Resolution by Judge Jorge Rodríguez regarding the Prats case must be reviewed by the Supreme Court.

Judge Jorge Rodríguez Ariztía granted bail today, subject to review by the Supreme Court, to the former head of the dissolved DINA, General (ret.) Manuel Contreras Sepúlveda, and General (ret.) Jorge Iturriaga Neumann.

Both are being prosecuted in the investigation into the assassination of the former Commander-in-Chief of the Army, Carlos Prats, and his wife, Sofía Cuthbert, in an explosive attack that occurred in Buenos Aires in 1974.

Regarding this, lawyer Juan Carlos Manss, who represents the retired military officers, stated that the current detention of his clients is "unjustifiable." The jurist added that he remains optimistic that the resolution will be ratified by the country's highest court in the coming days.

Both Contreras and Iturriaga, along with General (ret.) Augusto Pinochet, Brigadiers (ret.) Pedro Espinoza and José Zara, and civilians Eduardo Iturriaga and Mariana Callejas, are sought by the Argentine justice system through an international request sent by the judge of the First Federal Court of Buenos Aires, María Servini de Cubría, who is presiding over the case of the assassination of the Prats couple in Buenos Aires, for which only former DINA agent Enrique Arancibia Clavel has been convicted.

Regarding this, Manss added that on the issue of extradition, "we believe there are no means of imputation, neither general nor individual, regarding their eventual participation in the event." "The evidence that has been presented and that has arrived is absolutely superfluous, and the fundamental parts relate to a person who is completely discredited as a witness, as is the case with Mr. (Michael) Townley," the jurist maintained.

Source: Emol.com, November 15, 2001

Argentine justice confirms prosecution of former DINA members

The Federal Chamber confirmed the prosecution of Juan Manuel Contreras Sepúlveda and Pedro Espinoza Bravo as leaders of an illicit association, and of José Zara Holger, Raúl Iturriaga Neumann, and Jorge Iturriaga Neumann as members of the criminal gang.

A high court confirmed on Wednesday the prosecution of five former members of the dissolved DINA as members of an illicit association formed to assassinate former General Carlos Prats and his wife, judicial sources said.

The Federal Chamber confirmed the prosecution of Juan Manuel Contreras Sepúlveda and Pedro Espinoza Bravo as leaders of the illicit association, and of José Zara Holger, Raúl Iturriaga Neumann, and Jorge Iturriaga Neumann as members of the criminal gang.

The judges insisted on the "possibility that an illicit association was configured within the spheres of power." The same reasoning had been used by judges to confirm the prosecution of Emir Yoma, the former advisor and brother-in-law of former President Carlos Menem, in a case involving the illegal sale of weapons to Croatia and Ecuador.

Subsequently, however, the Supreme Court of Justice considered that it was not appropriate to apply the charge of illicit association to the arms sale case, opening the way for the release of Yoma and Menem. "The possibility that an illicit association was configured within the spheres of power... is a certain alternative, and in this case, evident once the particularities presented by the events are analyzed," the judges said.

They explained in their ruling that "the government established in Chile starting on September 11, 1973, had—from its perspective—founded motives, for political reasons and due to declared opposition to its actions, to seek the physical elimination of General Carlos Prats." The Chamber's decision leaves open the possibility that the trial judge, María Servini de Cubría, may again request the extradition of Pinochet from Chile, who is accused of being the leader of the illicit association that assassinated Prats and his wife, Sofía Cuthbert.

The Chilean justice system did not previously accede to a request to that effect. Last Monday, the magistrate requested the stripping of immunity (desafuero) of the former ruler, who possesses parliamentary immunity due to his status as a senator-for-life.

The Prats couple was assassinated on September 30, 1974, in front of the apartment where they resided in the residential Palermo neighborhood of this capital. They had gone into exile in Argentina after the coup d'état that overthrew Chilean President Salvador Allende in 1973.

Source: Emol.com, December 19, 2001

Justice prosecutes Manuel Contreras for the assassination of Carlos Prats

Investigating Judge Alejandro Solís prosecuted five former members of the DINA high command for double homicide and illicit association in the case of the death of General Carlos Prats, former Commander-in-Chief of the Army, and his wife, Sofía Cuthbert, an event that occurred in Argentina on September 30, 1974.

The judicial decision applied to General (ret.) and former director of the DINA, Manuel Contreras Sepúlveda; Brigadiers (ret.) Pedro Espinoza (the second-in-command of the DINA) and José Zara; General (ret.) Raúl Iturriaga Neumann; and his brother, the former civilian agent Jorge Iturriaga.

While Contreras and Espinoza were prosecuted "in the capacity of authors as leaders in the crime of illicit association in real concurrence with the double crime of aggravated homicide of Prats and his wife," Zara and the Iturriaga Neumann brothers were prosecuted "in the capacity of authors as members" of the aforementioned illicit association.

General (ret.) Contreras was notified of the judicial determination yesterday afternoon at his home, where he is serving house arrest for his prosecution in other crimes. This morning, Zara, Espinoza, and Raúl Iturriaga Neumann were informed of their prosecution.

For his part, Jorge Iturriaga Neumann has not yet been officially notified. It is understood that he is on vacation and will return to Santiago on Thursday, February 26, the day the judicial procedure will be carried out.

Prosecuted after intense interrogations Last week, Judge Solís interrogated the five individuals involved in the case, during which it was confirmed that former DINA agent Michael Townley is the material author of the crime.

General Prats and his wife were assassinated on September 30, 1974, in Palermo, Buenos Aires, when a bomb exploded in their vehicle as they arrived at their home. The case in Chile was opened after nearly 30 years, following the Supreme Court's review of an extradition request from Argentine judge María Servini de Cubría regarding the leadership of that repressive organization.

Although the highest court rejected the request on December 9, it ordered the opening of a case in Chile, a process that had been referred to the 19th Criminal Court. However, the judge of that court declared herself incompetent, so the highest court appointed magistrate Alejandro Solís as the investigating judge.

Source: La Tercera, February 25, 2003

Former DINA agent Jorge Iturriaga transferred to the former Penitentiary

The former civilian agent of the defunct National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), Jorge Iturriaga Neumann, was transferred to the former Santiago Penitentiary after being notified of the arrest warrant and the prosecution issued against him for the assassination of the former Commander-in-Chief of the Army, Carlos Prats.

This procedure could only be carried out this Thursday, as Iturriaga Neumann was on vacation outside the capital.

Source: Cooperativa.cl, February 27, 2003

Prats Case: Mariana Callejas and Cristoph Willeke prosecuted

The investigating judge presiding over the Prats case, Alejandro Solís, prosecuted former DINA agents Mariana Callejas and Cristoph Willeke as authors of the double aggravated homicide of General Carlos Prats and his wife, Sofía Cuthbert, which occurred on September 30, 1974, in Buenos Aires.

Willeke was also prosecuted for the crime of illicit association. Callejas was notified after testifying early this morning in the magistrate's office and was subsequently transferred to the Women's Orientation Center (COF).

Meanwhile, the former agent of the repressive organization Cristoph Willeke, who was serving house arrest, was transferred to the Telecommunications Command. After learning of the resolution, the lawyer for the Prats family, Hernán Quezada, maintained that "the prosecutions indicate that the case is moving decisively toward the clarification of the truth and the responsibility of all those who participated in this crime." Callejas and Willeke also face an extradition request from Argentine judge María Servini de Cubría, who is investigating the crime in Buenos Aires.

The request is being studied by Supreme Court Justice Nibaldo Segura, who must present it to the criminal chamber of the highest court for a ruling. Despite this, it is presumed that the Supreme Court will reject the request, just as it did with the five previously prosecuted in the case, when it denied the Argentine justice system's extradition request on the grounds that they should be tried in Chile.

Mariana Callejas was married to Michael Townley, who is attributed with having placed an explosive device under the car of General (ret.) Prats. According to some testimonies, Callejas detonated the device when the car entered the parking lot of the building where the former Commander-in-Chief lived, in the Palermo neighborhood of Buenos Aires.

In the same case, members of the leadership of the repressive organization were charged last February: General (ret.) Manuel Contreras, Brigadiers (ret.) Pedro Espinoza and José Zara, General (ret.) Raúl Iturriaga Neumann, and civilian agent Jorge Iturriaga.

Source: El Mercurio, September 1, 2003

Judge accuses DINA of “illicit association” for the first time

For the first time in recent judicial history, a Chilean judge accused the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), the secret police during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, of being "an illicit association," specifically for committing the double homicide of retired General Carlos Prats and his wife, Sofía Cuthbert, on September 30, 1974, in Buenos Aires.

Judge Alejandro Solís issued the indictments to rule on the case in the first instance, in which he pointed to General (ret.) Manuel Contreras and Brigadier (ret.) Pedro Espinoza as the leaders of this illicit association.

The magistrate noted that the process "has been complicated because there are several crimes, and people of a very high level in the military hierarchy are involved; therefore, the work has been quite strenuous." The ruling also determined that Brigadiers (ret.) Raúl Iturriaga Neumann, José Zara, and Christoph Willeke were part of the criminal group, as was former civilian agent Mariana Callejas.

Brigadiers Jorge Iturriaga and Reginaldo Valdés, meanwhile, were charged as accomplices. The DINA, which according to Contreras reported directly to the late dictator Augusto Pinochet, is identified by human rights lawyers as responsible for hundreds of crimes against opponents of the military regime.

In addition to the case of Prats and his wife, it was also responsible for the attack that cost the life of former Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier and his secretary in Washington.

Source: Radio Universidad de Chile, January 25, 2007

Manuel Contreras sentenced to life imprisonment for the Prats crime

After 34 years since the double homicide was committed, Judge Alejandro Solís issued separate sentences against the DINA leadership for their responsibility in the death of the former Commander-in-Chief of the Army, Carlos Prats, and his wife, Sofía Cuthbert.

In the first-instance ruling, the judge established a life sentence for Manuel Contreras Sepúlveda for the two crimes and, in turn, a sentence of twenty years in prison for illicit association. For Brigadier (ret.) Pedro Espinoza, the sentence is twenty years in prison for each assassination and another twenty years for his role in this illicit association.

In the case of agent Raúl Iturriaga Neumann, the ruling is fifteen years in prison for each homicide and 541 days for illicit association. The sentence is slightly lower for José Zara, Juan Morales Salgado, and Christoph Willeke, where the sentence reaches ten years in prison for each crime and 541 days for the illicit association.

In the case of Jorge Iturriaga Neumann, five years and one day for each homicide, and in turn, Mariana Callejas—in her role as a material author of the crime—received a sentence of ten years for each homicide.

