Political Affiliation: Member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name: ERNESTO REINANTE RAIPAN ID: No information DOB: 29 years old at the time of his detention Address: Fundo Trafún, Liquiñe, Valdivia Marital Status: Single Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name: ALBERTO SEGUNDO REINANTE RAIPAN ID: No information DOB: 39 years old at the time of his detention Address: Fundo Trafún, Liquiñe, Valdivia Marital Status: Married, 4 children Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name: JOSE HECTOR BORQUEZ LEVICAN ID: No information DOB: 01-22-31, 42 years old at the time of his detention Address: Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Marital Status: Married, four children Occupation: Timber worker and administrator at the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Political Affiliation: No known political affiliation Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name: ALEJANDRO ANTONIO TRACANAO PINCHEIRA ID: No information DOB: 22 years old at the time of his detention Address: Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Marital Status: Widower, two children Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Linked to the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name: MIGUEL JOSE TRACANAO PINCHEIRA ID: No information DOB: 25 years old at the time of his detention Address: Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Marital Status: Single Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Linked to the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name: ELISEO MAXIMILIANO TRACANAO PINCHEIRA ID: No information DOB: 10-22-55, 17 years old at the time of his detention Address: Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Marital Status: Single Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Linked to the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name: LUIS ALFREDO RIVERA CATRICHEO ID: No information DOB: 54 years old at the time of his detention Address: Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Marital Status: Single Occupation: Timber worker at the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Political Affiliation: No known political affiliation Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name: SALVADOR ALAMOS RUBILAR ID: No information DOB: 45 years old at the time of his detention Address: Liquiñe, Valdivia Marital Status: Married, 9 children Occupation: Timber industrialist Political Affiliation: Socialist Party Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name: CARLOS SEGUNDO FIGUEROA ZAPATA ID: 25.911 of Curacautín DOB: 07-25-26, 47 years old at the time of his detention Address: Fundo Paimún, Liquiñe, Valdivia Marital Status: Married, 6 children Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Advisor to the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Union representing Fundo Raimún. Socialist Party. Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name: MAURICIO SEGUNDO CURIÑANCO REYES ID: No information DOB: 38 years old at the time of his detention Address: Liquiñe, Valdivia Marital Status: Single Occupation: Artisan carpenter Political Affiliation: Socialist Party Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name: ISAIAS JOSE FUENTEALBA CALDERON ID: 25.220 of Villarrica DOB: 04-07-44, 29 years old at the time of his detention Address: Fundo Trafún, Liquiñe Marital Status: Married Occupation: Area Chief, Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex, Fundo Trafún Political Affiliation: Member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name: DANIEL ANTONIO CASTRO LOPEZ ID: No information DOB: 68 years old at the time of his detention Address: Liquiñe, Valdivia Marital Status: Married, 7 children Occupation: Merchant, correspondent for the newspaper "El Clarín" in Temuco. Political Affiliation: Socialist Party Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

On October 10, 1973, between 9:00 PM and 11:00 PM, the following individuals were detained in the Liquiñe sector, within the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex: Luis Alfredo Rivera Catricheo, timber worker, no known political affiliation; Eliseo Maximiliano Tracanao Pincheira, timber worker, linked to the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Miguel José Tracanao Pincheira, timber worker, linked to the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Alejandro Antonio Tracanao Pincheira, timber worker, linked to the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Salvador Alamos Rubilar, timber industrialist, member of the Socialist Party; José Héctor Bórquez Levicán, timber worker, work supervisor at Fundo Trafún, member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Alberto Segundo Reinante Raipán, timber worker, member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Ernesto Reinante Raipán, timber worker, member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement; Modesto Juan Reinante Raipán, timber worker, member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Luis Armando Lagos Torres, timber worker, member of the Socialist Party; Carlos Segundo Figueroa Zapata, timber worker, advisor for Fundo Paimún to the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Union, member of the Socialist Party; Mauricio Segundo Curiñanco Reyes, artisan carpenter, member of the Socialist Party; Isaías José Fuentealba Calderón, Area Chief at Fundo Trafún, of the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex, member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Daniel Antonio Castro López, merchant, correspondent for the newspaper "El Clarín" in Temuco, member of the Socialist Party.

For its part, the report of the National Commission for Truth and Reconciliation includes the names of the following victims as part of this same repressive situation: Carlos Alberto Cayumán Cayumán; and the 27-year-old teacher from Puerto Fuy, member of the Revolutionary Left Movement (MIR), Bernarda Rosalba Vera Contardo.

The detentions were carried out by uniformed personnel who carried a list with the names of the detainees. The apprehending group was composed of military personnel wearing combat uniforms who belonged to the No. 3 Maquehua Helicopter Group of the city of Temuco, of the Chilean Air Force (FACH); some Carabineros officers from the Liquiñe station, and civilians from the area.

They moved in private vehicles, a pickup truck from the Agricultural and Livestock Service (S.A.G.), a police vehicle, an ambulance from the Liquiñe station, and also had the support of a FACH helicopter.

The apprehenders acted in several groups, which met at the Coñaripe junction, near all the locations where the detentions were carried out. There, they took the road to Villarrica, and around 2:00 AM on October 11, 1973, at the bridge over the Toltén River, they proceeded to kill them and throw their bodies into the water.

Some of the bodies were found days later by a group of people working on the banks of the Toltén River. The bodies were placed in sacks with stones so they would not float; however, some bodies surfaced. This situation was immediately reported to the Carabineros, who, by order of the officer on duty, proceeded to push the bodies back into the river's current.

Among the testimonies obtained is that of Honorinda Lagos Sepúlveda, spouse of Isaías Fuentealba Calderón, Area Chief of the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex, who states regarding her husband that he left early on the morning of October 10, 1973, after his driver picked him up, and they traveled from Trafún to Liquiñe, about 14 km away.

Upon returning in the afternoon, at a place called Los Canelales, the victim was detained by Carabineros, who left Isaías Fuentealba's briefcase, which contained documentation from the Timber Complex, with the driver so that he could deliver it to his spouse.

