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VICTIMS: CHRONOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT
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1973 - 1976
The Initial Crackdown
The regime's initial crackdown was swift and massive, allowing it to gain absolute control of the country in less than a week. It aimed mainly to demobilize left-wing parties and organizations by arresting their leaders, interrogating them under torture and in many cases, executing them. By arresting thousands of people in their place of work or at home, setting up prison camps, carrying out mass executions throughout the country, raids on entire neighborhoods and industrial zones - all in the space of a few hours - the new military leaders created a psychological climate of fear and intimidation that would be long-lasting.
"To the parents of Mr. Carlos Contreras Maluje: On Wednesday, November 3 (1976), at 11.30 a.m., between Aconcagua Street and Nataniel Street, your son Carlos Contreras Maluje was arrested by DINA agents..."
More people were killed in the four months following the coup than in any other year of the dictatorship. "Between September 11, 1973 and December 31, 1973, a total of 1,213 people died or disappeared at the hands of state agents" (ILAS). The figure represents more than half of the total number of deaths in the entire 17-year period of the regime. These practices devastated the extended family and friends of the victims, most of whom, 25 years later, have still received no answers regarding the whereabouts of their loved ones.
The early months after the coup were characterized by large-scale human rights violations but which were carried out in a rather disorganized and almost haphazard fashion. In those days, for example, torture sessions were uncontrolled and often resulted in death. Methods of repression gradually became more systematic and sophisticated over time, particularly with the creation of the DINA intelligence service in 1974.
The opponents of the new regime, taken by surprise by the bloody aftermath of the coup, spent the initial part of this period divided and in disarray, and delayed in understanding the repressive tactics of the military and in adapting to the new political context.
The First Victims
The first victims of the new regime were targeted as such even before the coup operation was complete. A group of about 50 government ministers and advisors, Allende's personal security force (GAP) and Investigations police officers were held inside the La Moneda presidential building after it was attacked on September 11, 1973.
In the following exchange between Army Commander-in-Chief Augusto Pinochet and National Defense chief Vice Admiral Patricio Carvajal, the coup plotters discuss what to do with these soon-to-be prisoners:
"Carvajal: -Allende's former minister Flores and his secretary called me from La Moneda. They expressed their intention to leave by the Morande Street door... and they have been told to come out holding a white flag to hold their fire... The idea is not to converse, but to take them prisoner immediately.
Pinochet: -Confirmed. Patricio, the airplane has to be ready in Cerillos (airport). The people get there and that's it; they take them on the plane and they take off. With a large number of escorts.
Carvajal: -...The idea would be to take them prisoner, nothing more for the moment, later we see...But for the moment the idea is to take them prisoner.
Pinochet: -Well, but if we have them we give them time. ... My opinion is that these gentlemen are taken and sent someplace by airplane and, even, have them thrown out of the plane on the way there."
(cited in Memoria Prohibida, Vol. I, 1989)
The military leaders eventually agreed to escort the surviving members of Salvador Allende's family out of the country and transfer those inside La Moneda to either the Military Academy (Escuela Militar) or the Tacna Regiment. From there, many government ministers were shipped to the Dawson Island concentration camp in the extreme south of Chile. Between September 13 and 14, 32 people held at the Tacna Regiment were summarily executed.
Meanwhile, massive arrests took place at the factory workplaces in industrial zones along Vicuna Mackenna Avenue in Santiago. About 80 % of major national trade union leaders were arrested, persecuted or forced to go into hiding in this initial stage. Most were brought to Chile Stadium and later transferred to the National Stadium, both set up as temporary prison camps.
The State Technical University (UTE) also became a place of massive arrests from which the world renowned folk singer, Victor Jara, was arrested, alongside many other student leaders, UP sympathizers, university staff and students, who were taken to the Chile Stadium. Jara was later murdered in the stadium.
The Left Outlawed
Left-wing political parties in general suffered human rights abuses in this period. Political parties were outlawed, Congress shut down and the parties that continued to operate clandestinely were targets of repression.
