Tag: americas

The Supreme Court has just condemned seven former soldiers for the murder of popular singer Victor Jara. Six of them are sentenced to 25 years in prison for kidnapping and homicide. The artist, known internationally, was arrested the day after the coup led by General Augusto Pinochet in 1973 against the socialist president Salvador Allende.

Published on: 08/28/2023 – 23:51Modified on: 08/29/2023 – 00:37

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With our correspondent in Santiago, Naila Derroisné

The verdict of the Chilean justice falls a few days before the commemorations of the 50th anniversary of the coup and marks the end of several decades of impunity for the family of the singer. It was in 1978, in the midst of the dictatorship, that Victor Jara’s widow filed a complaint for the first time. But at that time, no investigation was opened… 24 years later, the family lawyer took over the case and took the case to court.

The accused will appeal several times but it was only yesterday, 50 years after the assassination of the singer, that the seven former soldiers were definitively sentenced.

On September 12, 1973, a day after the coup, Victor Jara, a member of the Chilean Communist Party and supporter of President Salvador Allende, was arrested, then tortured, before being killed. His body will be found along a railway line, riddled with 44 bullets and with 56 fractures.

Supreme Court justices considered his treatment to be “ closely linked to its artistic, cultural and political activity. The most severe beatings he received were to the face and hands. »

His lawyer Nelson Caucoto welcomes an almost unexpected decision, after so many years:

Within Chilean society, opinions are divided about these convictions. But I don’t think anyone thought we would get to such a result. No one believed that justice would not achieve these exemplary convictions, even if, as the years passed, it was clear that the various courts appealed fundamentally to international law. They ended up finding the way to reach this outcome and today, we could not have hoped for better, after all the obstacles encountered by the investigations for the resolution of these crimes in which the State itself participated. And we can consider that by being also guilty of these crimes, the State may have felt compelled not to participate in their resolution. We have seen it in other cases on a national or international scale.

Today we are witnessing the fulfillment of the destiny of all human rights trials with these very heavy sentences, commensurate with the seriousness of the acts committed, condemnation of homicide but also of kidnappings. And from this point of view, the families are satisfied.

In Chile, the Victor Jara case is an example of the slowness of judicial proceedings regarding cases of human rights violations committed under the dictatorship.