Part of this testimony indicates that the detainees were taken to the Liquiñe Hostería, owned by Tulio García, where they were beaten and kept in a cabin. After that, they were taken out tied up and blindfolded, being transported in vehicles.

For its part, the family of Salvador Alamos Rubilar indicated that the victim had been detained previously, remaining in that condition from September 18 to 28, 1973, for alleged links to a failed ambush on the Neltume station.

His apprehenders on that occasion were Carabineros; they detained him along with his 17-year-old son, Salvador. Alamos Rubilar was tortured. His arrest on October 10, 1973, was carried out by military personnel in the presence of his daughter, Mirta Alamos, who pointed out that there were more detainees in the vehicle into which they loaded her father, tied by his hands and feet.

The victim's spouse, Mrs. Elcira Figueroa, immediately began searching for him in different places such as: the Logistics Battalion of Valdivia, the Public Jail, the Military Prosecutor's Office of Temuco, etc.

On one occasion, while interviewing the Military Prosecutor, a high-ranking officer who was present intervened, telling her that the operation was carried out by "Boinas Negras" (Black Beret) Commandos from Colina, so the local military authorities had nothing to do with it, adding: "you had better mourn and grieve for the dead."

All the aforementioned victims, executed outside of any legal process by State agents who violated their right to life and then hid their bodies, preventing their families from giving them a dignified burial, remain in the status of forcibly disappeared.

JUDICIAL AND/OR ADMINISTRATIVE ACTIONS

There is no knowledge that any judicial proceedings have been carried out. Eliseo Maximiliano Tracanao Pincheira appears in the report of the National Commission for Truth and Reconciliation, and in a sworn statement by his mother, Mrs.

Margarita del Carmen Valenzuela González, as Eliseo Maximiliano Tracanao Valenzuela. This surname had to be rectified, because the young man is actually registered in the Civil Registry by his grandmother with the surnames Tracanao Pincheira.

Source: (Rettig Report)

As the author of the kidnapping of Luis Armando Lagos Torres, the only detainee in the Liquiñe case, Luis Osvaldo Acevedo Tapia, was prosecuted tonight by the special judge Juan Guzmán Tapia. At the time of his detention, Lagos Torres served as an advisor to the Panguipulli Timber Complex, being subsequently executed by firing squad at the Toltén River bridge.

Judge Guzmán, who is investigating the Caravan of Death case, held a confrontation today between Luis Osvaldo García and the children of some of the 15 peasants who disappeared at the Toltén River bridge.

Source: Primera Linea – May 23, 2001

Date: 05-23-2001

He was 48 years old at the time of his detention. He was born in Valdivia on December 24, 1924. He married Donatila Lagos González and they had nine children. The youngest was born in 1964, surviving the birth while his mother passed away. Luis was left a widower with his nine children. The two girls—19 and 17 years old—took charge of raising their seven younger siblings.

Luis worked as a foreman at the Carranco estate. He was in charge of receiving trucks with timber, dispatching deliveries, keeping activity logs, and issuing waybills. He was also in charge of the company store and was a member of the Complex's Administrative Council.

His children, Raúl and Teresa, remember him as an intelligent man who loved to read. He had studied at the Boys' School No. 1 in Valdivia, and later attended the Liceo.

"He was fair-haired, green-eyed, stocky, and fair-skinned. Careful in his dress. Serious, respectful, without vices, concerned about us. He always advised us to be good people."

"He was a believer who participated in the Adventist Church in Villarrica. He regularly received Christian literature from the Church."

"He was a member of the Socialist Party. In his capacity as a leader, he sometimes traveled to Santiago. We had some newspaper clippings at home in which our father appeared with President Allende. Those memories disappeared with the raids."

Source: Unidadmpt.wordpress.com 03/11/2017

Date: 03-11-2017

Labbé and the murder of 15 peasants in Liquiñe at the hands of the Black Berets

Neither the current mayor nor any other member of that detachment could be prosecuted and convicted for these crimes against humanity, despite their participation in the operation being documented. Court and police sources agree in stating that the "pact of silence" they swore to and the "zero collaboration with justice" were two reasons they managed to evade responsibility.

They acted in clothing without rank insignia, at night, and with their faces semi-covered, according to witnesses of the arrests, and for the inhabitants of these Andean foothills, "it was impossible to recognize anyone."

Night falls on a Santiago that still trembles under the bombs of the Hawker Hunters. The men of Lieutenant Colonel Alejandro Medina Lois rest at the Telecommunications regiment in Peñalolén. They are General Augusto Pinochet's "strategic reserve," stationed there during the first days of the Military Coup.

Elite commandos from the Paratrooper and Special Forces School directed by Medina. They are the boinas negras (Black Berets).

After the first 48 hours of the assault on Salvador Allende's government, everything is under control. Allende is dead. There is no armed popular resistance. The President's main collaborators are detained. The socialist revolution is now a memory. Smoldering. Sorrowful. Tragic.

But a thrust disturbs the security of the victorious insurgents. In the still-dark early hours of September 12, 1973, a group of peasants and young revolutionaries from the south, in the Andean foothills of Valdivia, becomes an alarm.

They surround the Neltume police station and demand that the carabineros hand over weapons and ammunition if they are not willing to fight the coup plotters. Among them is MIR militant José Liendo Vera. The mythical and feared "Commander Pepe."

The police refuse and open fire. A shootout begins. After a couple of hours, the group acting from the outside disperses. Silence returns. There are no dead or wounded on either side. From then on, the Panguipulli Forestry and Timber Complex becomes one of the military's main targets.

It is presumed that dangerous guerrillas are operating in the area. Pinochet orders their elimination. "Operation Leopard" is born.

To this end, Pinochet creates the "Special Anti-Guerrilla Brigade" with the Black Berets from the Peldehue Paratrooper School and other men prepared for combat. Under the command of General Nilo Floody, between 250 and 300 soldiers are sent to repress the insurgency. One of them is the young officer Cristián Labbé Galilea.

