FUNDO PIDENCO, Chile, July 21 - After years of reclaiming ancestral lands through occupations, sabotage and clashes with police, militant Mapuche groups are confronting one of their toughest periods in decades as lengthy prison sentences and a crackdown by Chile's new far-right President Jose Antonio Kast gather pace.

Reuters is the first news organization to gain access to Fundo Pidenco and one of the few to access several other emblematic centers of Mapuche resistance, including communities where police and state authorities rarely enter.

Several visits offered a rare glimpse into a movement confronting new difficulties as Kast promises to restore order in Chile's long-running southern conflict. While some communities vow to continue resisting, younger generations are increasingly turning toward legal methods such as university study, courts and environmental campaigns to defend ancestral lands.

The Mapuche are Chile's largest Indigenous group representing nearly 9% of the total population, or about 1.6 million according to Chile's latest census data, and the only one in the Americas to have negotiated an independence treaty with Spain after centuries of resistance. Much of Mapuche territory remained outside Chilean state control until the late 19th century.

Land loss accelerated during the 1973-90 Augusto Pinochet dictatorship, when large tracts were transferred to forestry companies.

Land reform that benefited Mapuches under socialist President Salvador Allende was largely reversed and between 1974 and 1994, nearly 1.7 million hectares of land were planted with eucalyptus and pine, with much of that land coming from Mapuche areas. Although some Mapuches have pursued state-backed land purchases, others have sought to reclaim territory through occupations.

Mapuche activists have set fire to forestry companies' vehicles, excavators, logging towers, camps, warehouses and offices. They have also attacked churches, cabins, crops and tourist complexes belonging to large landowners.

The most prominent militant organization is the Coordinadora Arauco-Malleco, or CAM, which has long advocated recovering territo...