00:00It has been 53 years since the civil-military coup in Chile.
00:04More than 30,000 survivors of torture, more than 2,000 executed, and more than 1,400 people who are
00:11still missing.
00:12There are figures that seem to matter little to the government of Pinochet's supporter, José Antonio Gass,
00:17who ruled out any kind of institutional gesture.
00:20Paula Doregne has the details.
00:26Although commemorative activities for this upcoming September 11 are being prepared at the sites of memory,
00:31former torture centers, there is a different kind of silence.
00:35Chile has returned to Pinochetism, and the date seems to hurt even more.
00:41What I feel is a great deal of uncertainty, concern, and I also feel anger, a lot of anger.
00:53Particularly because, well, what the far-right represents in the government is.
00:59It's a very significant cultural and civilizational setback.
01:04Alejandro was only 20 years old when he was arrested in 1976,
01:08as a member of the revolutionary left movement.
01:12This is Villa Grimaldi. Today, it's a part dedicated to peace.
01:17It is this physical place where state terrorism was carried out with the utmost cruelty and coldness.
01:25In particular, I had an experience that took place in the context of a targeted crackdown
01:31on an organization that was part of the resistance.
01:35Chile is riddled with what were once these centers of torture and extermination.
01:40We know about them because, like Alejandro, some people survived.
01:45Every September 11, they become a place to honor life.
01:48That experience of being imprisoned, of witnessing what I did,
01:53turned my life upside down.
01:55So I seriously considered the possibility of, first and foremost, surviving,
02:00and second, how to survive, if I did so within the country or outside of it.
02:05These are all moments, so to speak, that leave a deep mark on one's life.
02:10But the Pinochet-style government of Jose Antonio Cass seems not to understand this.
02:15Hesitantly, the Interior Minister confirmed that there will be no ceremony of any kind, absolute denial.
02:21The date you just mentioned
02:25is a day that all Chileans approach
02:28with different sensibilities and feelings.
02:37And we respect those perspectives regarding this date.
02:42But in our government,
02:45as we have said on numerous occasions,
02:51we are focused on and working day by day to address the people's priorities.
02:59And we are considering how that work contributes to building a better Chile moving forward.
03:07One where political differences do not lead us back to the extremes of the past.
03:11There's a narrative out there that says,
03:12no, let's move forward, let's leave the past behind.
03:15But the past we left behind still haunts us.
03:18History is family.
03:19It is exile.
03:21It is the rebuilding of democracy.
03:22Today, rebuilding the social fabric has taken all these years,
03:26precisely because we said, let's not move forward,
03:28let's pretend nothing happened.
03:30That's very Chilean.
03:31But it doesn't serve us.
03:32It doesn't help us build a country.
03:35Opposition parties, human rights organizations, memorial sites,
03:40and many other organizations are commemorating these events and preparing for them,
03:45while condemning the government's denial of the past.
03:48You go to the General Cemetery and see the images of the countless detainees,
03:52the disappeared, and those who were executed, men and women alike.
03:56That is a tremendous source of pain for Chile.
03:59And yet today there are politicians in Chile, and this government,
04:02who applaud it, justify it, or at the very least remain silent.
04:05The truth is, it's a disgrace.
04:07That's why I dare to point out that this is a government that brings shame upon Chileans.
04:13At 11.52 a.m. on September 11, 1973,
04:19democracy collapsed and an ordeal began that seems to have no end.
04:23Soledad Romero and Paola Drognik, TeleCert Chile.
Comments