Finally, non-commissioned officer (ret.) Reginaldo Valdés will face two sentences of 541 days for his role in the two assassinations. Daughters of the Prats-Cuthbert couple highlight the ruling Angélica and Cecilia Prats Cuthbert arrived pleased at the Palace of Justice to learn about the ruling by Judge Alejandro Solís against those who participated in the double homicide of their parents, Carlos Prats and Sofía Cuthbert, which occurred in 1974 in Argentina. "What one hoped for most was justice regarding what our parents lived through and the possibility of making a contribution to the country with this truth, a contribution to the Army so that it can write its true history," affirmed Angélica Prats. Meanwhile, Cecilia stated that "the country already knows the truth; we are calm after all these years. The Army also has clarity regarding the participants: there are seven military officers who were on active duty who participated in the death of the Commander-in-Chief; state agents who participated are also determined, so the country has that clarity, and we have it too." Angélica Prats valued the work carried out by the judge in charge of the process, Alejandro Solís, also pointing out that one cannot forget the progress made by the Argentine justice system, which is also processing this case. For the Prats family lawyer, Pamela Pereira, Judge Solís's investigation makes it evident that the crime was "an act of terrorism of the greatest magnitude on foreign territory" and that "DINA agents and officers of the Chilean Army" participated in it.

Source: La Nación, June 30, 2008

First step in justice for the Prats-Cuthbert crime

When General Carlos Prats pulled his car up alongside his wife, Sofía Cuthbert, to enter the garage on Calle Malabía in the Palermo neighborhood of Buenos Aires at around 1:00 a.m. on Monday, September 30, 1974, a few seconds might have saved their lives.

It was the brief interval in which DINA agent Mariana Callejas failed to activate the electronic detonator when her husband, the "gringo" Michael Townley, sitting beside her inside a vehicle, gave her the order to kill.

Townley was more skilled and took the device from her, triggering the explosion that shook the dark street. The general and his wife never knew about those seconds of destiny. Thirty-four years later, yesterday, the sword of justice finally fell upon the intellectual and material authors: six high-ranking Army officers and one non-commissioned officer, all retired, in addition to two civilians.

Two life sentences and prison terms ranging from 20 years to 541 days for all of them were handed down in the first-instance ruling by the judge in charge of the case, Alejandro Solís. At 10:00 a.m., the general's daughters, Cecilia and Angélica, arrived at Judge Solís's office, accompanied by lawyer Pamela Pereira.

The other daughter, Sofía, is the current ambassador in Athens. The other plaintiff lawyer, Hernán Quezada, is in New York for two years. Half an hour later, upon leaving the simple office on the terrace of the Palacio de Tribunales, the bright eyes of the three women showed the emotion experienced with the judge. "Now the country knows the truth," said Angélica.

Cecilia recalled the early days in Buenos Aires when Judge María Servini began the first investigations, which concluded with only one person convicted: the civilian agent Enrique Arancibia Clavel. Later, in 2002, the double crime began to be investigated for the first time in Chile.

Lawyer Pereira also had reasons to be moved, as she remembered her father, who was murdered alongside the peasants of Paine. "This act of justice for General Prats, his wife, and his family symbolizes the justice that other families have not yet had in Chile, as is the case with my father," she noted.

But as the daughters of the murdered couple recalled, the dictator Augusto Pinochet was missing from the proceedings. He was the main intellectual author, even though he escaped being stripped of his immunity for this double crime twice—first through his alleged dementia, with which he deceived the court judges, as some ministers privately acknowledge, and later due to a procedural technicality.

From New York, lawyer Quezada stated that "Judge Solís's sentence should become study material in the institutional schools of the Armed Forces, because it constitutes a historical document to establish the truth about the most atrocious crimes committed during the Pinochet dictatorship." That Sunday, September 29, 1974, strangely, General Prats seemed cheerful and even laughed at times.

At the Stevenin-Muratorio country house on the outskirts of Buenos Aires (BA), he attended a barbecue with the former Chilean consul, Eduardo Ormeño. They spoke of painting and other topics that he handled like a cultured soldier, as did his wife.

They played bridge, and the couple proposed forming a group to meet every Wednesday to play. They would start the following week. Around 4:00 p.m., the Prats-Cuthberts asked Ormeño to take them back to Malabía to change clothes because they were going to the cinema with Allende's former ambassador in Buenos Aires, Ramón Huidobro, and his wife. "Bread and Chocolate" was the film.

Afterward, they went to dinner at Huidobro's house. There, during the after-dinner conversation, Prats became sad again and said a phrase that marked that night forever: "How will this be, Ramón, where will it come from, but I am armed, so it won't be so easy for them." In the days prior, he had received death threats.

The previous Friday, hidden in the Malabía garage, Townley installed the charge with two C4 cartridges and three detonators under the general's Fiat 125. Uncle Kenny, as Mariana Callejas's children called the gringo, had crossed paths with General Prats in a park days earlier while following him.

He thought about shooting him right there but desisted because "there were too many people," as he later told Judge Servini in the United States. Meanwhile, "Yiyo" Raúl Iturriaga, then head of the DINA's foreign department, was watching, snooping, and gathering more data on the couple's movements, which he added to those collected by Major Juan Morales (who would later be the head of the fearsome Brigada Lautaro), sent by Contreras to BA as the first advance spy.

At 12:40 a.m. on the 30th, Townley and Callejas were waiting a hundred meters away inside their car in the gloom of Calle Malabía, whose lights were duly turned off in coordination with Argentine intelligence.

Prats and his wife did not manage to suspect anything. Much less that they were minutes away from knowing the fatal answer to the comment the general had made that night after dinner to his friend Ramón Huidobro: "How will it be!" 34 years later They were traveling through the Palermo neighborhood in Buenos Aires on the early morning of September 30 when a bomb installed by members of the DINA was detonated.

General (Ret.) Carlos Prats and his wife, Sofía Cuthbert, had been murdered. Yesterday, 34 years later, Magistrate Alejandro Solís finally handed down convictions against the former DINA agents accused of illicit association and double homicide.

For Manuel Contreras, the former operational head of the intelligence group, he ordered life imprisonment for each of the deaths. The sentence also includes penalties for eight other people. Informed of the ruling in depth, the two daughters of General Prats could not contain their emotion.

For both, the sentences are just and provide truth to the country and the Army. However, for them, Augusto Pinochet should also have been convicted, as "he was also part of this group of people who attacked my father," said Cecilia Prats.

Once the ruling was made public, the Government valued the investigation, a step in the work of "making truth and justice," as Minister of Justice Carlos Maldonado said. Socialist and PPD parliamentarians were also satisfied with the ruling and hopeful that other cases being investigated will also have this impact.

But not everything has been said in this case yet. As it is a first-instance sentence, those involved can appeal. We will have to wait. Convicted

• General (Ret.) Juan Manuel Contreras Sepúlveda: Two life sentences for the qualified homicides of Carlos Prats González and Sofía Cuthbert Charleoni. Twenty more as head of the crime of illicit association in real concurrence with the double crime of qualified homicide.
• Brigadier (Ret.) Pedro Octavio Espinoza Bravo: Two 20-year sentences for the homicides of Carlos Prats González and Sofía Cuthbert Charleoni and 20 years as head in the crime of illicit association.
• General (Ret.) Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann: Two 15-year sentences for the qualified homicides and 541 days as a member of illicit association in real concurrence with the double crime of qualified homicide.
• Brigadier (Ret.) José Octavio Zara Holger: Two sentences of 10 years and one day for the double homicide and 541 days for illicit association in real concurrence with the double crime of qualified homicide.
• Colonel (Ret.) Cristoph Georg Paul Willeke Floel: Two sentences of 10 years and one day for the double homicide and 541 days as a member in the crime of illicit association.
• Colonel (Ret.) Juan Hernán Morales Salgado: Two sentences of 10 years and one day for the double homicide and 541 days for illicit association.
• Mariana Inés Callejas Honores: Two sentences of 10 years and one day for the double qualified homicide.
• Jorge Enrique Iturriaga Neumann: Two sentences of 5 years and one day as an accomplice to qualified homicide.
• Non-commissioned officer Reginaldo de la Cruz Valdés Alarcón: Two sentences of 541 days as an accomplice to qualified homicide.

Source: La Nación, July 1, 2008

Harsh convictions confirmed for the crime of Carlos Prats

The Ninth Chamber of the Santiago Court of Appeals confirmed in all its terms the convictions handed down in the first instance by Judge Alejandro Solís on June 30, 2008, against nine former DINA agents, including their chief Manuel Contreras, for the double homicide of General Carlos Prats and his wife Sofía Cuthbert.

The double crime was committed in Buenos Aires in the early hours of September 30, 1974, through the installation of a bomb in the car of the former commander-in-chief of the Army. The general's daughter, Angélica Prats, said at the courthouse that "we are moved as a family because the Court has confirmed all the convictions applied by Judge Solís." However, she warned that "now we hope that the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court does not reduce the sentences." With this, she alluded to the fact that, for about three years, this court has been benefiting all former agents with considerable reductions in sentences, which allows them to be granted the benefit of serving them under five years and one day in the "supervised release" regime. Among human rights organizations, there is the question of whether this time the ministers of the Criminal Chamber "will dare" to also benefit the murderers of the general and his wife. Of the nine sentenced, only Manuel Contreras, the former second-in-command of the DINA, Pedro Espinoza, and the former foreign chief of this criminal illicit association, General (Ret.) Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann, are in prison serving other sentences. The others punished judicially are Brigadier (Ret.) José Zara Holger, Colonels (Ret.) Christoph Willikie Flöel and José Morales Salgado, non-commissioned officer (Ret.) Reginaldo Valdés Alarcón, and former civilian agents Mariana Callejas Honores (ex-wife of Michael Townley, who detonated the bomb together with Callejas) and Jorge Iturriaga Neumann. The resolution was adopted unanimously by the Ninth Chamber, composed of judges Jorge Dahm and Mario Rojas, and magistrate Dobra Lusic.

Source: La Nación, January 29, 2009

Prats Case: Drastic reduction of sentences for perpetrators of the crime and formation of illicit association

The Second Chamber of the Supreme Court released this Thursday the final ruling with the convictions handed down against those responsible for the homicides of the former commander-in-chief of the Army, Carlos Prats, and his wife, Sofía Cuthbert, perpetrated in September 1974 in the Buenos Aires neighborhood of Palermo.

The president of the criminal chamber, Rubén Ballesteros, announced the following penalties. For illicit association formed in 1974, General (Ret.) Manuel Contreras and Brigadier (Ret.) Pedro Espinoza were sentenced to three years and one day, without benefits.

