Carabineros police have repressed protests following the murder of young Francisco Martinez. | Photo: EFE

Santiago de Chile, February 9 (RHC)-- Political and social sectors in Chile are demanding the dismantling of the Carabineros (militarized police) after the murder of a juggler by an agent of that body, which unleashed a wave of protests.

Social networks have been the means for citizens and politicians to demand the "refounding" of Carabineros, which accumulates a series of complaints of police abuses that violate human rights, which increased during the demonstrations that began in October 2019.

Eduardo Artés, secretary general of the Chilean Communist Party and president of Unión Patriótica, posted on Twitter that Carabineros claims that the death of juggler Francisco Martínez was "legitimate self-defense (...) Dissolve Carabineros, out (President Sebastián) Piñera!".

Senator Alejandro Navarro, for his part, demanded that the Senate "initiate (the) debate on (the) re-foundation of Carabineros."

Last Friday, a military policeman shot dead Francisco Martínez, 27, in the southern city of Panguipulli, where the young man earned his living as a juggler, after he refused to submit to an identity check.

On Monday, a magistrate accepted a request from the prosecutor's office in the Los Rios region of southern Chile, which charged the Carabineros member with simple homicide, and placed the policeman under house arrest while the judicial process is underway.

The crime unleashed a new wave of protests in the South American country, which have been repressed by the militarized police, with a balance of more than 40 people arrested, the burning of several public buildings and the burning of buses.

In this context, the alleged suicide of Camilo Miyaki, who was in a cell of a police station in Santiago, after being detained for not carrying a safe-conduct, was reported.

The National Human Rights Observatory ANEXPPSA Chile reported in a statement that, according to his partner, Camilo Miyaki "had no history of mental health illnesses, that they had plans and projects, that he was a kind person, emotionally stable and that in no case did he show suicidal ideas or signs of an incipient depression."