In 1974, the DINA and other military intelligence forces focused their repressive tactics on the Movement of the Revolutionary Left (MIR). A large number of its leaders disappeared after detention. In 1975, both the MIR and the Socialist Party suffered disappearances. Subsequently, the DINA tracked down and killed or made to disappear two consecutive hierarchies of the Chilean Communist Party within a period of one year. Members of moderate parties who opposed the regime, such as the Christian Democratic Party, also suffered human rights violations.
But not only politically active people were victimized in this period. Common criminals were also often executed as part of the general "cleansing of unwanted elements" advocated by the military Junta. Likewise, church leaders involved in defending individual rights and doctors treating injured victims, suffered from persecution and a significant number of individuals with no known involvement or political affiliation were shot for violating curfew.
La DINA Abroad
During this period, the DINA also operated in other countries of the region, carrying out secret operations such as high-profile political assassinations, as was the case of the murders of UP minister Orlando Letelier, and former Army head General Carlos Prats, and misinformation campaigns, such as the "Operación Colombo," among others.
Click here to enter the International page and read more about the DINA´s activities abroad. (under construction)
1977 - 1982
Change in Repressive Tactics
This period can be characterized by, first, the dissolution of the DINA secret police and its replacement by the newly created CNI on August 13, 1977, and, secondly, an evident change in repressive tactics used by the state, principally the end of the practice of "disappearance" except in a few isolated cases. Between 1978 and 1981, there are a few cases of disappearances, but this practice is not systematically applied and they are not the responsibility of the CNI, rather, they are carried out by paramilitary commandos.
According to the Rettig Report, the CNI concentrated its efforts on gathering information between November 1977 and mid 1980, "as can be seen by the drop in the number of deaths caused by this organization." Nevertheless, beginning 1980, until the end of the dictatorship, the CNI intensified its repressive activities. One of its most important functions, in conjunction with similar organisms, was to instill fear throughout society.
Due to the closure in 1976 of the regime's concentration camps, people arrested by the state's repressive agencies were generally no longer subjected to long-term detention beginning in 1977. Rather, towards the end of the 1970s, individuals were usually detained for a number of hours or a few days, during which he or she was interrogated and tortured.
Also during this period, activists against the regime began to be targets of harassment and threats from special "commandos" set up by the CNI in different locations, such as university campuses, specifically for this purpose. Other commandos such as the Commando for the Vengeance of Martyrs, COVEMA, achieved notoriety through the practices of kidnapping, torture and homicide.
Enemies of the State
The type of person targeted by the security forces changed during this period. Leaders and members of clandestine political parties, principally the MIR, the Communist Party and the Socialist Party continued to head the regime's hit list, but unlike the 1973-77 period, relatives of the disappeared and of other victims also fell within its definition of "enemy of the state." So did those who defended human rights, and leaders, organizers and participants of social movements which emerged as the new opposition to the military regime.
The CNI also targeted those it qualified as "subversive criminals" or "enemies of the state" who allegedly or truly promoted armed resistance against the regime. Real or false armed confrontations served as the backdrop for the execution of "terrorists" and "extremists." The victims of these confrontations were usually members of the political parties which were back in operation after the heavy setbacks suffered pre-1977. These included the MIR - which in 1979 began its "Operacion Retorno" aimed at reorganizing the party through the clandestine return to Chile of exiled MIR members trained in armed combat abroad - the Communist Party and the Socialist Party.
The Resuscitation of the Opposition
From 1977 to 1982, a severely weakened union movement gradually re-organized and a palpable opposition movement began to take shape. In July 1978, for example, the Chuquicamata miners organized a protest to express their dissatisfaction with their working conditions. The regime's response was harsh. On October 19, 1978, it closed seven confederations, which represented over 500 unions.