For their part, Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann, Cristoph Willike Floel, José Zara, and Juan Morales Salgado were sentenced to 100 days in prison for this same illicit act. For the crime of qualified homicide, retired generals Manuel Contreras and Pedro Espinoza were sentenced to 17 years of major imprisonment, without alternative measures.

Meanwhile, Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann, Willike Floel, José Zara, and Juan Morales Salgado were sentenced to 15 years and one day without benefits. As accomplices, Mariana Callejas and Jorge Iturriaga Neumann were sentenced to a penalty of five years of imprisonment with benefits.

On January 29 of last year, the Santiago Court of Appeals ratified the sentence handed down on June 30, 2008, by the first-instance judge, Alejandro Solís. The magistrate sentenced General Manuel Contreras to double life imprisonment, and additionally, he was sentenced to another 20 years in prison as head of the illicit association that organized the dissolved DINA to commit the double crime.

Former Brigadier Pedro Espinoza Bravo received the same sentences; while retired General Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann, in charge of the organization's foreign operations, received two 15-year prison sentences for the murders and 541 days for illicit association.

Former Brigadier José Zara was sentenced to two 10-year prison terms for the homicides and 541 days for illicit association, as were former colonels Cristoph Willike Floel and Juan Morales Salgado. Meanwhile, Mariana Callejas was sentenced to two 10-year terms.

The woman was the wife of former American agent Michael Townley, who currently resides in the United States under the witness protection program and was in charge of installing and detonating the bomb placed under General Prats's car.

Source: El Mostrador.cl, July 8, 2010

Allende's former minister died in an attack in 1974 in Buenos Aires. One person involved in the assassination of General Prats arrested

Former Chilean police agent Enrique Lautaro Arancibia Clavel, identified as one of those involved in the assassination of the former army chief of that country, Carlos Prats, was detained after giving an investigative statement before the judge.

Arancibia Clavel is prosecuted as an alleged participant in the homicide of the high-ranking Chilean military chief that occurred on the streets of this Capital on September 30, 1974. Prats was Minister of the Interior during the final stage of the communist government of Salvador Allende.

The former agent allegedly participated in the attack against Prats by order of Chilean General Manuel Contreras, then head of the Chilean secret police, who was sentenced in the neighboring country to seven years in prison for the homicide of Orlando Letelier.

The arrest of the former member of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) took place last Thursday at the accused's home in Palermo. The event was made public yesterday by President Carlos Menem himself. "It is a new success for Justice and the Federal Police," said Menem.

The President conjectured that it was very likely that the Chilean justice system would demand the extradition of the detainee. Judge Servini de Cubría, in an opposite sense, ruled out the possibility of extradition.

Menem, from La Rioja, communicated with Chilean President Eduardo Frei, who thanked him for the work done to clarify the assassination of Prats. For his part, the President thanked Chile for its help in fighting the fire in the Argentine south.

For their part, and during a press conference held in this Capital, Sofía and María Angélica Prats, daughters of the murdered military officer, pointed out that the American citizen Michael Townley participated in the crime.

The Prats sisters pointed out that Arancibia Clavel had been a fugitive since 1988. Both sisters spent an hour with the judge. Dr. Servini de Cubría highlighted the work of the Federal Police to achieve the arrest of the prosecuted man after the contribution that the declaration of two witnesses during a trial being processed for the attempted assassination of former Chilean Vice President Bernardo Leighton meant for the investigation.

The magistrate considered the trip useful since they are working on the hypothesis of a "trilogy" of attacks related by the methodology and the era in which they were perpetrated: that of Prats, that of Leighton, and that of Letelier.

Satisfaction in Chile over the arrest Key piece: he not only participated in the attack against Prats but is also involved in the one that cost the life of General Schneider. SANTIAGO, Chile.—The Chilean government described the arrest of Enrique Arancibia Clavel as "a positive fact," while a human rights organization pointed out that he could be a key piece to clarify, after so many years, the deadly attack against the former Army chief, General Carlos Prats.

Edgardo Riveros, acting Minister Secretary General of Government and official spokesperson, was in charge of evaluating the event positively. Verónica Reyna, director of the legal department of the Social Assistance Foundation of the Christian Churches (Fasic), an ecumenical organization that inherited the concern and the processes for human rights violations bequeathed by the Vicariate of Solidarity of the Catholic Church, pointed out to La Nación that Arancibia Clavel is "a key piece" for the clarification of the attack perpetrated on September 30, 1974.

Reyna commented on Arancibia's capture due to the trip to Buenos Aires by Sofía Prats, the eldest daughter of the murdered general, and her lawyer Pamela Pereira, called by Judge Servini de Cubría. Possessor of a vast terrorist history, Arancibia Clavel is not only suspected of having participated in the attack against General Carlos Prats but was also involved in the plot that cost the life of his predecessor in the leadership of the Chilean Army, General René Schneider, whose objective was to hinder the confirmation by Congress of the triumphant Salvador Allende in the elections of September 1970. After being mentioned as a member of the group that plotted to kidnap Schneider, Arancibia traveled to Buenos Aires to flee from police and judicial persecution. Disappearance of 119 people Likewise, for human rights organizations, he would have some responsibility in the disappearance of 119 people whom the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) and the regime of Augusto Pinochet maintained had fallen in clashes that occurred in Argentina and Brazil. When, during the 70s, the Federal Police raided his house in Buenos Aires after the accusation of alleged espionage, they discovered the identity cards of the disappeared. It was the era in which, under the name of Felipe Alemparte, the supposed representative of the Chilean State Bank reported to his DINA bosses. With family ties in the high commands of the armed forces, the former member of the feared DINA is also suspected of being related to the attack in which Commander Arturo Araya, naval aide-de-camp to then-President Allende, died in 1972. Twenty years gathering evidence What was the participation of the Chilean government in this process? the daughters of the murdered Chilean general, María Angélica and Sofía Prats Cuthbert, were asked yesterday during a press conference at a downtown hotel in Buenos Aires. "The reality is that the Prats family has gathered information for more than twenty years," was the answer they offered. Chilean lawyer Pamela Pereira, who also participated in the meeting, referred to the process being followed against Arancibia: "Judge Servini de Cubría took charge of this case two years ago with the support of the Federal Police." Arancibia was arrested last Thursday and had been a fugitive since 1988, continued Pamela Pereira. "The case establishes that it was a qualified homicide against Mr. and Mrs. Prats; and the participation of Michael Townley and Jorge and Eduardo Iturriaga, among others (all had records), is accredited," the lawyer stressed. Furthermore, she pointed out that it was established in the process "the place where the command stayed and that Townley received money from the DINA to carry out the crime. What happened was that Argentine citizens allegedly refused to carry out the crime." After clarifying that Arancibia had been a fugitive since 1988, Dr. Pereira said that "at the time, they protected Arancibia in Argentina, but today he is at the disposal of the magistrate." On the other hand, she clarified that "there is still no decision on preventive detention. But (Arancibia) should be kept in prison."

Source: lanacion.com.ar, January 23, 1996

Pinochet was the head of an illicit association

In a clear response to the recent pronouncement of the Supreme Court of Justice in the arms case, the Second Chamber of the Federal Chamber ratified the possibility that an illicit association entrenched in power can be formed, by confirming the indictments of two Chilean leaders for the double assassination of General Carlos Prats and his wife in 1974, and by pointing to former dictator Augusto Pinochet as the head of the organization that executed the attack in Buenos Aires.

As expected, the court waited for the opportune moment to pronounce itself regarding its position on the crime of "illicit association," disparaged by the Argentine Supreme Court of Justice, and it did so by confirming the indictment for the purposes of the extradition of Chilean military officers Juan Manuel Contreras Sepúlveda and Pedro Octavio Espinoza Bravo, for whom it modified the qualification from leaders of the clandestine repressive organization that acted in the sphere of the DINA intelligence center to that of organizers.

The court thus ratified what was ordered by Federal Judge María Servini de Cubría, who is investigating the attack committed against the former chief of the trans-Andean Army that occurred in Buenos Aires on September 30, 1974, through the placement of an explosive device in his private car.

The Argentine magistrate had adopted that measure for the purposes of extradition, since there are no treaties on the matter between both countries and Chilean laws establish that before adopting such a measure, the accused must be prosecuted in the requesting country.

The appellate court also partially confirmed the indictments of Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann, Jorge Enrique Iturriaga Neumann, and José Octavio Zara Holger as members of an association, in real concurrence with the crime of double aggravated homicide in premeditated concurrence of two or more persons, in the capacity of co-authors.

Servini de Cubría had considered Contreras Sepúlveda and Espinoza as heads of the illicit association, but judges Horacio Cattani, Eduardo Luraschi, and Martín Irurzun understood that although the former was the one who exercised the leadership of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) and the latter its Chief of Operations, the testimonies collected in the file prove that "both had to report to the highest authority of the Military Junta and later President of the Republic, that is, Augusto Pinochet Ugarte." In addition to confirming the existence of an illicit association, the court ratified that the investigated event falls within the so-called crimes against humanity, considered imprescriptible. The illicit association The 25-page ruling abounds in considerations regarding the possibility that an illicit association can be formed in the spheres of power. "The possibility that an illicit association is configured within the scope of a legitimate organization (administrative, state, private entities, or private companies) has vast doctrinal recognition," highlights the Chamber when describing the participation of the Pinochet government in the planning and execution of the assassination of Prats and his wife, whose executing arm was the so-called DINA Exterior, which was composed of undercover agents and local collaborators. "Procedurally, it has been said, facts demonstrating the existence of the agreement with criminal ends, expressly or tacitly provided by three or more people, are sufficient to have the type in question configured. The agreement can be disguised through participation in an association with illicit ends and certainly could be entrenched in the heart of a legal entity of any type, using the prerogatives that it grants. This implies that it can clearly encompass public officials," the Chamber's ruling categorically expresses, in which it ratifies its traditional position on the subject. In this regard, it points out that in a description perfectly applicable to the case, "the legal figure in question points to a stable organization for the commission of indeterminate crimes, it being necessary to take into account that indeterminate are the plans that, to commit the perfectly determined crimes, the members of the association agree upon." "It is also required that a plurality of criminal plans be kept in mind, not becoming atypical due to the commission of an indeterminate number of crimes framed in the same criminal figure, since the realization of diverse crimes is not required for its typicality, it being sufficient, simply, to be destined to commit them."

Source: diariojudicial.com, December 19, 2001

Chilean Court of Appeals reduced charges against Jorge Iturriaga Neumann

The Santiago Court of Appeals reduced the charges against Jorge Iturriaga Neumann, the only civilian charged in the assassination of Chilean General Carlos Prats, perpetrated in Buenos Aires in 1974, judicial sources reported.