Most are killing machines. Their specialties: mountain military instructor, with courses in paratrooping, commandos, special warfare, assault, guiding, and explosives and ammunition.

Days after the Coup, the brigade begins the journey from Peñalolén aboard military trucks. They carry sufficient light and heavy weaponry and ammunition. They are prepared for war and to kill guerrillas. "The brigade was formed because a rural guerrilla could exist in the Panguipulli Timber Complex.

We had to sweep those pockets, and if clashes occurred, the order was to open fire." It is Labbé who testifies before the courts in December 2003 regarding the crimes against 15 peasants from Liquiñe, 150 kilometers east of Valdivia, near the Argentine border. For the first time, Labbé uncovers his well-guarded secret: he acknowledges that he was indeed part of that operation.

From Brazil, where before September 11, 1973, he studied various techniques to become the elite of the elite, Labbé returns to the Paratrooper School at the Directorate of Instruction. In other words, he is not just an ordinary Black Beret; he is the one who trains them.

During the operation in Liquiñe and other places in the Valdivian Andean foothills, the current mayor of Providencia reports directly to the top chief of the Black Berets, Lieutenant Colonel Alejandro Medina, who on this long journey was General Nilo Floody's Chief of Staff. "My work depended on the Chief of Staff," Labbé maintains in his judicial statement.

As is known, with that comprehensive training, he was later one of the trainers of DINA agents and, in fact, a prominent member of this illicit criminal organization.

"We first arrived in Valdivia, but we didn't really know what we were going for. We were only told that the objective was to fight a guerrilla," recalls a Black Beret non-commissioned officer who spoke with El Mostrador but preferred to keep his identity confidential.

A day later, the non-commissioned officer maintains that they headed toward the Andean foothills, to the area of the Panguipulli Forestry and Timber Complex, and arrived in Liquiñe.

"The Black Berets set up tents in the courtyard of the nuns' school," states Julián García, an industrialist and owner of the Liquiñe Hot Springs and the inn, in the judicial investigation. It refers to the Liquiñe Missionary School.

Another military contingent under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Hugo Guerra Jorquera, which arrived earlier from Valdivia, sets up its camp on the large site of the hot springs themselves, according to Julián García. He is a recognized anti-communist, according to judicial statements from surviving peasants.

The complex is born

The Panguipulli Forestry and Timber Complex extended between the Chihuío Baths in the south and Liquiñe in the north, about 150 kilometers east of Valdivia. It eventually encompassed 360,000 hectares. It was made up of 22 large estates.

Starting in the late 1960s, the properties were occupied by members of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (MCR), an organization controlled by the Movement of the Revolutionary Left (MIR). By 1973, more than 3,000 peasants worked there.

Not a few followed "Commander Pepe," the leader of the MCR. Along with Liendo Vera, a handful of MIR students arrived in the area in the late sixties to begin a "land recovery" alongside the peasants.

When Allende triumphed in 1970, his government expropriated the 22 estates. Thus, the Panguipulli Forestry and Timber Complex was officially born as a subsidiary company of the Production Development Corporation (CORFO). The dream of building their own destiny was fulfilled. The complex and Commander Pepe became the terror of the landed right. Therefore, the post-military coup revenge was fierce.

After the Liquiñe police station episode on the early morning of September 12, 1973, Commander Pepe, along with his wife, Yolanda Ávila, and MIR militants Luis Pezo and Pedro Barría—who used a crutch to walk—hid for a few days and went up into the mountains.

But on September 19, they were found and taken to the Valdivia prison. On the night of October 3, 1973, Liendo Vera was executed at the Llancahue military camp. The next day, eleven other MIR members accused of participating in the attack on the Neltume police station were murdered.

The crimes were handled by General Sergio Arellano's "Caravan of Death," present in Valdivia during those days. For this, Arellano signed a sentence from a fake War Council. The man who would later become the second-in-command of the DINA, Pedro Espinoza Bravo, attended that night to witness the death of Liendo Vera.

Accusing the Black Berets

The night of October 10, 1973, can never be forgotten by the inhabitants of Liquiñe. Julián García's inn operated as "headquarters." From there, the list of the 15 peasants who were to be arrested and killed immediately was issued.

As established in the proceedings, Julián García and his son Luis, who wore military uniforms that night, provided the names of those who were to die. The Black Berets began the raid together with carabineros from the Liquiñe station, led by non-commissioned officer Luis Anguita Castro. They knew the chosen ones well.

According to the police report signed by the sub-prefect of the Valdivia Investigative Police, Benjamín Leal Riquelme, and sub-commissioner Manuel Castro Contreras, "a Carabinero corporal named Quintana from the Liquiñe station and several Black Beret soldiers" participated in the arrests of the Complex's peasants: José Miguel and Alejandro Antonio Tracanao Pincheira and their father, Eliseo Maximiliano Tracanao Valenzuela.

The owner of the Liquiñe hot springs, Julián García, testified judicially that "the Black Berets carried out the arrests."

The judge of the Villarrica court in 1973, René García Villegas, maintains in his book I Am a Witness that one of the bodies of those riddled with bullets on the Toltén bridge remained hours later in the river "tangled among some rocks, headless."

Elcira Figueroa Arias, wife of Salvador Alamos Rubilar, one of the 15 victims of Liquiñe, declared in the proceedings that, while searching for her husband, "at the Temuco Military Prosecutor's Office, Captain Ubilla told me that on the date of my husband's disappearance (October 10, 1973), an operation by the Colina (Santiago) Black Beret Command was in the area, so the local military authorities 'washed their hands of it,' and that if my husband fell into their hands, 'you had better mourn him and consider him dead.'"

On the Toltén bridge

Tied hand and foot, the 15 peasants were driven that night in two pickup trucks toward Villarrica. One of the vehicles was provided by Julián García and driven by his son Luis. The other was provided by merchant Juan Carmach and driven by the Liquiñe ambulance driver, Sixto Díaz.

