Ramon Alfonso Arevalo Gaete
Victim of the military dictatorship.
Background
Ramon Alfonso Arevalo Gaete
Victim of the military dictatorship.
Case summary
Ramon Alfonso Arevalo Gaete was a 2nd Corporal in the Chilean Navy who served as an agent of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA). His identity is part of an official list of more than one thousand agents of said organization that was delivered by the Army to the courts of justice.
MemoriaViva[1]
The following is the complete list of DINA agents, which was delivered a few years ago by the Army to the Courts of Justice. The text was kept under lock and key for a long period, but time leaked it to human rights lawyers and a journalist specializing in this matter.
This document, which has never been published in print media, has reached Clarín from the desk of a journalist who has followed multiple cases of human rights violations during the dictatorship. The document, therefore, is completely authentic. It concerns more than a thousand agents, some prosecuted, others convicted, and not a few already deceased. [List of names omitted for brevity]
Source: elclarin.cl, July 8, 2013
Fears that those sued for belonging to DINA will argue they were unaware of what was happening
According to official figures, during the Pinochet dictatorship, more than 3,200 Chileans died at the hands of State agents, of whom some 1,200 remain forcibly disappeared; more than 38,000 were subjected to political imprisonment and torture, and several hundred thousand were forced into exile.
The list of more than a thousand members of the DINA who were sued for illicit association continues to generate repercussions. Mainly because of the recognized men who today stand out in politics who were part of this repressive institution during the military dictatorship.
Faced with this, the deputy and one of the precursors of the lawsuit, together with the Association of Relatives of the Forcibly Disappeared, Hugo Gutiérrez (PC), maintained that "we will have to wait until the Court declares it admissible, from there the trial will be held to investigate the criminal responsibility in this illicit association that was created, which was the DINA." In dialogue with Cambio21, he added that "the lawsuit aims to condemn those who persecuted people and tortured those who thought differently from the military regime." "People like Mayor Cristián Labbé or Deputy Rosauro Martínez (RN) cannot continue to appear in politics and in Chilean society when they were part of the torture of thousands of Chileans," said the parliamentarian. Finally, he indicated that "for twenty years I have processed many criminal complaints, defending human rights, and if this is another one that I will have to wait until it is resolved, I will do so." For his part, Deputy Jorge Tarud (PPD) told Cambio21 that "all actions to make our recent history transparent, and who participated in a criminal organization and illicit association to commit crimes such as the DINA, seem positive to me." In that vein, he added that "now all those who have participated in the DINA must concretely express what their activity was, because certainly some are going to hide behind the fact that they had administrative responsibilities, when we all know that it was a repressive body that was mainly in charge of torturing people." "In my opinion, people who have belonged to the DINA and who are linked to politics today should not do so, and there people should consider their vote," the legislator explained. Finally, Tarud said that "it is good that it is known who were part of a repressive body and who they are today, such as Mr. Labbé, Mayor of Providencia." A real list? As it was established, at the end of 2007, a selected group of the Army took on the task of building, for the first time, a list of officers and non-commissioned officers who were part of the DINA. The task was stamped in a "secret" document, dated August 28, 2008, signed by the then Chief of the Army General Staff, General Alfredo Ewing Pinochet, which contains the list of officers and non-commissioned officers who "carried out an extra-institutional mission in the Army General Command, assigned to the DINA, between September 11, 1973, and December 1977." The document, however, remained stored in an archive until now. In addition to the list of agents, it reveals that the DINA existed from September 11, 1973, the date of the coup against the democratic government of Salvador Allende. According to official figures, during the Pinochet dictatorship, more than 3,200 Chileans died at the hands of State agents, of whom some 1,200 remain forcibly disappeared; more than 38,000 were subjected to political imprisonment and torture, and several hundred thousand were forced into exile. The cases of the disappeared occurred in their vast majority between September 11, 1973, and December 1977, the period in which the DINA operated, later replaced by the National Intelligence Center (CNI).
Source: cambio21.cl, April 12, 2012
References
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