The Third Chamber of the appellate court revoked the indictment for illicit association against Iturriaga Neumann but confirmed his indictment for the assassination of the former chief of the Chilean Army and his wife, Sofía Cuthbert.

General Carlos Prats, who preceded Augusto Pinochet in the leadership of the Army, died along with his wife on September 30, 1974, when a bomb exploded as they arrived at their home in the Buenos Aires neighborhood of Palermo.

In Argentina, the case has been in charge of Judge María Servini de Cubría, who charged the leadership of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), the secret police of the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990), with the authorship of the double crime.

The lawyer for the Prats family, Pamela Pereira, when commenting this Friday on the decision of the Chilean appellate court, said that the important thing is that Iturriaga remains under process as a co-author of the double crime of the Prats-Cuthbert couple.

Defense lawyer Jorge Balmaceda, for his part, maintained that the ruling makes it clear that his client has not belonged to any illicit association and expressed confidence that his innocence will soon be proven.

The indictment of Iturriaga Neumann was ordered on February 25 by the special judge investigating the case in Chile, Alejandro Solís. Jorge Iturriaga Neumann is the brother of retired General Raúl Iturriaga Neumann, who was also charged by the magistrate as a co-author of the crime and a member of the illicit association, charges that the Court of Appeals ratified a few days ago.

The judge also prosecuted the former director of the DINA, Manuel Contreras, and retired brigadiers Pedro Espinoza and José Zara as co-authors of the double assassination. Contreras and Espinoza were also indicted as heads of the illicit association.

In Argentina, Judge Servini de Cubría prosecuted former DINA agent Enrique Arancibia Clavel, the only one convicted of the double crime, who received a life sentence.

Source: lahora.com.ec, March 8, 2003

Enrique Arancibia Clavel received thirty-four stab wounds on April 29th. The news had an impact in Argentina, where he spent 11 years in prison for the crime of General Prats and his wife. In Chile, his footprint in the most brutal repressive operations of the dictatorship left a mark on thousands of survivors and relatives of the forcibly disappeared.

A history hidden by the same mantle of impunity that covered the Prats crime for more than 30 years, which was captured in the incredible archive kept by the head of the DINA network in Buenos Aires, discovered in 1986. This is his story.

The Argentine hairdresser and dancer Humberto Zambelli got into a Renault 12 car and headed quickly toward Ezeiza airport. On that November 4, 1978, he was going to meet his partner, Enrique Arancibia Clavel, whose business card indicated he was an agent of the Banco del Estado in Buenos Aires.

A very well-paid cover for the head of the clandestine network of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) in Argentina, who was returning shaken from Santiago. The dancer from Susana Jiménez’s ballet did not suspect that all his steps were being observed and photographed.

Zambelli was nervous. The farewell had been marked by tension. He would later say that “a complicated emotional state” was affecting his intimate friend. Arancibia had reasons. An earthquake was being experienced at that moment in the regime’s secret services after General Manuel Contreras was sent into retirement and later detained at the Military Hospital when a process was opened, pressured by the United States, for his responsibility in the assassination of former Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier in Washington (1976).

The transformation of the DINA into the CNI and the arrival of General Odlanier Mena as chief accounted for his uncertain professional future.

Hence, Zambelli made special preparations for the reception. The meeting, the men who were observing his movements would say, was very effusive. Arancibia was also returning from a Chile loaded with signs of war.

In Buenos Aires and other large Argentine cities, war drills and blackouts were being carried out in those days to prevent air attacks. Both countries were preparing for a confrontation that seemed inevitable. Just two days earlier, on November 2, the talks that were taking place in the Chilean-Argentine Joint Commission were declared closed. War was imminent.

The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Chile, Hernán Cubillos, announced that his country would appeal to the Hague Tribunal, while feverish activity was unleashed in the Vatican with calls to Chile and Argentina in a desperate and final effort to avoid catastrophe.

The effusive embrace of Zambelli and Arancibia was observed from close by by the men scattered throughout the air terminal. Some could barely stifle a smile. The couple noticed nothing. In the same car, they began their return to the elegant apartment where they lived. They had met in the summer of 1974, and since then they had not separated.

They barely had time to enjoy it, because suddenly the car was intercepted by the Argentine police who were watching them. Arancibia was arrested and accused of espionage. Shortly after, his apartment was raided by the same police, who did not take long to find what they were looking for.

In the double bottom of the dining room sideboard, they found voluminous documentation whose content caused the first surprise. Because what jumped before the eyes of the trans-Andean Federal Police group was a document with confidential information about the Foreign Minister of Chile, Hernán Cubillos, and his relationship with the CIA and the newspaper El Mercurio during the government of Salvador Allende.

In the days when the war with Argentina was about to break out, the head of Chile’s secret agent network in the neighboring country was dedicated to investigating the foreign minister who was leading the negotiations. That would be the last report sent by Enrique Arancibia to Santiago under the name of “Luis Felipe Alemparte Díaz,” his identity as a DINA agent.

What followed the report on Cubillos in the documents carefully organized in black plastic folders were the copies and responses to the orders he received from the DINA central headquarters in Santiago since 1974, including private letters with high-ranking officers of the secret service command.

Among them, Michael Townley, who had just been expelled (April 1978) by the Pinochet regime to the United States to be tried and convicted as the material author of the crime of Orlando Letelier and his assistant Ronnie Moffit (Washington, 1976).

Pinochet and Contreras insisted that Townley was never a DINA agent. And there was the evidence of his participation in the most secret operations of the repressive organization.

The folders contained four years of the history of the repression unleashed outside Chilean territory by the main secret security service, with a network of agents deployed through several countries and close collaboration with the other services of the Southern Cone dictatorships. A part of the history of “Operation Condor” that inexplicably Arancibia kept in his sideboard.

To the Argentines, already involved in their own massive and brutal repression, the content did not surprise them. How they used it is, until now, a secret. The reality is that after a few months, a large part of the papers remained abandoned, only to be practically stuffed by force into five boxes where the espionage trial was condensed.

From there, they went to a dark and lonely room in the Judicial Archive. To oblivion.

Eight years later, the author of this report would go to Buenos Aires to investigate the assassination of General Carlos Prats and his wife. In a hallway, a man would tell her almost in her ear to look for that file.

They were intense days of knocking on many doors, which culminated when, with the help of Argentine journalist Horacio Verbitsky, an impassive official finally took the five boxes of the trial out and left me behind closed doors in that freezing room of the Judicial Archive. What would open before my eyes caused a cold greater than the one that prevailed in Buenos Aires in that winter of 1986.

A TERRORIST FOR HIRE

Two months after the coup d’état, in November 1973, Arancibia Clavel presented himself at the headquarters of the newly created DINA Commission. “I did it to greet the then-Colonel Manuel Contreras and offer myself at his disposal to bring him any type of information,” declared Arancibia himself before an Argentine court on November 28, 1978.

“A few days later, I was interviewed by a DINA officer who, because of his position, was called ‘Don Elías’ (Raúl Iturriaga Neumann) and who was one of the chiefs of the Foreign Department. He gave me instructions on how I should send the information through the channel I considered most suitable, explaining to me that I should not use my real name nor divulge my status as a member of the DINA Foreign Service,” he elaborated.

That was how Enrique Arancibia Clavel became a DINA agent in Argentina. His cover was the representation of the Banco del Estado in the neighboring country, a position for which he was recommended by its vice president, Valentín Robles.

To hire him, they had to overlook an important obstacle: Arancibia was at that time a fugitive from justice, accused of terrorist acts as a member of the group that assassinated the Commander-in-Chief of the Army, René Schneider, in October 1970.

His footprint as “El Dinamitero” —as they called him— remained in the bombs that were placed at the Stock Exchange, at the Law School of the University of Chile, at the then-Channel 9 TV station, and at the Santiago airport. Only chance meant that the most powerful device he placed at the airport facility did not explode.

He confessed this before the Chilean courts in the trial for the Schneider crime (page 1,877), where he acknowledged his participation. He also accused General Roberto Viaux of being the intellectual author of the chain of terrorist acts that he himself executed with other members of the far-right group.

The goal, he said, was to prepare the climate for the kidnapping of Schneider, whose final objective was to prevent Allende from assuming the presidency of Chile. For that reason, after each attack, pamphlets from a hitherto unknown Worker-Peasant Brigade (BOC) were thrown: “to make people believe that the authors were from an ultra-left group and create an adverse climate.”

Arancibia was arrested. He was 26 years old and was in his fourth year of Engineering at the University of Chile after a brief stint at the Naval School. His father was a retired Navy officer and one of his brothers was an officer in the same branch.

Another was an Army officer. Despite his own confession, the explosives found in his home on October 8, 1970, and the numerous pieces of evidence against him, he was released on bail.

That same night, he fled to the south of Chile. Everything was organized by someone who was never identified. Because they hid him at the Hostería del Lago Ranco, and in February 1971, the owner of that inn (surnamed Provoste) transported him to the other side of the border through the Tromen (Mamuil Malal) pass, leaving the country with a fake ID.

There, he was awaited by the former aide-de-camp of General Juan Carlos Onganía, when he held command of Argentina as dictator in the 60s.

In 1966, at the Conference of American Armies held in Buenos Aires, Onganía proposed institutionalizing a permanent inter-American defense force for regional intervention against the subversive enemy. His main detractor was precisely General René Schneider, who had not yet assumed the position of head of the Chilean Army.

Three years later, the terrorist fugitive for his role in the conspiracy that culminated in the assassination of the Commander-in-Chief of the Army was hired as a public official by the regime headed by another general.

“I began to comply with the instructions given to me by Captain Luis Gutiérrez,” he declared in 1978. And the documents that Arancibia kept in his possession prove it.

ELIMINATING PRATS

On the last day of September 1974, the intellectual authors of the crime of General Carlos Prats believed they had eliminated a key obstacle for Pinochet to seize total power in the Army and the Military Junta.

By removing from the scene the general who, until 18 days before the coup, vindicated military honor to prevent the dictatorship and repression, they thought they had also made the ever-present ghost of General René Schneider disappear, his predecessor in the Army command, assassinated in October 1970. And the principles that both defended.

It would take almost thirty years before justice was served. And it was precisely the Supreme Court’s rejection of the stripping of General Augusto Pinochet’s immunity for his participation in the assassination of Prats and his wife Sofía Cuthbert, requested by Argentine judge María Servini, that provoked the historic opening in Chile in 2003 of the trial for the crime of the former Army chief (See Note 1).