On the bridge over the Toltén River, the peasants were taken out, and the Berets ordered both drivers to move away. In a few minutes, the detainees formed a macabre human carpet laid out on the bridge.

Red, like the blood flowing in torrents from their bodies riddled by repeating rifles with war ammunition. Below, the rushing waters of the river could not drown out the sound of the machine-gun fire. Díaz and García heard it, as they later declared judicially.

After Liquiñe, always in search of guerrillas, the contingent of Black Berets in which Labbé participated headed to other localities that made up the Timber Complex. But the non-commissioned officer we spoke with maintains, smiling ironically: "We didn't find anyone; there was nothing, no guerrillas or anything." The Anti-Guerrilla Brigade remained in the area until the beginning of December 1973.

A couple of days before the nightly massacre in Liquiñe, in Chihuío, 25 kilometers south of Liquiñe, 17 members of the Complex were also riddled with bullets—all peasants who lived in the area with their families.

One by one, the bodies were thrown into the river. The Liquiñe list was fulfilled. The executioners thought that the multiple perforations in the bodies would allow them to sink and be lost forever downstream to the sea.

The boatmen and the authority

But days later, local boatmen who fish discovered some bodies clinging to branches on the riverbank or stuck between rocks. They notified the Villarrica Carabineros. The secretary of the Villarrica Criminal Court, Osvaldo Wiegand Carrasco, arrived at the scene with the sub-commissioner of the Villarrica sub-station, Captain Ramón Torrealba Guzmán.

In the proceedings, Secretary Wiegand says he managed to save a couple of bodies. But the boatmen contradict him. They state that the order they received from both the secretary and the sub-commissioner was to free the bodies from what was holding them and throw them back into the current so they would disappear.

The boatmen Eliseo Rosas Maldonado and José Carrasco Rodríguez were confronted with Wiegand and Torrealba. They maintained their statements that they were forced by both authorities to release the bodies and return them to the torrent. The same was confirmed by boatmen Guido Mora, Leopoldo Ghisolfo, and Juan Yáñez Cares.

However, in the area where the Berets moved under the command of General Floody and Medina Lois, in addition to the 15 from Liquiñe, another 30 peasants from the Timber Complex were murdered. A couple of days before the nightly massacre in Liquiñe, in Chihuío, 25 kilometers south of Liquiñe, 17 members of the Complex were also riddled with bullets—all peasants who lived in the area with their families.

Members of the Cazadores regiment of Valdivia also participated in this operation. The raid was supported by Air Force Puma helicopters, which came from the Maquehua Air Base in Temuco.

The secret Some other officers who participated in "Operation Leopard" are: Carlos Parera Silva, Emilio Timmermann Undurraga, Arturo Bosch González, Manuel Pérez Santillán (DINA agent), and Sergio Candia Muñoz.

Why could neither Labbé nor any other member of the Black Berets be prosecuted and convicted for these crimes against humanity? Court and police sources agree in stating that the "pact of silence" they swore to and the "zero collaboration with justice" were two reasons they managed to evade responsibility.

According to the sources, it is added that, because it was an unknown contingent from Santiago that acted in clothing without rank insignia, at night, and with their faces semi-covered, according to witnesses of the arrests, for the inhabitants of these Andean foothills, "it was impossible to recognize anyone." The former DINA agent, retired Colonel Cristián Labbé, avoids prison once again while waiting to be re-elected as mayor on October 28.

Source: elmostrador.cl 23/10/2012

Date: 23-10-2012

Court confirms longer sentence for human rights violations during dictatorship

The Santiago Court of Appeals confirmed this Friday the 18-year prison sentence against retired Colonel Hugo Alberto Guerra Jorquera for the kidnapping of 11 peasants who were executed in 1973 but whose bodies were never found, judicial sources reported.

The peasants were from the town of Liquiñe and worked in a local timber complex. The appeals court rejected an appeal filed by Guerra Jorquera to invalidate the sentence imposed by Judge Alejandro Solís in January 2006, which is currently the harshest sentence handed down for human rights violations.

The retired Army colonel was also ordered to pay 250 million pesos (about 480,000 dollars) as compensation, by virtue of a civil lawsuit filed against him by five relatives of the victims. According to the Rettig Report, which documented human rights violations during the regime of the late dictator Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990), the agricultural workers were detained in a joint operation by the Carabineros police of the Liquiñe station, Army personnel, and civilians.

The peasants were taken to the Villarrica bridge, over the Toltén River, where they were executed, and their bodies were never found. Among the executed are the brothers Modesto, Ernesto, and Alberto Reinante Raipán, all three workers and members of the Panguipulli timber complex union.

The plaintiff lawyer, Nelson Caucoto, celebrated the ruling because, as he said, it confirms the crimes and establishes exemplary punishments against the defendants.

Source: August 3, 2007 El Mostrador

Date: 03-08-2007

Judge Solís handed down the highest penalty to date in human rights cases

The magistrate sentenced a retired Army lieutenant colonel to 18 years of presidio mayor in its maximum degree for the aggravated kidnapping of 11 peasants in Liquiñe. Minister Alejandro Solís handed down this Thursday the highest penalty known for a case linked to human rights violations during the military regime headed by General (R) Augusto Pinochet.

The magistrate sentenced retired Lieutenant Colonel Hugo Alberto Guerra Jorquera to 18 years of presidio mayor in its maximum degree as the perpetrator of repeated crimes of aggravated kidnapping in the so-called "Liquiñe episode." The ruling is based on the repression suffered starting October 10, 1973, by a group of 11 peasants who sympathized with the Popular Unity (UP), in the Andean foothills sector of the Tenth Region of Los Lagos.

Among the victims are Salvador Álamos Rubilar, José Héctor Bórquez Levican, Daniel Antonio Castro López, Carlos Alberto Cayuman Cayuman, Mauricio Segundo Curiñanco Reyes, Carlos Figueroa Zapata, Isaías José Fuentealba Calderón, Luis Armando Lagos Torres, Ernesto Juan Reinante Raipan, Modesto Juan Reinante Raipan, and Luis Alfredo Rivera Catricheo.

