Will Liley’s letter was profoundly disturbing. While I worked with Amnesty International, I met many Chilean refugees seeking asylum. It is well documented – the human rights abuses under the Pinochet regime.
The terrible trauma of people I met still haunts me today. Women and men tied to steel- framed beds and tortured with electricity. The beatings leaving people with lifetime disabilities.
The psychological trauma lives on, as well as the physical scars. The shocking massacre of hundreds in the Santiago stadium. Stealing the babies from young mothers and giving them to Pinochet supporters then ‘disappearing the mothers’. Even today the grandmothers meet every Thursday at the Plaza de Maya demanding to know what happened to their children and grandchildren.
In supporting Pinochet’s regime, Liley defends the indefensible. We need to remember these shocking events to alert society to what human beings are capable of and to recognise the atrocities inflicted on the Chilean people. Their crime was to have a different political view of the world. Shame on you Liley.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