Very soon, the minister in charge of the case, Alejandro Solís, would find the most important evidence that was missing: the report with the tracking of all of Prats’ steps and the floor plans of his house, delivered by DINA officer Juan Morales Salgado to Manuel Contreras.

A report that had been kept in complete secrecy and that allowed for the irrefutable proof of DINA’s authorship. And also the significant participation of Enrique Arancibia Clavel.

Because the last piece of the puzzle discovered by Solís also caused others to confess: the crime was ordered from Santiago in June 1974, and the data collected by Morales Salgado, which allowed for the placement of the bomb that tore apart the bodies of Prats and his wife at the precise place and time, were provided by Enrique Arancibia Clavel.

The picture was completed in Chile. Arancibia Clavel was already convicted in Buenos Aires. And in the process, it was proven that Michael Townley, the man who planted the bomb, never lied. His first confession was made before Chilean police officers —Nelson Jofré and Rafael Castillo, accompanied by Deputy Commissioner Eduardo Riquelme González of Interpol Chile— on September 2 and 3, 1992, in the United States.

An interrogation ordered by Minister Adolfo Bañados:

—In mid-1974, Manuel Contreras gave the order to Pedro Espinoza to eliminate Prats in Buenos Aires. 20 thousand dollars were offered to an Argentine extremist group —Triple A— to execute the mission. But the Argentines, after receiving the money, did not have enough courage to kill him.

Given that circumstance and under pressure from General Contreras and Brigadier Espinoza, the mission was assigned to the head of the DINA exterior, at that time, Commander Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann, who used the false name ‘Diego Castro Castañeda’; and to officer Armando Fernández Larios.

I remember that three days before the attack, I met with Commander Iturriaga in Buenos Aires. This was done with the cooperation of Argentine citizens of the Triple A. The head of the DINA Exterior was Commander Iturriaga and as second in command was Captain José Zara —confessed Townley (See Note 2).

But in 1992, Pinochet maintained his political power and his influence in the Supreme Court. The seal of impunity was unbreakable. Even more so for the crime of an Army chief. Townley’s confession was archived. For many, Arancibia would be the only one convicted.

Enrique Arancibia Clavel’s contract at the representation of the Banco del Estado de Chile in Argentina has an start date of October 1, 1974, hours after the attack that ended the life of General Carlos Prats and his wife Sofía Cuthbert on a street in Palermo in Buenos Aires was perpetrated. Almost a reward.

But during the trial for his death in Argentina, no one paid attention to the date. Nor that the dancer Humberto Zambelli, his partner, declared in the espionage trial that they met in the summer of 1974, in Argentina. Days in which Arancibia claimed he was in Chile.

MIRTHA LEGRAND AND SUSANA JIMENEZ

Had it not been for the famous Mirtha Legrand and Susana Jiménez, Arancibia and Zambelli would not have met. Because it was when the latter was working as a hairdresser at the Miguelito Romano house in Mar del Plata that he had to attend to Legrand and also her husband, Daniel Tinayre, who hired him to be a dancer in the musical comedy “Hair.” A total success.

It was 1973 and the performances lasted for eight months. When “Hair” lowered the curtain, Zambelli returned to Mar del Plata but no longer as a hairdresser: he would perform at a nightclub called “Hidrógeno,” where he met Susana Jiménez. The Argentine diva would hire him to dance at the Teatro Astros.

It was the summer of 1974 and on one of those nights when he was leaving the show, his life would take another turn. At least that was what he related to his interrogators in 1978:

—A young male person was waiting for me. He invited me several times to have coffee and chat. As the days went by, I accepted the invitation and even took him to my parents’ house in Lanús. That was how we fully entered into a friendly relationship with the person who turned out to be Enrique Arancibia Clavel —he declared in the espionage trial against Arancibia.

Four years later, the story would jump again. Arancibia would fall and with him, the archive he kept in the double bottom. There, where the evidence that incriminates him in the repression against Chileans is found.

FAMILY OF WRITER ISABEL ALLENDE IN THE CROSSHAIRS

Although Arancibia Clavel’s archive shows that the main focus of his task was the exiles, there is also proof that he maintained permanent surveillance on the other Chileans who, like him, participated in the conspiracy to assassinate Schneider and took refuge in Argentina.

Regarding Mario Igualt, brother-in-law of Roberto Viaux, he reported on October 21, 1974: “He is working for the Argentine security services from which he receives a fairly high remuneration. His contact is an officer Schiaffino (of the SIE).” Four days later, he reported that Ramón Huidobro, ambassador of Chile in Argentina until September 11, 1973, stepfather of writer Isabel Allende and the last person —along with his wife, Francisca Llona— who saw General Carlos Prats alive, managed to leave Argentina.

He was threatened with death and they were looking for him to assassinate him.

He was not the only one. In a peremptory order sent by “Luis Gutiérrez,” a code name used by the head of the DINA Foreign Department and which in those days hid the identity of General Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann, he was asked for “the work location and private address of the most notorious of the past regime in Buenos Aires and Mendoza.” The first list of Chileans sympathetic to the Unidad Popular living in Argentina was deposited personally by Arancibia on “Luis Gutiérrez’s” desk in Santiago.

Mario Igualt continued to worry him: “I have learned that Igualt uses a fake identity card in Chile under the name of Pino for unclear business. In Argentina, he also has double documentation. The fake one bears the name of Horacio Pizarro.”

As repression intensified in Argentina, Arancibia extended his links with the military and civilians of the repression. Salesian priest Luis Gallo became his target at the end of 1974. He wrote: “He is in Santiago, he is a contact for the Argentine guerrilla of Córdoba with the Chilean extremists. They must surround him. He is very skillful and dangerous.”

One of the initial points that demanded the most work was finding the safest ways to send documents from and to Chile. For a time, it was done through Sonia Montecinos, secretary to the chargé d’affaires of the Chilean embassy in Buenos Aires, Carlos Osorio (See Note 3).

In Chile, the envelopes were received at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs by Miguel Poklepovic Klamce, who had to call “Don Elías” (another code name used by Iturriaga).

The above was confirmed to me by Poklepovic himself, in a notarial statement, who even informed me that he received the request to help in this task in Santiago, at a dinner at the home of a relative of Arancibia.

DINA’s surveillance in Buenos Aires focused on the Chileans who worked at ECLAC and the Ebert Foundation, of the then-West Germany. In one of the documents, it reads: “The representative of the Ebert is Klauss Dressel, domiciled at Florida 716, eighth floor, apartment C.

He acts together with Walter Nocker, labor delegate of the German embassy in Chile. Walter acts as a courier and liaison for the two countries. Obtain the maximum amount of background information on the foundation as well as the mentioned subjects.”

Arancibia delivered the response in person at the DINA headquarters on Belgrado street in Santiago. And he also added data about his other object of surveillance, Mario Igualt’s group, which he saw as competition: “Father Ernesto Rojas, who made the accusations in November 1974, is going to Chile at the end of December, I will let you know so you can have an interview.

He has more background on the network that Igualt has tried to form, in which Enrique Rojas, Julio Fontecilla, Jorge Arce, and Carlos Labarca (brother-in-law of Admiral Martínez Bush and all fugitives for the crime of General Schneider) would be involved. The latter would be a contact for a Commander Carrasco of the DINA with offices in the Ministry of Justice.”

Arancibia was wrong. Igualt was already working for the DINA. Labarca too. This coincided with the arrival of the official head of the DINA network in Buenos Aires: Colonel Víctor Barría Barría. In a document dispatched from Santiago, it reads: “Colonel Barría is our official representative and you are a clandestine information chief.

Your relations with him must be totally covert. You must not burn yourself. You must continue working in the same way you have done until now.”

THE ARGENTINE CONNECTION

The announcement of Colonel Barría’s arrival prompted Enrique Arancibia to deploy greater activity. In December 1974, the former engineering student reported on a key partner for DINA’s repressive activity abroad and “Operation Condor.” Martín Ciga Correa, head of security at the University of Buenos Aires, offered him information on all Chileans, teachers and students, at that university (See Note 4).

But Ciga was an old acquaintance of the DINA. A leader of the Nationalist Militia group, he participated in the assassination of Prats.

He was not chosen at random. His terrorist history speaks for itself. He was a militant in the shock groups of Argentine nationalism where he received the nickname “Cristo” and in “Los Panzer,” an armed group of the so-called Socialist Nationalist Youth.

Upon Perón’s death, López Rega’s group, founder of the Triple A, convinced President Estela Martínez to appoint Oscar Ivanisevich as Minister of Education, who appointed Alberto Ottalagano as rector of the University of Buenos Aires.

It was not a scandal. The brutal repression prevented it. Because Ottalagano exhibited in his academic profile being the author of a book whose title is I am a fascist, so what?

The new rector and author of the book immediately hired Ciga Correa as head of security at the university. Very soon, he would be identified as the author of the assassination of Daniel Winier, an engineering student, kidnapped on November 29, 1978.

But he did not spend a day in prison. It was Ciga who, at the end of 1974, gave Arancibia new information that he transmitted to Santiago: “The group that eliminated Prats would have a list of 8 other Chileans.” Ciga also informed him that Ramón Huidobro and his wife Panchita were already in the United States. The couple never knew that by leaving Argentina in a hurry, they escaped certain death.

The same would have happened —according to these files— with María Isabel Camus, a former executive of Codelco in the times of the UP and one of the 8 people indicated as “targets to be eliminated.” “Her address is the same as that of our naval attaché. All the background on her movements is held by the SIDE,” Arancibia reported.

All that cost a lot of money. Because just as Arancibia received a monthly envelope with dollars from the DINA, a supplement to his salary at the Banco del Estado, the services that Ciga provided were not free.

Neither was the information he provided. In an official letter sent by Arancibia to Santiago, it reads: “I am sending a photocopy of a check paid by Ciga to María José Riesco Bezanilla, a Chilean, for information that she provided to Ciga about Chileans at the University (of Buenos Aires, UBA).”

The heat of February (1975) did not prevent Arancibia from following the steps of other priests “connected with the subversive movement,” whom he identifies in relation to the “American Jesuit priest based in Salta, Father Haas, rector of the Catholic University of that city and a personal friend of Allende. This priest is assiduously visited by Chilean and Bolivian exiles.”

The arms business, on behalf of his bosses, kept him busy in March 1975. His interlocutor was Luis Sanies, the “contact was initiated by Jorge Ramírez of the Bank of America.” Sanies is a “retired major, from the Joint Staff, Intelligence Headquarters Two, subordinate to General Della Croce and who will serve as a direct liaison with Admiral Peyronnel, current head of the SIDE.” On Friday, March 14, at 3:00 PM, the meeting took place.

