Women’s Vigil in Chile in the Run-up to September 11
HAVANA TIMES – In silence, dressed in black and with a candle in hand, a multitude of women walked this Sunday night outside the Palacio de La Moneda. They were there as part of “Never+ bombed democracy”, a vigil convened by more than 50 civil society and human rights organizations, as part of the commemorative activities of the 50 years since the Coup d’état.
Among the attendees were the Minister of Cultures, Arts and Heritage, Carolina Arredondo, and the Undersecretary of Cultures and the Arts, Noela Salas.
“The important thing about participating in the different activities that have been carried out during these days is that those of us who attended share the common feeling of unrestricted defense of memory and democracy, contrary to the acts of violence that marked Chile on that sad 11 September 11, 1973,” said Minister Carolina Arredondo.
In addition, she added that “the possibility of sharing this emotional walk with all the women attending, in a respectful, complicit silence, was an opportunity to meet, hug and strengthen our tireless resolve for never again.”
This Sunday, in advance of the commemoration, the Secretary of State attended the inauguration of “Photojournalism and dictatorship: “Brazil 1964 / Chile 1973” at noon, at the Museum of Memory. The exhibition contains photographs of the historic Brazilian photojournalist Evandro Texeira, who just 10 days after the Coup d’état entered Chile as a correspondent for Jornal do Brasil, the most important of the time in that country.
The exhibition brings together images of the bombed La Moneda Palace, the National Stadium as a detention center and an unpublished record of the death of Pablo Neruda, after the correspondent had exclusive access to the poet’s family environment.
During the afternoon, Minister Carolina Arredondo was also at the commemorative ceremony “50 Years since the Chilean exile in Mexico”, held at the residence of the Mexican Embassy in Santiago.
Salvador Allende thought that running a popular, progressive, democratic, socialist country was possible in the Americas in the early 1970s.
He was incorrect.
Ultimately the USA was never going to allow this.
No more than the USSR was going to allow uprisings in Budapest or Prague in the preceding two decades.