Statement: 46 years after the beginning of the civic-military dictatorship in Chile

On September 11, 1973, one of the longest and bloodiest civic-military dictatorships in Latin America began in Chile, led by dictator Augusto Pinochet. This period was characterized by severe repression of left-wing social and political movements and the implementation of harsh authoritarian measures that curtailed the freedom of all Chileans. During this time, numerous human rights violations were committed, with more than 28.000 people subjected to torture and political imprisonment, and more than 1.000 disappeared, their remains still missing to this day.

Furthermore, some 200.000 people experienced exile, both voluntary and forced, many of whom were geographers who played a significant role in the development of geography departments throughout Latin America. Among them were Graciela Uribe, exiled in Mexico; Pedro Cunill, exiled in Venezuela; and Eusebio Flores, in Costa Rica—all important figures in geography in their respective countries. In addition, geography departments in Chile were either closed by the dictatorship or relocated to different faculties under military control.

Another consequence of the Chilean dictatorship was the imposition of a neoliberal doctrine and model under the tutelage of the United States. This included the privatization of pension systems, the implementation of labor reforms that restricted union organization, and the privatization of public education, leading public universities to take on debt from private banks to finance themselves—a situation that persists to this day. Currently, the governments of Argentina and Brazil are attempting to implement these reforms, which will likely lead to greater social and spatial inequality and condemn millions to poverty and destitution.

In Latin America, between the 1970s and 1980s, a plan of coordinated action and mutual support was carried out between the dictatorships of Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, and Venezuela with the United States. Known as "Operation Condor" or "Plan Condor," its objective was to implement the neoliberal economic model by dismantling social welfare states in the Southern Cone. This coordination officially and directly involved the tracking, surveillance, detention, torture, inter-country interrogation, and forced disappearance or murder of individuals considered by these regimes to be subversive and opposed to their ideology. The "Archives of Terror," discovered in Paraguay in 1992, document figures of 50.000 people killed, 30.000 disappeared, and 400.000 imprisoned.

Just like Working Group “Critical Latin American Geographical Thought” We believe it is necessary not to forget these acts that have marked Chile and all of Latin America. We raise our protest especially in times when fascist presidents tend to remember and make apologies for the dictator Augusto Pinochet, and where many of the military continue to maintain pacts of silence and where sectors of civil society justify civic-military dictatorships in the name of development and democracy.

Forty-six years after these tragic events, the crimes of the dictatorship remain unpunished. In recent weeks, Chilean right-wing politicians and retired and active military officers belonging to Sebastián Piñera's government have tended to downplay the events, criticizing the justice served and the sentences handed down, demonstrating a complete lack of commitment to the truth and reconciliation they once championed when they were tried and sentenced.

The non-repetition of human rights violations is something that is becoming increasingly relevant today, especially due to the criminalization of social protest applied by different governments in Latin America to different progressive expressions and social movements.

“Neither forgiveness nor forgetting” is the slogan coined by those of us who demand truth and justice, which must remain in force in every corner of our continent, Abya Yala.

EVERYTHING FOR EVERYONE!

 September 2019
CLACSO Working Group
Latin American critical geographical thought

This statement expresses the position of the members of the Working Group Latin American critical geographical thought and not necessarily that of the centers and institutions that make up the CLACSO international network, its Steering Committee or its Executive Secretariat.