The retired Army officer was also ordered to pay a total sum of $250 million as compensation, by virtue of a civil lawsuit filed against him by five relatives of the victims. The beneficiaries, with $50 million each, will be Miguel Ángel and Isaías Julián Fuentealba Lagos, as well as Héctor Hernán, Hugo Raúl, and Didier Antonio Figueroa Arraigada.

Additionally, the owner of the Liquiñe Hot Springs, a civilian identified as Luis Osvaldo García Guzmán, was convicted, who in his capacity as the perpetrator of the aggravated kidnapping of Luis Armando Lagos Torres received a sentence of five years and one day.

Source: January 26, 2006 El Mostrador

Date: 26-01-2006

Individual involved in Liquiñe case prosecuted

The investigating judge, Juan Guzmán Tapia, resolved this evening to prosecute Luis Osvaldo García Tapia as the perpetrator of aggravated kidnapping for the case of Luis Armando Lagos Torres, 50 years old—a worker at the Panguipulli timber complex—a socialist militant detained in Curranco in 1973.

Luis Lagos was detained in 1973 along with 15 other people in the south, in the so-called "Caravanita Chica," in the Ninth Region.

The 16 disappeared

Salvador Alamos Rubilar José Héctor Bórquez Livican Daniel Antonio Castro López Carlos Alberto Callumán Callumán Mauricio Segundo Curiñaco Reyes Carlos Figueroa Zapata Isaías José Fuentealba Calderón Luis Armando Lagos Torres Alberto Segundo Reinante Raipán Ernesto Juan Reinante Raipán Modesto Reinante Raipán Luis Rivera Catricheo Alejandro Antonio Tracanao Pincheira José Miguel Tracanao Pincheira Eliseo Maximiliano Tracanao Valenzuela Bernarda Rosalba Vera Contardo

Source: El Mostrador – May 23, 2001

Date: 23-05-2001

Neltume, dreams of popular power: 48 years after the Liquiñe case

Student of Social Anthropology at the Universidad Academia de Humanismo Cristiano. Member of the research team for the Fondecyt project "Absent bodies/present bodies: Experiences of relatives of the forcibly disappeared in Chile," headed by professor Laura Panizo.

Neltume will be remembered by history, like so many other cases, as a place where the working class's dreams of popular power became reality. Today, 48 years after these crimes occurred, we remember the 16 murdered at the Toltén River and all those families who had to move forward fighting against the denialism and hatred that snatched away their loved ones: workers and laborers who lived the dream of being masters of their future.

September 12, 1973. While Santiago was recovering from the agitated previous day, in the Andean zone of the Los Ríos Region, the first act of armed resistance against the nascent military regime was orchestrated.

A group of local youths, belonging to the MIR, organized to surround the Neltume police station and begin the attack. Among them was the famous "Commander Pepe," a great insurgent and revolutionary political leader who was later a victim of the Caravan of Death.

Despite no fatalities being recorded from that armed clash, the regime reacted with great force to that attempt at an armed popular response through a series of military intelligence actions associated with arrests, executions, and disappearances of civilians.

Added to this, as a cause for alarm for the regime, was the fact that great political participation of the people had been demonstrated in this area within the agrarian reform processes. The Panguipulli Forestry and Timber Complex, located in the vicinity of the town of Neltume, emerged from the process of land and factory seizures by workers during the first years of the UP government.

The workers, in an unprecedented manner, began to claim control of the country's main means of production. In the Andean zone of Valdivia, 22 forestry estates were seized. The State did its part and, subjected to pressure from opposition sectors, took action and decided to expropriate these estates and nationalize the production companies.

This gave way to the first experience of popular power in Chile with direct State participation in granting power of control and production planning to the workers. During the early morning of October 10, 1973, a military convoy formed by a vehicle from the Agriculture and Livestock Service (SAG), an ambulance, and a private car provided by the civilian Luis García, headed to the Liquiñe sector and its surroundings to carry out a series of arrests.

Minister Alejandro Solís, the judge in charge of a series of emblematic human rights violation cases, established that Air Force personnel from Temuco participated in these events along with local carabineros.

During those hours, 16 people were detained: fifteen workers from the Panguipulli Forestry and Timber Complex and a teacher from the Puerto Fuy school. All were accused as suspects of participating in the attack on the police station.

Some were kidnapped from their homes in the town of Liquiñe and others were detained directly at their workplace in the complex. Once the arrests were made, the vehicles grouped at the Coñaripe junction and headed toward Temuco.

Upon passing over the Rodrigo de Bastidas bridge, which crosses the source of the Toltén River in the city of Villarrica, the convoy stopped and the order was given for the 16 detainees to get out. There, they were all lined up while remaining tied and blindfolded.

It was dark; no one was circulating on the streets at those hours, when suddenly a burst of gunfire broke the calm of the place: the 16 fell dead on the bridge. Immediately afterward, the uniformed men were instructed to throw the bodies into the riverbed, not without first tying them to heavy stones so they would not float.

However, early in the morning, local boatmen spotted some bodies that had been dragged to the shore, becoming trapped among the vegetation. When they notified the Carabineros, they were ordered to push the bodies toward the riverbed, where they were lost in its depths.

Traffic on the bridge was cut off, and firefighters were ordered to clean the blood accumulated in the area. To this day, none of the bodies have been recovered. These events are known as the "Liquiñe Case." In this way, the military regime put an end to the dream of thousands of workers to exercise the legitimate right to control their destinies through the execution of an unprecedented project of worker participation in national production.

In a conversation with Raúl Lagos, son of Luis Lagos Torres, he described to me how the events prior to his father's disappearance occurred. The day before, both were detained and taken to Valdivia. There, they were beaten and interrogated in search of information about the ambush at the Neltume station: "They took us at the house and released us there in Valdivia; they took us to the military prosecutor's office, they had us imprisoned there," he noted.

