Terror Under the Junta

On May 3, Guillermo Hernan Herrera Manriquez was arrested by DINA, Chile's dread secret police, near Santiago's central railroad station. Herrera was detained briefly and then was taken to his father's home; along with the rest of his family, he was placed under house arrest. The next day Herrera was allowed to speak to his wife, who reported that he had been badly beaten and his ears, mouth and genitals subjected to electric shock. Herrera was permitted no medical attention by his DINA guards. Two days later, his father heard noises from the room where his son was being held. Bursting in, he saw his son vomiting blood. Moments later he died. The DINA agents removed the body and tried to erase the traces of the crime. Later Herrera's corpse showed up in the morgue; there was no record of who had brought it there.

The Herrera incident, which a Santiago lawyer active in human rights cases swears is true, symbolizes a grim fact about life in Chile today: the torture stories that were the hallmark of the military junta's first year still continue. True, midnight arrests and unexplained detentions are rarer now than immediately after the coup, and summary shootings have stopped, but terror has become institutionalized. It operates in the hands of DINA, which has an estimated membership of 1,000 and is responsible only to Military Strongman Augusto Pinochet Ugarte. DINA (Direccion de Informaciones Nacional) maintains centers for interrogation where dozens of suspects are brutally tortured as a matter of routine. Says a senior foreign diplomat in Santiago: "With the single exception of detainees released [meaning those interrogated and exiled], I defy you to find any tangible improvement in human rights."

Recent Victims. Last month, with considerable fanfare, General Pinochet signed a new decree requiring police officials to notify a prisoner's family within 48 hours of his detention and, more important, prohibiting "illegal pressure on detainees," meaning torture. But in one two-week period since the decree, according to legal sources, about 30 people were seized by the police; 19 of them have not been seen since. Among the recent victims is a socialist named Sergio Zamora Torres. Seized and tortured for six hours, Zamora eventually managed to get the protection of Raul Cardinal Silva Henriquez, head of Chile's increasingly oppositionist Roman Catholic Church. Zamora was examined by Silva's doctor and found to show burns on his arms, legs, genitals and nose, plus evidence of beating. With the help of the cardinal, he was able to get a safe-conduct pass out of the country, but at last word he was still in Santiago.

Despite continued repression, there has been a cautious but discernible rise in public criticism of the junta. The main target of the complaints has been the regime's economic policies, which thus far have failed to curb the country's astronomical inflation, now rocketing at the rate of 1% each day, or its 15% unemployment rate.

Most Chileans recognize that the junta did not cause the country's economic problems; indeed, when the military overthrew Marxist President Salvador Allende Gossens in 1973, inflation was running at a rate of 800% annually. But even right-wingers who ardently supported the 1973 coup have now begun to speak out about the "social cost" of the government's approach to the economy. Under Finance Minister Jorge Cauas, the government is resorting to economic "shock treatment"--15% to 25% reductions in government spending and attempts to hold the money supply down. Basically, the government's economic planners want to return to an unrestricted free-market economy with none of the bloated employment lists, subsidies or price controls of the Allende regime. The problem is that this recessionary program is likely to push unemployment up to 20% in the coming months.

The most influential figure to criticize the junta so far is former Christian Democratic President Eduardo Frei. In a recent interview published by the Santiago newsweekly Ercilla, Frei complained that the junta's rejection of any sort of economic controls would only lead to monopoly. "This is what is actually happening: a greater concentration of power and wealth."

Frei and other critics have been careful to limit their statements to the economy, but they contain an implicit political criticism as well. Indeed, secret-police repression has discouraged many foreign governments from helping Chile overcome its economic plight.

The country's economic difficulties become ever more obvious as Chile enters the South American winter. Hunger is settling into the shantytowns around Santiago as the poor find it increasingly difficult to buy food. Workers' salaries, often only $25 to $30 a month, have not kept pace with prices, which rose 94% in the first four months of this year. The fall in international copper prices has badly hurt Chile's major export commodity, forcing the government, in conjunction with other copper-producing nations, to lower production by 15%.

As yet, nobody thinks that the junta's hold on the country is threatened by the discontent. The junta leaders--who self-righteously claim that criticism is the work of Communists--may not be aware of the rising doubts about their performance. Yet a sense of unease on the part of many Chileans is unmistakable. If the police terror and economic deterioration are not reversed, many more will blame Pinochet and the junta--not the damage wrought by Allende--for the country's hardships.

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