MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Pinochet's coup remembered in Chile after 51 years

“We still have more than 1,100 compatriots who we do not know where they are,” argued Boric

Chilean authorities Wednesday paid tribute to the victims of the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet Ugarte which started on Sept. 11, 1973, after the military uprising resulted in the death of President Salvador Allende and the overthrowing of the democratically-elected government 51 years ago, when a regime that would last until 1990 seized power.

President Gabriel Boric Font's government announced that former torture centers would be refurbished as a warning of what should never happen again. In addition, a repeal of the amnesty law benefitting human rights violators is about to be approved.

“We still have more than 1,100 compatriots who we do not know where they are,” argued Boric, who also pledged to expedite the parliamentary treatment of a bill seeking to exclude pardons from cases of crimes against humanity. “Although amnesty is no longer applied thanks to a solid jurisprudence of the courts of justice, ending its effects in a definitive and irreversible manner is a pending debt that we have as a country,” he added.

Boric and various cabinet members as well as a group of survivors Wednesday toured the premises of what used to be between 1974 and 1975 the Venda Sexy torture and sexual violence center in the commune of Macul, east of Santiago.

“We had the opportunity to talk about the recovery of this site for the memory and for the country which, after a process of expropriation, this July 24, 2024, we managed to recover as a site of memory and that, during 2025, if the Parliament agrees, will have the necessary resources to function as a site of memory and develop its tasks and objectives,” Boric said.

Interior Minister Carolina Tohá, the daughter of one of the victims of Pinochet's regime, hailed the opening of the “Hall of Ministers” within the La Moneda Palace to honor three officials “eliminated by the dictatorship”.

“Every year we pay tribute to those who have been victims of human rights abuses and to those who have dedicated a large part of their lives to fight for their defense, truth, and justice,” said University of Chile Rector Rosa Devés during the ceremony remembering students disappeared under Pinochet. “Paying tribute to them inspires us and signals conduct. During the past year, we have been concerned with strengthening an education focused on human rights, which fosters coexistence based on respect for those rights and contributes to empowering our professionals and graduates,” she added. So far 126 students have been granted posthumous degrees by the University of Chile.