After that, they were released under threats: "We arrived at our house. We were more or less calm because they made us all sign a sworn statement. So we said: with this matter, we are free now. But still, I said, my dad wasn't very calm... and then, around 11 at night, they arrived...".

Raúl's account, like that of so many other relatives, is built from the deep pain of a wound that has not healed. The attempts to administer justice by Minister Alejandro Solís were reflected in his book Plaza Montt-Varas without number.

Memoirs of Minister Alejandro Solís, where he recounted the events that occurred, in whose sentence, handed down in January 2006, he sentenced Army Lieutenant Colonel Hugo Guerra Jorquera to the penalty of 18 years of presidio mayor in its maximum degree, "the highest fixed for human rights violations until then," and to pay compensation of 250 million pesos in his capacity as the perpetrator of eleven crimes of aggravated kidnapping.

The civilian Luis Osvaldo García Guzmán was also convicted as the perpetrator of the crime of aggravated kidnapping of Luis Armando Lagos Torres, to the penalty of 5 years and 1 day of presidio mayor in its maximum degree.

However, the Supreme Court, applying the statute of half-prescription, granted both individuals the benefit of supervised release. None of the culprits in this case spent a single day in prison. The "Liquiñe Case" is framed, like so many other human rights violation cases, within a context of military cruelty against the working class.

The same class that during the previous years had fulfilled the dream of controlling the means of production and balancing the scales based on social justice. The collaboration and/or participation of civilians in these cases accounts for a sort of revenge on the part of the landowners who had been affected by the Agrarian Reform and the expropriations.

The reward for their collaboration would be paid in the form of the return of the expropriated lands during the military regime's counter-agrarian reform. The involvement and political participation of the working class during those hectic years of the 70s shook the traditional foundations of the Chilean social structure, provoking an unprecedented fear in the dominant sectors of society that could only be appeased by the coup d'état and the subsequent bloodthirsty dictatorship: the Armed Forces, through a process orchestrated by North American imperialism and the Chilean oligarchy, returned the benefits to the powerful to the detriment of a politically very cultured people and, therefore, extremely dangerous for the elites of the time. Neltume will be remembered by history, like so many other cases, as a place where the working class's dreams of popular power became reality. Today, 48 years after these crimes occurred, we remember the 16 murdered at the Toltén River and all those families who had to move forward fighting against the denialism and hatred that snatched away their loved ones: workers and laborers who lived the dream of being masters of their future. Thus, and considering the current electoral context, it is prudent to reclaim the political consciousness that the Chilean people built prior to the dictatorship and to get involved in the democratic processes we have today. It is not the same who governs, and whoever does so must fight against denialism and the pacts of silence of the military leadership. Only then can Chilean society advance toward the construction of a historical memory based on truth, justice, and reparation. Paulo Cuadra

Source: eldesconcierto.cl 10/10/2021

Political Affiliation: Council member of the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Union, representing Fundo Paimún. Socialist Party. Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name

LUIS ARMANDO LAGOS TORRES

ID: No information DOB: 50 years old at the time of detention Address: Liquiñe, Valdivia Marital Status: Widower, 9 children Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Socialist Party Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name

MODESTO JUAN REINANTE RAIPAN

ID: No information DOB: 18 years old at the time of detention Address: Fundo Trafún, Liquiñe, Valdivia Marital Status: Single Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name

ERNESTO REINANTE RAIPAN

ID: No information DOB: 29 years old at the time of detention Address: Fundo Trafún, Liquiñe, Valdivia Marital Status: Single Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name

ALBERTO SEGUNDO REINANTE RAIPAN

ID: No information DOB: 39 years old at the time of detention Address: Fundo Trafún, Liquiñe, Valdivia Marital Status: Married, 4 children Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name

JOSE HECTOR BORQUEZ LEVICAN

ID: No information DOB: 01-22-31, 42 years old at the time of detention. Address: Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Marital Status: Married, four children. Occupation: Timber worker and administrator at the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Political Affiliation: No known political affiliation Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name

ALEJANDRO ANTONIO TRACANAO PINCHEIRA

ID: No information DOB: 22 years old at the time of detention Address: Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Marital Status: Widower, two children Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Linked to the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name

MIGUEL JOSE TRACANAO PINCHEIRA

ID: No information DOB: 25 years old at the time of detention Address: Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Marital Status: Single Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Linked to the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name

ELISEO MAXIMILIANO TRACANAO PINCHEIRA

ID: No information DOB: 10-22-55, 17 years old at the time of detention Address: Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Marital Status: Single Occupation: Timber worker Political Affiliation: Linked to the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name

LUIS ALFREDO RIVERA CATRICHEO

ID: No information DOB: 54 years old at the time of detention Address: Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Marital Status: Single Occupation: Timber worker at the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Political Affiliation: No known political affiliation Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name

SALVADOR ALAMOS RUBILAR

ID: No information DOB: 45 years old at the time of detention Address: Liquiñe, Valdivia Marital Status: Married, 9 children Occupation: Timber industrialist Political Affiliation: Socialist Party Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name

ISAIAS JOSE FUENTEALBA CALDERON

ID: 25.220 of Villarrica DOB: 04-07-44, 29 years old at the time of detention Address: Fundo Trafún, Liquiñe Marital Status: Married Occupation: Area Chief, Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex, Fundo Trafún Political Affiliation: Member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.) Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

Name

DANIEL ANTONIO CASTRO LOPEZ

ID: No information DOB: 68 years old at the time of detention Address: Liquiñe, Valdivia Marital Status: Married, 7 children Occupation: Merchant, correspondent for the newspaper "El Clarín" in Temuco. Political Affiliation: Socialist Party Date of Detention: October 10, 1973

