RIGHTS-CHILE: New Book Stirs Up Conflict Over ‘Disappeared’

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Gustavo González

SANTIAGO, Jul 12 2000 (IPS) - A book on the case of the daughter of victims of Chile’s 1973-90 dictatorship, who was adopted by a right-wing family, has once again highlighted the conflict between the search for the truth and the various forms of censorship that invoke the right to privacy as well as political reasons.

The launch of “Difícil envoltorio” (roughly Difficult Package) by Mónica Echeverría was slated for Monday evening. But the Editorial Sudamericana publishing house suspended the event on the request of Tamara Callejas Leiva, the book’s protagonist.

Callejas Leiva accused Echeverría of breaking a promise not to mention her name in the book, and threatened to take legal action against the publishers.

However, “Difícil envoltorio” had already hit the shelves last Friday. And the commotion surrounding the cancelled book presentation only heightened the public’s interest, which mean that by Tuesday, the first edition of 5,000 copies was sold out.

Echeverría said there had been no commitment to keep Tamara’s identity in reserve. She attributed the young woman’s reaction to “insecurity and fear” caused by the high-profile treatment the book received even prior to its official release. But she did not rule out the possibility that Tamara had come under some kind of pressure.

Callejas Leiva, a 26-year-old student of journalism, says she asked that her name be withheld to protect her adoptive parents. She insists that she only agreed to the book mentioning the names of her biological parents, both of whom fell victim to General Augusto Pinochet’s de facto regime shortly after the Sep 11, 1973 coup that overthrew socialist president Salvador Allende.

Tamara’s father, Javier Pacheco Monsalve, was killed by firing squad on the outskirts of Santiago on Oct 7, 1973. Her mother María Isabel Beltrán was taken into custody in Linares, 300 kms south of the capital, on Dec 18 that year, and has been missing ever since.

Pacheco and Beltrán were militants in the Revolutionary Left Movement (MIR).

After her mother’s arrest, Tamara, just a few months old, was left with her grandmother, who put her in the care of her godmother. Her godmother in turn gave her in adoption to a childless couple, the Callejas-Leiva’s, in 1977, telling them the girl’s parents had died in an accident.

The conservative middle-class couple did not tell Tamara that she was adopted. The girl only found out who her biological parents were in 1998, through a friend who was doing research on detained-disappeared victims of the dictatorship.

Tamara fell into a deep depression and approached Echeverría, who put her in contact with psychiatrist Paz Rojas, with the Committee of Defence of the Rights of the People (CODEPU), a non- governmental organisation that assists victims of the repression.

Tamara agreed, meanwhile, to narrate her story to Echeverría, a professor of literature who has written a number of books, including “Antihistoria de un luchador” (Anti-History of a Fighter), the biography of trade unionist Clotario Blest, and “Crónicas vedadas” (Forbidden Chronicles), a compilation of reports of incidents dating back to the de facto regime.

In the form of a novel, “Difícil envoltorio” reconstructs the life of Tamara, the stories of her biological parents and her search for the truth about the disappearance of her mother, undertaken with the support of CODEPU and Echeverría herself.

A week ago, the magazine ‘Rocinante’ exclusively released a chapter of the book that tells of Tamara’s meeting with the police director of investigations, who in 1973 took charge of political prisoners in the Linares Artillery regiment, the last place the girl’s mother was seen alive.

Although the book does not mention his name, the allusion to the current director of investigations, Hernán Mery, is obvious — which raised the possibility that Tamara may have received pressure from that police division to discredit the book.

Allegations of the role he played in the de facto regime are not new to Mery. A 1992 CODEPU report on the repression in the region of Maule, where Linares is located, stated that in 1973, Mery had 42 detainees in his charge in the regiment, 37 of whom disappeared.

The police, including Mery, declined to comment on such reports.

There was also talk that among official circles, the book was seen as “inconvenient” for the human rights agreement signed Jun 13 with the armed forces, which guarantees that the identity of anyone who provides information shedding light on the whereabouts of the remains of some 1,200 victims of forced disappearance will be kept in reserve.

But Echeverría ruled out the possibility that the centre-left coalition government of socialist President Ricardo Lagos took part in blocking the official presentation of her book due to political reasons.

On the contrary, she said, “Tamara’s story is very important for sensitising those who have information on the detained- disappeared.”

For that reason, she added, “the book is very important at this point in time. Becoming familiar with these stories is the only way to complete the transition” to democracy.

Journalist and anthropologist Loreto Rebolledo, coordinator of the Freedom of Expression Programme at the University of Chile’s School of Journalism, told IPS that books like “Difícil envoltorio” contributed to “clarifying the (pending cases of) human rights violations.”

Such works also help us “look at the future from another angle, gathering together scattered memories to make them part of a collective memory,” said Rebolledo.

In her view, the diametrically opposed versions of Echeverría and Callejas Leiva regarding the question of the revelation of the latter’s real identity made it impossible to determine whether there was any pressure aimed at restricting freedom of expression.

“What is lacking is information on the conditions and terms in which the author and the protagonist agreed on writing the book,” said Rebolledo. “The young woman had a legitimate right to ask for her name to be kept in reserve if whe wanted to protect her adoptive parents, but we don’t know if she actually did so.

“When someone decides to tell their life story, to talk about how they were left an orphan, about their adoption, what it means to know your parents were killed, enormous pain is involved. And although it is part of a collective history, it is focusing on one person in particular,” she explained.

“The question has more to do with morals and ethics than about freedom of expression,” said Rebolledo.

Arturo Infante, the director of Editorial Sudamericana, said a second edition of the book was already in the making, and that it would not be pulled off the shelves unless the courts issued an injunction to do so.

But he added that the publishing house would not be opposed to the name of the central character being changed in the second edition.

Amidst the debate over “Difícil envoltorio”, lawyer Jean Pierre Matus and the publishing editor of Editorial Planeta, Carlos Orellana, asked the Santiago appeals court Tuesday to overturn the ruling that banned “El libro negro de la justicia chilena” (The Black Book of Chilean Justice) 13 months ago.

The book, written by journalist Alejandra Matus, was banned on the basis of a libel lawsuit filed by former Supreme Court president Servando Jordán, who invoked the Law of State Security.

The author fled Chile to avoid arrest, and is living in the United States, which granted her political refugee status.