From the report he dispatched, it is clear that the SIDE is not responding to the collaboration with the DINA. “Sanies agrees that the collaboration should be done unofficially, without the embassy.” And he adds “all the background on the ‘toys’ he has for sale, including a quote for projectiles.”

A salary increase is the reward for this business with Sanies and his second-in-command (Horacio Sturlla), which is finalized in Santiago. Arancibia changes focus and asks for an investigation into the deputy manager of foreign trade of the Banco del Estado, Alfonso Ubilla, while reporting on the increase in disappeared persons due to the repression in Argentina: “160 people have fallen up to April 13, which makes an average of one death every 15 hours.

In the last few days, 8 Chileans have fallen. They are estimated to be R.I.P.”

“OPERATION COLOMBO” STEP BY STEP

April would be a month in which Arancibia would show his bosses the efficiency of his contacts. The supposed corpse of Chilean engineer David Silbermann, former manager of Chuquicamata, kidnapped in October 1974 from prison in Santiago and missing since then, was found in a parking lot in Buenos Aires (See Note 5).

In Arancibia’s archive are the handwritten sheets with the data of Silberman sent from Santiago for that setup.

It would be the beginning of one of the most brutal operations of the Chilean regime: “Operation Colombo,” which would attempt to make 119 forcibly disappeared Chileans appear as if they had been murdered by their own comrades abroad. Arancibia would play a key role in that setup.

“Attached is material related to the executives of the operations that appeared in different press organs. Included is a photo of Ubal Tahl, possibly R.I.P. by federal coordination. The invoices that accompany Colombo will be paid during the course of the week along with 15 Argentine invoices,” says the encrypted cable he sent to “Luis Gutiérrez,” head of the DINA Foreign Department.

The invoices are detainees.

But not everything worked as planned. On April 22, Arancibia sent a report to General Raúl Iturriaga: “Unfortunately, up to the moment, the publicity for the ‘Colombo’ case has been almost nil. Tomorrow I will interview Martín Ciga to know exactly what happened.

For this week, the two remaining ones are promised, who will appear with 15 ‘locals.’ I hope the publicity is greater. Martín requested photographic attention for approximately seven people. I hope to take them with me. He also offered me a business with Isabel Camus.”

Isabel Camus was in danger again. Like thousands of Chileans and Argentines on whom an unprecedented hunt had been unleashed. Arancibia traveled to Chile on April 25 to coordinate the details of the “Operation Colombo” in progress. The names of 7 prisoners already executed, on whom Martín Ciga requested photographic attention (passports or IDs), were discussed at the DINA central headquarters.

As operational arms of the DINA, coordinated personally by Arancibia Clavel, the Falange de Fe group was integrated, based in Córdoba and whose chief was Jorge E. Flores Allende. Sanies also constituted another operational arm on the payroll. Two armed arms to act and repress in Buenos Aires and Córdoba as decided by the DINA leadership in Santiago.

THE HANDWRITTEN SHEETS

The reality is that neither Sanies nor Flores could compete with Ciga Correa’s group, the main operational arm that the DINA had in Argentina. In the black plastic folders that Arancibia kept, the macabre footprint of that partnership remained.

Dated May 8, the handwritten lists appear with the names of more than 100 Chilean detainees who must be made to appear as executed in Argentina. They are simple notebook sheets, with blue edges and spelling mistakes.

There, names appear that have never had an explanation because they do not appear in any register of prisoners or disappeared: Samuel Ovando Abarca Molina, Gabriela Arredondo Andrade, and Soledad Sepúlveda.

Ciga did his job. This is clear from the report that Arancibia dispatched on May 16 regarding the first phase of Operation Colombo, “carried out by Martín Ciga’s group in a perfect way,” he writes. A report that is chilling because he also detailed there the effectiveness of the paramilitary groups that sowed terror in those days in the neighboring country.

Those whom Arancibia simply calls “execution commandos.”

“Their direct executor is Commissioner Ramírez (a), ‘The Butcher,’ specialist in burnings and drownings. With the latest political events, this group has decided to join Martín’s (Ciga) group,” Arancibia related to his bosses when informing them of his latest acquisition: the Arens group.

The address of the private residence of Ricardo Lagos and five other researchers from FLACSO in Buenos Aires is the last note that Arancibia added to his detailed report on the Argentine paramilitary groups.

But something happened. On May 23, he dispatched an urgent report: “The silence regarding the ‘publicity’ of the ‘COLOMBO’ case has caught my attention. For a week, there has been no information from you regarding this.

I would like to know what determination was reached to know how to handle myself with the journalist Carlos Manuel Acuña who calls me almost every day. Tomorrow I will obtain all the background information that was sent to Santiago through Interpol. The copies were obtained by Vicente (Colonel Víctor Barría).”

Colombo had problems. Even so, the DINA’s connection with its Argentine counterpart (SIDE) was established again. Sanies was the liaison with Colonel Spinetto, “second in command of the SIDE interior, that is to say, of subversive work,” Arancibia wrote. And he added: “What they are interested in is the contact in case an unofficial operation had to be carried out.”

THE DISCOLOURED AMBASSADOR

The last phase of Operation Colombo was imminent. And in those precise days, the ambassador of Chile in Argentina, René Rojas Galdames, fired a missile at Manuel Contreras that was never public: he cut off the diplomatic pouch to the DINA men.

Arancibia was furious and looked for an alternative. It would be Michael Townley who would find it in Lan Chile pilots who, for a few dollars, accepted the job. But Rojas remained on a blacklist with scores to settle.

Later, as recorded in his files, Arancibia would resort to a high-ranking Argentine intelligence chief to watch and spy on Ambassador Rojas and his family. The private life of his daughters was described with lewdness in the DINA reports, while the tension between Rojas and Colonel Barría grew.

Arancibia writes: “It is fundamental that this gentleman understands who he works for. The ambassador is now traveling to Santiago. Surely he will go to move his radical mafia against the loyal officials. I ask the company to take the corresponding drastic measures.”

Years later, on the night of November 10, 1981, the CNI would blow up a car in front of the ambassador’s residence in Santiago (Las Vizcachas), with four occupants inside. The official version indicated that the four young people, who died...

[They were] cornered, preparing an attack on the former ambassador's house when the bombs accidentally exploded. What Judge Joaquín Billard confirmed years later was that the four occupants of the car had been previously detained by the CNI.

One of them has not been identified to this day, as he was missing his head, feet, and hands. Many believe it was a revenge act by former DINA agents against Rojas.

THE TOWNLEY TRAIL

In those days of 1975, Michael Townley appears in Buenos Aires in Arancibia's papers. Both know each other. And very well. Ever since they coincided in the operation in which General Carlos Prats and his wife were murdered on a street in Palermo, Buenos Aires (1974).

This time, Townley bursts in with a relevant role in Operation Colombo. Manuel Contreras himself has sent him with a card signed by him and addressed to the Undersecretary of Internal Security, Héctor García Rey, to finalize Colombo.

In it, Contreras offers him "the unconditional support you will have from us in all your activities" and asks him to "devote a few minutes to someone who is already an old acquaintance of yours." Indeed, Arancibia and García Rey know each other. The card is the seal that the mission the former carries is official. And at the highest level.

The meeting between Arancibia Clavel and García Rey takes place on Friday, August 1. "Regarding the lists of Chileans who entered Argentina through different crossings, delivered in due course by Mr. Diego Castro (false identity of Raúl Iturriaga Neumann), he will deliver them to me with stamps and signatures just as it was proposed in the original delivery.

He replied that these lists will be ready on August 5 and will be prepared by his own brother, who is present at the interview. I asked for blank Argentine passports, to which he committed to delivering five to me on that same Tuesday the 5th" (See Note 6).

What is demanded of García Rey are the official papers that will certify that the 119 Chileans whom they want to appear as murdered by their own comrades abroad, effectively crossed from Chile into Argentine territory through different mountain passes. They are the same ones that appear on the handwritten list with more than 100 names of detainees that was in his file.

After one inconvenience or another, and the timely intervention of another important DINA associate and protagonist of the Argentine dirty war, Jorge Osvaldo Riveiro (alias "Rawson," second in command of the SIE), the operation is ready for its final execution.

García Rey will be mentioned from then on as "Tito." Months later, when García is threatened with death, he is offered rest and recuperation in Chile for him and his family. Riveiro does the same, traveling to Santiago with his wife with all expenses paid by the DINA on September 2, 1975.

He embarks from Paraguay. A route that will be recurrent among the men committed to Operation Condor, of which Riveiro will be a key piece.

This is proven by a report dated August 27 of that year, in which Arancibia writes to Iturriaga: "Lieutenant Colonel Osvaldo Rawson has the idea of forming an intelligence center coordinated between Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay."

The story that follows has already been written several times. After the appearance of the Argentine magazine Lea (60 names) and the newspaper Novo O’Día of Curitiba, Brazil (59 names), with the list of the 119 Chileans supposedly murdered in Salta by their own comrades, the headlines of the Chilean press arrived.

On July 23, thousands of Chileans read with horror: "Exterminated like rats" (La Segunda), "The MIR murders 60 of its men abroad" (La Tercera), "60 MIR members executed by their own comrades identified" (El Mercurio), "Bloody MIR struggle abroad" (Las Últimas Noticias).

For several days, it was highlighted that habeas corpus petitions had been filed for all of them, "which demonstrates the lie that the Marxists have fabricated about the action of the security services." That setup, one of the most shocking experienced during the dictatorship and which put the word "disappeared" on the table for the first time, was directed from the DINA central headquarters and bears the key fingerprint of Enrique Arancibia Clavel.

The Pinochet regime insisted through all its diplomatic and political channels that it had no relationship with the Operation Colombo setup. Even when survivors of the prisons began a hunger strike, insisting that they had seen most of them in one of the secret prisons where they were held.

Even when it was proven that the magazine Lea had only that one edition in Buenos Aires, and came from a printing press owned by López Rega, the founder of the Triple A in Argentina and a partner of the DINA. And despite the fact that the same thing happened with the Curitiba newspaper, but articulated by the Chilean consul in Rio de Janeiro, Gerardo Roa.

"OPERATION EUROPE"

Execution operations did not end with the repercussions of Colombo. On the contrary. In Arancibia Clavel's files is the proof. Ciga Correa asked for more "jobs" to be executed in Buenos Aires or any other city in the world; and "a Sterling submachine gun or similar, plus silencers." And he put a high price on his role.

A note from Arancibia catches the attention: "Martín asks if 'Operation Europe' will need collaboration from them." On August 15, Ciga receives an affirmative response: he will work on the "German leg" of "Operation Europe." And only that.

