcementon Wednesday morning, telling reporters Chile would no longer be able to host November’s Apec trade summit and the COP25 UN climate conference the following month.
World leaders including Donald Trump and China’s leader, Xi Jinping, had been due to attend the first event while climate champions including the teenage activist Greta Thunberg were expected at the second.
Piñera blamed the “difficult circumstances” Chilewas facing for the decision and said his government’s primary concern had to be “fully restoring public order, security and social peace”.
“This has been a very difficult decision – which has caused us great pain – because we understand perfectly the importance [of the events] for Chile and for the world,” Chile’s centre-right president said.
“When a father has problems, he must always put his family before everything else. Similarly, a president must always put his own countrymen ahead of any other consideration,” Piñera added.
Patricia Espinosa, the UN’s climate change executive secretary, said the UN was “exploring alternative hosting options” for the climate summit after being informed of the decision in a letter from Chile’s environment minister.
Piñera said he had warned other world leaders of the cancellation.
Chile’s protests began in mid-October as a student-led  fight against a 3.7% hike in  metro fares. But those demonstrations quickly swelled into a much broader mutiny against inequality, the cost of living and police repression.
According to Chile’s Human  Rights Institute, 3,535 people have been arrested since 17 October while 1,132 people have been taken to hospital – 38 of them with gunshot injuries.
On 18 October Piñera declared a state of emergency after violence broke out on the streets of the capital, Santiago, later declaring the country “at war” with “evil” delinquents.
After such moves failed to quell the unrest, Chile’s president tried to placate protesters with a conciliatory televised address in which he asked forgiveness for the “shortsightedness” of the country’s political leaders.
Piñera also unveiled a string of progressive economic reforms, a cabinet reshuffle and the decision to end nightly curfews in an effort to calm tensions.
But those concessions appear not to have been enough (▪ ▪ ▪)

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