Gabriel Boric: Yesterday it was Pinochet, Today It’s Ortega
The President of Chile made reference to the Nicaraguans deprived of their nationality: “One’s homeland doesn’t depend on papers signed by dictators but is something far beyond that.”
HAVANA TIMES – Chilean President Gabriel Boric warned of the “authoritarian turns” in today’s world during the commemoration in Rome of the 50th anniversary of the attempted assassination of Chilean dissident Bernardo Leighton. In his discourse, Boric also lashed out against the dictatorships of Nicaragua and Venezuela.
“It is important for those on the left to speak out and not lose sight of the fact that authoritarian deviations can be the order of the day anywhere, and that the defense of democracy must be without double standards,” Boric said in his speech on Wednesday, October 15, 2025.
Boric paid tribute to all those who “did not compromise their values in defense of democracy, justice, and the law;” and to those who, like Bernardo Leighton, are prevented from living in their homeland today.
He denounced the fact that the Nicaragua of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo has forced hundreds of opponents into exile, including poet Gioconda Belli and writer Sergio Ramirez.
“Yesterday it was Pinochet, today it’s Ortega in Nicaragua who denies [writers] Gioconda Belli and Sergio Ramirez their rights and turns them into stateless persons. But one’s homeland does not depend on papers signed by dictators; it goes much further than that,” he argued.
The United Nations Group of Experts on Human Rights for Nicaragua (GHREN) has documented some 452 cases of Nicaraguans officially stripped of their nationality, although they warn that there are hundreds of cases of “de facto statelessness,” imposed by denying citizens entry into their own country or refusing those outside the country the right to renew their passports and other identification documents.
Since taking office in Chile in March 2022, Gabriel Boric has been an outspoken critic of the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo, who he has accused of behaving “very distant from what was the Sandinista promise and hope. Today they are more like [former Nicaraguan dictator] Somoza than anything else.”
50 years since the attempted assassination of Bernardo Leighton
The Chilean president participated in a ceremony at the Temple of Hadrian in Rome to commemorate the 1975 attack on Chilean Christian Democrat leader Bernardo Leighton and his wife Ana Fresno, The attempted killing, ordered by the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, took place in the Italian capital.
“It is important to remember these figures who shaped our homeland and represent the best of humanist values,” he told the audience, which included his Italian counterpart, Sergio Mattarella, among other politicians and diplomats.
Boric recalled that the attempt on Leighton’s life “was not only the work of the dictatorship and Chilean politicians,” but also a collaboration between authoritarian regimes, including the [former] dictatorship in Spain and members of the Italian “far right.”
For this reason, he warned of the existence of a “right-wing international” that promotes intolerance and hatred in today’s world.
“In the face of intolerance and hatred, progressive forces must respond not only by pointing fingers and saying ‘this is a threat,’ but by offering a better alternative of progress, humanity, love and affection for politics, and honesty and austerity, as represented by Bernardo Leighton,” he declared.
“These lessons must not be forgotten,” Boric recalled, and warned that “dictatorships and authoritarian leaders cross borders to impose fear when they believe they can do so with impunity,” citing the Venezuelan political crisis as an example.
“Without going any further than Chile, we have the murder of a former Venezuelan military officer, where one of the suspects is from Nicolas Maduro’s regime, the dictator who stole the elections in his country,” said Boric. His remarks referred to the murder of Venezuelan opposition leader Ronald Ojeda in Santiago, Chile.
The Chilean President asserted: “The present demands both realism and firmness. In different corners of the world, extremism is resurging that seeks to silence those who think differently.”
Gabriel Boric ended his speech in Rome by stating that, in the face of this situation, “the answer is more and better democracy.”
First published in Spanish by Confidencial and translated and posted in English by Havana Times.