Today we know that at that moment, only days remained until the attack against Bernardo Leighton and his wife, executed on October 5 in Rome. Both survived, but with serious sequelae. And also, the failed attempt to assassinate the Venezuelan terrorist Carlos "The Jackal" (Ilich Ramírez Sánchez), in exchange for a large reward that Manuel Contreras asks the Shah of Iran for. (See report: The day Manuel Contreras offered the Shah of Iran to kill "Carlos, The Jackal").

What were the other attacks? How many were successful? There is no answer yet.

But Arancibia's files provide other answers. Such as what happened when the MIR leader Jorge Isaac Fuentes Alarcón ("El Trosko") was detained in Asunción and handed over by the Paraguayan secret police to the DINA.

When Lieutenant Colonel Riveiro ("Rawson") finds out in Buenos Aires, he is furious. He is convinced that Fuentes has key information on the Revolutionary Coordinating Junta and wants him for themselves. The services would dispute the prey of the human hunt, causing the nascent cooperation to stumble.

It is not the only problem that the DINA and Arancibia face in those days. Because Riveiro ("Rawson") is informed that Manuel Contreras has organized a coordination meeting of the secret services of the Southern Cone dictatorships in Santiago.

What he considered his original idea would debut in November, and he was not invited. The Argentine officer explodes. Arancibia would move his pieces in the days when Manuel Contreras was preparing to officially inaugurate Operation Condor in Chile on November 26. Officially, because in reality, the coordination to assassinate opponents had been underway for some time.

THE CAPTURE OF EDGARDO ENRIQUEZ

Repressive activity does not stop. Days before the premiere of Condor, on November 17, 1975, Arancibia dispatches the following report to Santiago: "According to information from Commander Jorge Osvaldo (Riveiro), 'Pollo Enríquez' is located in Baires.

Developments are expected. The so-called Claudet (Jean Ives Claudet, forcibly disappeared) could be Humberto Sotomayor, send photo. Claudet is RIP. In the latest instructions from the Revolutionary Coordinating Junta, Renán Fuentealba and Bernardo Leighton appear involved."

The head of the MIR, Edgardo Enríquez, would be detained in Buenos Aires. His detention and elimination would mark a milestone for the DINA. The participation of the SIE apparatus in his capture was not free.

The DINA offered to connect the two services directly and permanently through a special telex that the DINA itself financed and provided. Manuel Contreras complied. In March, the coordination of the secret repressive services of Chile and Argentina moved to a higher level.

One detail is surprising. Reviewing Enrique Arancibia Clavel's file, it is noted that in those days of November 1978, with war imminent between both countries, that telex never stopped working. The dirty war had no respite.

NEW PARTNERS FOR TERRORISM

The documents contained in the Arancibia Clavel archive, the only one of the DINA finally found, are a shocking record of the horror. There are the identity cards of some of the disappeared who were always denied to have been detained. Photos of bodies torn apart, mutilated, or charred. What were they doing in Argentina? A mystery. Because Arancibia always refused to talk about it.

Nor is anything known beyond what is in those papers regarding the tracking, detention, and murder of Alexei Jaccard Siegler, who landed in Buenos Aires on May 16, 1977. He came from Europe and brought money to take to his Communist Party comrades in Chile.

The day after his arrival, he was captured. His trail was lost, but the reports contain some clues about the torture he suffered and his execution, as well as the hunt that was unleashed and ended with 15 other Chileans forcibly disappeared.

An episode that reveals the other side of the repression: the constant theft of money and valuables from which prisoners were stripped. To the point that the men of Ciga Correa, the Italian fascist Stephano Delle Chiaie, and the Cubans Virgilio Paz and the Novo brothers, plus Arancibia and other Chileans, end up forming a partnership whose objective will be to kidnap businessmen to collect ransoms and traffic arms.

A chapter that no tribunal, neither Argentine nor Chilean, has investigated until now.

In Arancibia's files, there are several documents that prove the new incursion of the agents of repression. Such as the one that accounts for the meeting that Ciga Correa, Virgilio Paz, and others had in June 1976 at the safe house inhabited by Michael Townley in Lo Curro, to "plan a series of kidnappings to be carried out in Argentina given the need to obtain our own funds."

IN THE FBI'S SIGHTS

Towards the end of 1976, the need for money revealed by the men of international terrorism becomes more evident. As do the luxuries they allow themselves. Enrique Arancibia Clavel does not stay on the sidelines.

With his partner Humberto Zambelli, they have become partners as owners of the apartment in which they live together in Buenos Aires. For the weekends, they have bought a plot of land in the residential sector of Tortuguitas and there they have a quinche built, a type of stilt house with a straw roof, and a swimming pool.

A perfect refuge for rest. All of that requires money. Arancibia will explore new commercial veins for his group. He will also coordinate more complex purchases.

Like the one he reports in a mysterious envelope that he dispatches from Buenos Aires addressed to Alejandro Bontempi of Lan Chile Operations in Santiago. Inside is another smaller envelope addressed to "Luis Gutiérrez" and his phone number at the DINA headquarters: 31402. Arancibia waits impatiently for the response. As it does not arrive, he becomes alarmed. And he sends a telex.

In the small envelope was the report of the purchases of supplies made by "Javier" (the Cuban Virgilio Paz, who participated in the assassination of Orlando Letelier, was convicted by the U.S. justice system, and took refuge for a time in Chile), on behalf of the DINA: radio equipment and other elements for the manufacture of bombs of the same type as the one used to assassinate Carlos Prats and his wife in 1974.

And they were manufactured. And they were used. This was demonstrated by the U.S. justice system in a testing ground: the same bomb that murdered Prats in September 1974 was used in September 1976 to blow up the car in which Orlando Letelier and his assistant were traveling in Washington.

The elements were bought by Virgilio Paz, who used an ID card belonging to Alejandro Bontempi, making him reside in Argentina. In Arancibia's files is the fingerprint.

Operations that ended with Enrique Arancibia in the FBI's sights. On October 12, 1977, his appointment with Arancibia is recorded in the agenda of the FBI attaché in Buenos Aires, Robert Scherrer, who introduces himself as a "friend" of Colonel Víctor Barría, the official head of the DINA in Buenos Aires.

He asks for a visa to travel to California. These are days when, according to the files, several businesses are underway to obtain funds. And they all end in the United States.

The visa will cost him dearly. Because later, Scherrer will say that without being asked, Arancibia tells him that his work at the Banco del Estado is only a cover for his real work as head of the DINA's clandestine network in the neighboring country (See Note 7).

The end of these files coincides with the loss of the total power that Manuel Contreras and his men enjoyed. The decomposition is reflected in every report. Much more so in the letters that officers write to Arancibia from Chile (See Note 8).

A chapter that leads to the hidden framework of the gestation, financing, and development in Chile of "Operation Condor," which served to deploy, in the 70s and 80s, an enormous apparatus of international state terrorism in concomitance with the security services of the other Southern Cone dictatorships. And all this under the logistical and financial wing of the DINA.

Hundreds of agents deployed around the world, sophisticated communication networks, the manufacture of chemical and biological weapons, trips, payments to agents from other countries, and many other items required a millionaire financing structure that came from the coffers of the State of Chile and a complex network of companies based in tax havens (See report: Why Ovalle resigned from Sonami: He was a partner of the DINA's financial chief).

Even today, those networks maintain contacts and ties of protection. This was revealed by the assassination of the DINA chemist, Eugenio Berríos, in Uruguay in 1993, who worked precisely for that secret Foreign Department manufacturing chemical weapons.

Arancibia knew him very well. In his file, there are several references to "Hermes," his battle name in the DINA, and the repercussions caused by his imprudence in having mentioned him by name and surname in one of his telexes. And also, one of his business cards.

The proof of that network of impunity is the freedom that Arancibia Clavel himself enjoyed since 2007 in Buenos Aires due to an incomprehensible legal interpretation of his sentences. Even more serious is the total impunity that Martín Ciga Correa enjoys to this day.

Not only because he provided the main help that allowed the bomb to be placed in General Prats' car, a double crime for which he has never been interrogated. Ciga holds the key that leads to the secrets of the final destination of many forcibly disappeared detainees from Chile and Argentina. And also what was done with large amounts of money that fueled the repression.

NOTES

Note 1 In July 2002, when the Santiago Court of Appeals had to rule on the request for the stripping of immunity requested by the Argentine justice system against him for his role in the crime of Carlos Prats and his wife, Pinochet was on vacation in Iquique.

In a publicized journey, the general demonstrated that there was little of his touted irreversible cortical dementia, the cause of the end of his trial for the crimes of the Caravan of Death. But that new request for the stripping of immunity sounded the alarm. The vacation ended and Pinochet returned abruptly to Santiago to await the Supreme Court's ruling (December 2002).

In 2003, and for the first time, the Chilean justice system acted through the presiding judge Alejandro Solís when he prosecuted the DINA's top leadership for the crime of General Carlos Prats and his wife Sofía Cuthbert: Manuel Contreras and Pedro Espinoza (both in their capacity as chiefs); and Raúl Iturriaga Neumann, Jorge Iturriaga Neumann, and José Octavio Zara Holger, as members of the criminal organization.

A group that planned "the physical elimination of General (ret.) Carlos Prats González for being considered dangerous to the permanence of the military government of Chile," the ruling states. All of them would be convicted.

Note 2 Judge Alejandro Solís incorporated into his ruling the exits and entries into the country registered by General Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann, convicted for his direct participation in the crime of General Prats and his wife under the false identity of "Diego Castro Castañeda" between July 16 and 30, 1974.

In addition, he appears with twelve exits to and from Uruguay to Chile from April '74 to September '77. His brother Jorge, also convicted for the same double crime, registers as many entries from Argentina between July 5 and September 3, 1974, immediately after the assassination.

As for Michael Townley, he used for that criminal operation a passport that the Pinochet regime negotiated with the United States in April 1978 and that would never be investigated: Kenneth Enyart entered Chile on August 30, 1974, from Argentina, left on September 10 of that same year bound for Buenos Aires, and his entry into Chile occurred this time from Uruguay on October 1, 1974, hours after the attack was perpetrated.

General Raúl Iturriaga registers other movements, but under another false identity: "Eduardo José Rodríguez Pérez," with a diplomatic passport. Movements that include April 1975 and January 1976 between Chile, Argentina, and Brazil.

The same person, but without a diplomatic passport and ten years younger, registers exits by land to Peru (January 1973), entries from Ecuador by air (February 1973), and an exit bound for Argentina in February 1974. Another unexplored thread of the secret operations of the coup-plotting military.