On October 10, 1973, between 9:00 PM and 11:00 PM, the following individuals were detained in the Liquiñe sector, within the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex: Luis Alfredo Rivera Catricheo, timber worker, no known political affiliation; Eliseo Maximiliano Tracanao Pincheira, timber worker, linked to the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Miguel José Tracanao Pincheira, timber worker, linked to the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Alejandro Antonio Tracanao Pincheira, timber worker, linked to the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Salvador Alamos Rubilar, timber industrialist, member of the Socialist Party; José Héctor Bórquez Levicán, timber worker, work supervisor at Fundo Trafún, member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Alberto Segundo Reinante Raipán, timber worker, member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Ernesto Reinante Raipán, timber worker, member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement; Modesto Juan Reinante Raipán, timber worker, member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Luis Armando Lagos Torres, timber worker, member of the Socialist Party; Carlos Segundo Figueroa Zapata, timber worker, council member for Fundo Paimún at the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex Union, member of the Socialist Party; Mauricio Segundo Curiñanco Reyes, carpenter, member of the Socialist Party; Isaías José Fuentealba Calderón, Area Chief at Fundo Trafún, Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex, member of the Revolutionary Peasant Movement (M.C.R.); Daniel Antonio Castro López, merchant, correspondent for the newspaper "El Clarín" in Temuco, member of the Socialist Party.

The Rettig Report also includes the names of the following victims as part of this same repressive situation: Carlos Alberto Cayumán Cayumán; and the teacher from Puerto Fuy, 27 years old, a member of the Revolutionary Left Movement (MIR), Bernarda Rosalba Vera Contardo.

The detentions were carried out by uniformed personnel who carried a list with the names of the detainees. The apprehending group was composed of military personnel wearing combat uniforms who belonged to the No. 3 Maquehua Helicopter Group of the city of Temuco, of the Chilean Air Force (FACH); some Carabineros officers from the Liquiñe station, and civilians from the area.

They moved in private vehicles, a pickup truck belonging to the Agricultural and Livestock Service (S.A.G.), a police vehicle, an ambulance from the Liquiñe station, and they also had the support of a FACH helicopter.

The captors acted in several groups, which met at the Coñaripe junction, close to all the places where the detentions were carried out. From there, they took the road to Villarrica, and around 2:00 AM on October 11, 1973, at the bridge over the Toltén River, they proceeded to kill them and throw their bodies into the water.

Some of the bodies were found days later by a group of people working on the banks of the Toltén River. The bodies were placed in sacks with stones so they would not float; however, some bodies surfaced. This situation was immediately reported to the Carabineros, who, by order of the officer on duty, proceeded to push the bodies back into the river's current.

Among the testimonies obtained is that of Honorinda Lagos Sepúlveda, spouse of Isaías Fuentealba Calderón, Area Chief of the Panguipulli Timber and Forestry Complex, who states regarding her husband that he left early on the morning of October 10, 1973, after his driver picked him up, and they traveled from Trafún to Liquiñe, about 14 km away.

Upon returning in the afternoon, at a place called Los Canelales, the victim was detained by Carabineros, who left Isaías Fuentealba's document holder, which contained documentation from the Timber Complex, in the driver's possession so that he could deliver it to his spouse.

Part of this testimony indicates that the detainees were taken to the Liquiñe Inn, owned by Tulio García, where they were beaten and held in a cabin. After that, they were taken out tied up and blindfolded, and transported in vehicles.

For its part, the family of Salvador Alamos Rubilar stated that the victim had been detained previously, remaining in that condition from September 18 to 28, 1973, for alleged involvement in a failed ambush on the Neltume station.

His captors on that occasion were Carabineros; they detained him along with his 17-year-old son, Salvador. Alamos Rubilar was tortured. His arrest on October 10, 1973, was carried out by military personnel in the presence of his daughter, Mirta Alamos, who stated that there were more detainees in the vehicle into which they loaded her father, tied by his hands and feet.

The victim's spouse, Mrs. Elcira Figueroa, immediately began searching for him in various places such as the Valdivia Logistics Battalion, the Public Jail, the Temuco Military Prosecutor's Office, etc.

On one occasion, while interviewing the Military Prosecutor, a high-ranking officer who was present intervened, telling her that the operation was carried out by "Black Beret" Commandos from Colina, so the local military authorities had nothing to do with it, adding: "you had better mourn and grieve for the dead."

All the aforementioned victims, executed outside of any legal process by State agents who violated their right to life and then hid their bodies, preventing their families from giving them a dignified burial, remain in the status of forcibly disappeared.

JUDICIAL AND/OR ADMINISTRATIVE ACTIONS

There is no knowledge that any judicial actions have been taken. Eliseo Maximiliano Tracanao Pincheira appears in the Rettig Report, and in a sworn statement by his mother, Mrs. Margarita del Carmen Valenzuela González, as Eliseo Maximiliano Tracanao Valenzuela.

This surname had to be corrected, as the young man is actually registered in the Civil Registry by his grandmother with the surnames Tracanao Pincheira.

Source: Corporation report

The Santiago Court of Appeals confirmed this Friday the 18-year prison sentence against retired Colonel Hugo Alberto Guerra Jorquera for the kidnapping of 11 peasants who were executed in 1973 but whose bodies were never found, judicial sources reported.

The peasants were from the town of Liquiñe and worked at a local timber complex. The appeals court rejected an appeal filed by Guerra Jorquera to invalidate the sentence imposed by Judge Alejandro Solís in January 2006, which is currently the harshest sentence handed down for human rights violations.

The retired Army colonel was also ordered to pay 250 million pesos (about 480,000 dollars) in compensation, by virtue of a civil lawsuit filed against him by five relatives of the victims. According to the Rettig Report, which documented human rights violations during the regime of the late dictator Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990), the agricultural workers were detained in a joint operation by the Carabineros police from the Liquiñe station, Army personnel, and civilians.

The peasants were taken to the Villarrica bridge, over the Toltén River, where they were executed and their bodies were never found. Among the executed are the brothers Modesto, Ernesto, and Alberto Reinante Raipán, all three workers and members of the Panguipulli timber complex union.

