Thousands of people on Sunday took part in a march to the Chilean capital's largest cemetery to pay tribute to the victims of the brutal far-right dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet, three days before the 46th anniversary of the coup that overthrew the democratically-elected government of Salvador Allende on Sept. 11, 1973.
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The protesters began their march from Los Heroes Square and then crossed the Palacio de La Moneda – which was bombed by Pinochet's air force during the coup d'etat – before heading to the General Cemetery.
Other banners featured slogans such as "I do not forget, I demand justice," "Where are they?" and "Yesterday's impunity is the cause of today's injustices," as well as messages related to the search for truth and justice.
Small clusters of protesters and the police clashed around the final stretch of the march, when protesters arrived at the General Cemetery, in Santiago's Recoleta neighborhood. No injured was reported, but anti-riot officers, who threw tear gas and jets of water at protesters, arrested at least a dozen people.Recoleta Mayor Daniel Jadue, a member of the Communist Party, participated in the first stretch of the march and underlined the importance of combating the denialism of the dictatorship.
Pinochet's name has garnered unexpected attention of late due to controversial statements by Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who praised the Chilean dictator in a harsh verbal attack on former President Michelle Bachelet, who is currently the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.
"Mrs Michelle Bachelet, if the people led by Pinochet had not defeated the left of 1973, including your father, today Chile would look like Cuba,” Bolsonaro said in response to a UN report critical of the human rights situation and police violence in Brazil.
Bolsonaro's words put the government of Sebastian Piñera – who has cordial relations with his Brazilian counterpart – in a diplomatic bind, forcing him to express his disagreement in public.
Piñera said that he was not on the same page as Bolsonaro on the remarks about Bachelet, especially on a subject as painful as the death of her father, an Air Force general who opposed the coup and who died in a prison in Santiago in 1974 after being savagely tortured.
The right-wing Chilean president, however, avoided explicitly condemning Bolsonaro's allusion to Pinochet and his reaction was criticized by the opposition, who considered it too.