By the first half of 1980, there was a notable change in the opposition movement, reflecting Chile's worsening economic conditions. Its re-articulation responded to the new political conditions which evolved in the country from the onset of the military coup. On March 8, 1980, International Women's Day, and on May 1, International Workers’ Day the same year, the number of people protesting on the streets had evidently increased. The latter protest was organized by the newly created National Union Coordinator, CNS, and other union organizations. The regime sent 45 people to internal exile following both protests.
By 1982 the repressive mechanisms against the growing union movement culminated in the murder of union leader Tucapel Jimenez. On December 2 of that same year, the CNS organized a protest which was met with strong repression and the exile of CNS leaders Manuel Bustos and Hector Cuevas. It was during this protest that the so-called "gurkas" first appeared. Infiltrated among the protesters, these state agents dressed in civilian clothes, attacked and wounded their victims in a surprise offensive, resulting in dozens of injuries and arrests.
As large-scale protests became more common, the state's security agencies began to carry out mass arrests. By 1982, the number of mass detentions was far greater than the number of individual detentions. In the first six months of 1981, 254 people were arrested during protests, and 448 people were victims of individual detentions. By the first half of 1982, these figures had practically reversed, at 447 and 220 respectively.
In 1982, 53 public demonstrations against the regime took place in the country, and the regime changed its repressive tactics, relying more on constant surveillance, harassment, raids and arbitrary arrests, all of which aimed to control its opponents through the systematic use of terror.
1983 - 1989
The Era of National Protests
During this period, repression was aimed primarily at the organizers of and participants in mass protests, particularly from 1983 to 1985.
Human rights violations consisted mainly of abuse of power by state agents during the protests, mass arrests, harassment and torture. The practice of forced disappearances returned, but on a very small scale The use of particularly brutal or cruel violence against selected individuals was also an important characteristic of this period.
The gradual resuscitation of the labor movement and political parties in the early 1980s, the campaigns carried out by associations made up of victims' family members and mounting discontent over the economic situation led to an increasingly bold defiance of the regime, culminating in the era of social protest. For first time in 10 years, the climate of fear was broken. The tactic of selective victimization and cruelty were intended to instill terror and defuse the growing protest movement.
State of Seige
In November 1984, in response to the national protests, the military government reimposed a state of siege, which remained in place until June 1985. The state of siege, which imposed a 10:00 p.m. curfew, gave rise to an increased incidence of arbitrary detentions, raids on poblaciones, abuses and deaths. The Vicaria of Solidarity reports that 39 % of all deaths that occurred in the 1983-89 period took place in this eight-month period.
Abuse of power, as in the notorious case of the military patrol which poured kerosene over Rodrigo Rojas and Carmen Gloria Quintana and set them on fire, accounted for about half of all deaths in 1986. In that same year, when demonstrations and protests increased considerably, more than 35,000 human rights violations were reported.
It was during the state of siege that, on March 28, 1985, police abducted and brutally murdered teachers Santiago Nattino and Manuel Guerrero and Vicaria staff member Jose Manuel Parada. Curfew was also used to carry out grave violations of human rights, as was the case of the four leftist opponents - Felipe Rivera, Gastón Vidaurrázaga, Abraham Muskablit, and Jose Carrasco - killed September 9, 1986 in revenge for the deaths of Pinochet's escorts during an assassination attempt.
Death Threats And Torture
Intimidation in the form of death threats, common throughout all the military regime, became widespread in 1987 and 1988. The Chilean Human Rights Commission reported 1,088 such threats in 1987, twice the number of the previous year. Authors of threats appear to have been paramilitary groups or squads associated with the CNI.
Perhaps the most active was the Chilean Anti Communist Action (AChA), responsible for threats by telephone and mail against union leader Manuel Bustos and to Cardinal Raul Silva Henriquez. Targets for death threats ranged from community and union leaders and human rights activists to clergy, journalists, actors, lawyers and political figures.
As a concession to the outcry against the continued practice of torture, in June 1986 a new decree law called for CNI agents to turn over detainees to police. Americas Watch was one of several international and national human rights monitoring groups that confirmed that while CNI agents refrained from torturing in their own premises, they continued to do so in police stations.
continue:
Targets of Repression
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