The plaintiff lawyer, Nelson Caucoto, celebrated the ruling because, as he said, it confirms the crimes and establishes exemplary punishments against the accused.

Source: August 3, 2007, El Mostrador Date: 08-03-2007

Artists forcibly disappeared and executed by the civil-military dictatorship. They deprived us of their creativity

September 11 marked the beginning of the most painful stage we have ever lived, caused by State agents and complicit civilians. Today we commemorate 47 years of that tragedy that still mourns all of Chile.

More than three thousand people—men, women, children, and young people such as primary, secondary, and university students; pregnant women, the elderly, the blind, the disabled—were directly affected, and hundreds of thousands joined the category of relatives and victims of the dictatorship.

Those who survive fight tirelessly for justice, reparation, and non-repetition of genocidal acts by the State. Men and women whose contribution to society came from their social struggle, as militants, and also from their trades and occupations as shoemakers, laborers, textile employees, doctors, linotypists, dressmakers, secretaries, union and neighborhood leaders, municipal officials, public employees, railway employees, newspaper vendors, carpenters; peasant workers, miners, forestry workers, construction workers; engineers.

Also those who were passing through, on a mission, studying, or had started a family in Chile, coming from Vietnam, France, Spain, Bolivia, Argentina, Uruguay, England, Ecuador, among other countries. Some of their murderers and accomplices who are serving lukewarm sentences in luxury prisons have deprived us of them, but they have also deprived us of nearly a hundred artists and creators whom we have identified, with the desire to offer a tribute to those who, from the cultures, arts, and heritage, were victims of state terrorism.

We have recognized 84 people whose creativity was expressed in audiovisuals, crafts, theater, architecture, photography, Visual Arts, literature, and music. In this note, you will be able to find the names of the people whose information allows them to be associated with an artistic language, according to the available information; however, it is highly possible that many more remain to be identified.

You will also find a link to the information that, among all the people who make the site www.memoriaviva.com possible, is made available to us so that we can contribute to not forgetting until there is justice. For them… No forgiveness, no forgetting!! Among all of them is Mr. Mauricio Segundo Curiñanco Reyes, carpenter, forcibly disappeared in Liquiñe, 10/10/1973.

Source: ofucap.org 9/11/2020 Date: 09-11-2020

Judge Solís handed down the highest penalty to date in human rights cases

The magistrate sentenced a retired Army lieutenant colonel to 18 years of maximum-grade imprisonment for the qualified kidnapping of 11 peasants in Liquiñe. Minister Alejandro Solís handed down this Thursday the highest penalty known for a case linked to human rights violations during the military regime headed by General (R) Augusto Pinochet.

The magistrate sentenced retired Lieutenant Colonel Hugo Alberto Guerra Jorquera to 18 years of maximum-grade imprisonment as the perpetrator of repeated crimes of qualified kidnapping in the so-called "Liquiñe episode." The ruling is based on the repression suffered starting on October 10, 1973, by a group of 11 peasants who sympathized with the Popular Unity (UP) in the foothills sector of the Tenth Region of Los Lagos.

Among the victims are Salvador Álamos Rubilar, José Héctor Bórquez Levican, Daniel Antonio Castro López, Carlos Alberto Cayuman Cayuman, Mauricio Segundo Curiñanco Reyes, Carlos Figueroa Zapata, Isaías José Fuentealba Calderón, Luis Armando Lagos Torres, Ernesto Juan Reinante Raipan, Modesto Juan Reinante Raipan, and Luis Alfredo Rivera Catricheo.

The retired Army officer was also ordered to pay a total sum of $250 million as compensation, by virtue of a civil lawsuit filed against him by five relatives of the victims. The beneficiaries, with $50 million each, will be Miguel Ángel and Isaías Julián Fuentealba Lagos, as well as Héctor Hernán, Hugo Raúl, and Didier Antonio Figueroa Arraigada.

Additionally, the owner of the Liquiñe Hot Springs, a civilian identified as Luis Osvaldo García Guzmán, was convicted, who in his capacity as the perpetrator of the qualified kidnapping of Luis Armando Lagos Torres received a sentence of five years and one day.

Source: January 26, 2006, El Mostrador Date: 01-26-2006

Individual involved in Liquiñe case prosecuted

The investigating judge, Juan Guzmán Tapia, resolved tonight to prosecute Luis Osvaldo García Tapia as the perpetrator of qualified kidnapping in the case of Luis Armando Lagos Torres, 50 years old—a worker at the Panguipulli timber complex—a socialist militant detained in Curranco in 1973.

Luis Lagos was detained in 1973 along with 15 other people in the south, in the so-called "Caravanita Chica," in the Ninth Region.

The 16 disappeared

Salvador Alamos Rubilar José Héctor Bórquez Livican Daniel Antonio Castro López Carlos Alberto Callumán Callumán Mauricio Segundo Curiñaco Reyes Carlos Figueroa Zapata Isaías José Fuentealba Calderón Luis Armando Lagos Torres Alberto Segundo Reinante Raipán Ernesto Juan Reinante Raipán Modesto Reinante Raipán Luis Rivera Catricheo Alejandro Antonio Tracanao Pincheira José Miguel Tracanao Pincheira Eliseo Maximiliano Tracanao Valenzuela Bernarda Rosalba Vera Contardo

Source: El Mostrador – May 23, 2001 Date: 05-23-2001

"FAR FROM THE NOISE" BY NELSON PAREDES (POETIC SELECTION)

The other half At the table the editor prunes my text just as a minute ago he was chopping the grilled chicken. The television shows the interview of the granddaughter of a disappeared person The only memory the family keeps of him is a photograph that the soldiers tore in which half of his face remained.

I finish eating and drink my glass of wine I think about the crossed-out poem and the images on the screen The editor smiles and wipes his hands with the napkin He is part of this history to which I add the name of a carpenter that I will not allow to be erased: Mauricio Curiñanco Reyes This poem invokes him This poem is his light The other half of the face.

Source: revistaelipsis.org 6/30/2022 Date: 06-30-2022