Note 3 Carlos Osorio Mardones was a direct witness to the DINA's activities in Buenos Aires. In 1976, for the assassination of Orlando Letelier, he was Director of Protocol of the Foreign Ministry in Santiago and had control of the delivery of false passports in the operation with which they tried to hide the DINA's authorship.

Osorio knew too much. In October 1977, he died under strange circumstances never investigated. Judge Alejandro Solís makes mention of the fact in his final ruling for the crime of General Prats. At least one witness has said that he was eliminated with Sarin gas. His death still awaits justice.

Note 4 The Argentine journalist Horacio Verbitsky investigated Martín Ciga Correa in depth: In March 1976, veterans of the Tacuara movement, of the Triple A, such as Juan Martín Ciga Correa and José Luis Resio, were assimilated into the repressive forces of the dictatorship as qualified military personnel.

They then reappear in the task forces that kidnap, torture, and murder. He receives the name "Major Mariano Santa María." He was assigned by the Army to missions outside the country, as an instructor of counter-revolutionaries in Central America.

Missions in which they worked under the orders of officers such as Colonels Santiago Villegas, Osvaldo Riveiro, Julio Cesar Durand, and Major Hugo Miori Pereyra. Ciga Correa carried the money to pay the salaries of the Argentine soldiers in Tegucigalpa.

He was detained for stealing a car in Mar del Plata, but his former companion in Tacuara, the then-judge Eduardo Pettigiani, set him free. His defense attorney was Roberto Falcone, who is a member of the Federal Oral Tribunal of Mar del Plata and who also defended Commissioner Rozsicki, head of Intelligence of the Buenos Aires Provincial Police and, at the time, the right-hand man of the repressor Ramón Camps when he was head of that police in 1977 and the kidnappings, disappearances, and murders of lawyers occurred in Mar del Plata.

Note 5 The trail of David Silberman, who was convicted by a War Council in Calama for crimes that were never proven, was lost in the Santiago Prison in October 1974. He was made to appear as kidnapped by a MIR commando.

Subsequently, it was proven in court that it was all a farce, since he was taken from there by a DINA group led by Armando Fernández Larios, and then brutally tortured and murdered. The justice system even managed to identify the officer who operated at the Telephone Company to intercept phones and create numbers for the DINA to use according to needs, which happened the day they kidnapped Silberman.

That officer is Marcos Derpich. The Buenos Aires incident was a crude attempt to make his body appear as the first of the Chileans who were reported as executed or detained by the Pinochet regime and who had actually been murdered by their own comrades. The identity of the body that they tried to pass off as Silberman's was never investigated.

Note 6 Under the identity of Diego Castro Castañeda, General Iturriaga acquires the house in Lo Curro that served as a barracks for the manufacture of chemical weapons and the home of Michael Townley and Mariana Callejas. Carmelo Soria was also murdered there, as was proven in court.

Note 7 From the investigation collected in the book Labyrinth, by Eugen M. Propper and Taylor Branch, page 478.

Note 8 An example that illustrates that climate is the handwritten letter written to him by Christopher Willike Floe, an Army officer of the DINA high command, which Arancibia kept in his files. It was written on May 9, 1978, when the expulsion of Townley from Chile, the forced retirement of General Manuel Contreras from the Army, and the abrupt departure of Commander Eduardo Iturriaga from the old DINA transformed into the CNI, caused panic among the agents:

"For your peace of mind, I am serving as Luis Gutiérrez second (second chief of the DINA's Foreign Department). Regarding Wilson (Townley), he is well in the USA, but I cannot tell you more for security reasons. It was a dirty trick what they did to him, both by Pinocho, and by Mena and IMA Ividben (in the original). It has no name."

"Elias (Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann) was kicked out of the service due to problems with Wilson and with Mena (Odlanier Mena). The situation is calmer, but there is still a long way to go and it will cost a high price for certain people, especially politically.

You have to have faith, this downpour will have to pass soon. I beg you to speed up as much as possible, everything is being done to save Wilson (Townley)."

"I cannot tell you much about work. Here, nobody works anymore because the person who makes an arrest has to go and testify in court. Nobody does anything. They retired Commander Prado for not complying with the order to go and arrest 'Mamo.' The war is between bullets.

It seems that Brady (General Hermán Brady, then Minister of Defense) will soon replace Covarrubias (General Sergio Covarrubias, Chief of the Presidential Staff)."

The last letter, and the most compromising, is dated June 27, 1978. In it, Willike says:

"Here the mess continues and every day it gets worse. I think we are in a tight spot. Mariana (Callejas) continues with her stupid statements. Unfortunately, the only one who pays the price is my compadre Wilson (Townley).

Because of the statements of this bitch, I came to the fore in the Grand Jury, along with our compadre Joselo (Zara), for having talked to her during the 'party of the airs' (DINA's name for the Letelier operation), but fortunately Orozco (General Héctor Orozco, military judge) and Pantoja (Colonel Jerónimo Pantoja, deputy director of the DINA and later of the CNI) supported me and I am not in the summary.

The good thing: starting this week I will begin activities at the Buin Motorized Regiment No. 1 - Long live Chile, damn it! Happy to return to freedom and not work with these assholes anymore."

Note 9 Enrique Arancibia Clavel's files were systematized by the National Security Archive and donated to the Uniacc and Alberto Hurtado universities, where copies of the documents are kept.

By Mónica González

Source: ciper.cl, May 1, 2011

Venda Sexy: Former DINA agents sentenced for kidnapping and sexual torture

Regarding the ruling, it confirms the conviction of agents Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann, Manuel Rivas Díaz, and Hugo del Tránsito Hernández Valle to 15 years and one day in prison, as authors of the repeated crimes of aggravated kidnapping and the application of torture against 10 detainees in the clandestine center known as "Venda Sexy," in the commune of Macul, between 1974 and 1975.

This Friday, the decision of the Sixth Chamber of the Santiago Court of Appeals was made official, which sentenced four former agents of the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) for their participation in the crimes of aggravated kidnapping and the application of torture, and the application of torture with sexual violence against 10 detainees in the clandestine center known as "Venda Sexy," in the commune of Macul, between 1974 and 1975.

In this way, the Chamber presided over by Minister María Rosa Kittsteiner and composed of Minister (S) Paula Merino and Paola Herrera, issued a final second-instance sentence. Consequently, they confirmed what was resolved by Minister Mario Carroza in his sentence last November, whose ruling set a precedent because, for the first time, a tribunal applied a gender perspective regarding sexual abuse for which State agents are responsible against female prisoners during the dictatorship.

Regarding the ruling, it confirms the conviction of agents Raúl Eduardo Iturriaga Neumann, Manuel Rivas Díaz, and Hugo del Tránsito Hernández Valle to 15 years and one day in prison, as authors of the repeated crimes of aggravated kidnapping and the application of torture to Agustín Julio Holgado Bloch, Luis Rodolfo Ahumada Carvajal, Eugenio Ambrosio Alarcón García, and Luis Humberto Bernal Venegas.

And for aggravated kidnapping and the application of torture with sexual violence to the victims Cristina Verónica Godoy Hinojosa, Laura Ramsay Acosta, Beatriz Constanza Bataszew Contreras, Sara Gabriela de Witt Jorquera, Carmen Alejandra Holzapfel Picarte, and Clivia Marfa Sotomayor Torres.

In parallel, former agent Alejandro Francisco Molina Cisternas was sentenced to two terms of 541 days in prison, as an accomplice to the kidnappings of Agustín Julio Holgado Bloch and Luis Rodolfo Ahumada Carvajal, granting him the benefit of supervised release.

[You may be interested in] Punta Peuco prisoner dies, Ciro Torré, former Carabineros colonel and member of the DINA

Victims' defense highlights gender perspective approach

In civil matters, the Court confirmed the rejection of the exceptions filed by the Treasury and confirmed that all the compensation claims presented by the representatives of the 10 victims of the case must be accepted, ordering the payment of reparations.

Lawyer Francisco Ugás Tapia, of the Caucoto Abogados Law Firm and representative of Clivia Marfa Sotomayor Torres, Carmen Alejandra Holzapfel Picarte, and Laura Ramsay Acosta, positively valued this decision.

"It is a sentence that, endorsing what was resolved by the lower court, is consistent with the merits of the process, evidencing a correct application of domestic law and, especially, of international law."

For Ugás, "special mention must be made of a relevant consideration for the resolution of this case in its first-instance sentence, by Minister Mario Carroza, shared by the Court of Appeals. Namely, addressing violence against women that is exercised in contexts of crimes under international law, with a gender approach."

"Criminal acts constituted dehumanized aberrations" In this sense, the lawyer highlighted the arguments applied in his first-instance ruling by Minister Carroza, confirmed by the capital's appellate court, which alludes to "the criminal acts determined judicially, excesses that constituted dehumanized aberrations executed by State agents, in which not only were serious physical and psychological suffering inflicted on the victims, but there were abuses in the helplessness in which they found themselves, to execute the sexual violence aggressions, systematically, behaviors (...) despicable and that prevailed in the interrogations."

Additionally, they point out that "such behaviors oblige the Judiciary to construct a separate criminal category from that of aggravated kidnapping (in this case, that of the application of torture), for constituting behaviors that, in a look at international standards, must be made visible and highlighted for their gravity and dehumanization, since they constitute a specific form of violence against women."

And it adds that "these behaviors, which are executed in a context of generalized or systematic attacks directed against the civilian population, executed by state agents, protected by the de facto government, are crimes against humanity and, consequently, must be pursued and sanctioned."

Several torture centers operated simultaneously

According to the investigation substantiated by the magistrate, the DINA maintained different covert facilities during the years 1974 and 1975, with the purpose of keeping people who were supporters of political parties or movements that followed the deposed government before the Coup d'État was executed, and their condition in said places was that of political prisoners.

One of these sites was Calle Irán No. 3037 in the commune of Macul. Specifically, it was a place of confinement and torture that they called "Venda Sexy" or "La Discoteque," due to the sexual aggressions and abuse to which they subjected prisoners, used at the same time as other barracks destined for similar purposes, such as the well-known "Londres 38," "Villa Grimaldi," or "Cuartel Terranova," and also that of "José Domingo Cañas."

To the above, they added the one in charge of keeping prisoners incommunicado and recovering from the torture suffered in the interrogations, so that later the command of the organization would decide their final destination, known as "Cuatro Álamos," which had an annex, in which they kept prisoners in free communication until their potential release or expulsion from the country could be finalized.

They called this adjacent facility "Tres Álamos."

Source: eldesconcierto.cl, January 1, 2021