Minister of Foreign Affairs participates in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of coup d'état and leads heritage tour with international guests
The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Alberto van Klaveren, participated in the central commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Chilean coup d'état, which took place in the Plaza de la Constitución.
The ceremony was led by the President of the Republic, Gabriel Boric, and was attended by more than 3,000 people, including victims' relatives, human rights associations, and national and international authorities.
"It is an act of great international importance. The truth is that the international community, to this day, remembers what was the breakdown of democracy in Chile. Chile was always an example of democratic behavior, and for this very reason, this rupture had a very strong effect," said the Minister after the ceremony.
"What we are talking about now is a projection for the future, to prevent something as terrible as what happened to us in 1973 from ever happening again, neither in Chile nor in Latin America, nor in any part of the world", added the Secretary of State.
Prior to the event, the Minister led a heritage tour for a group of international guests, which included foreign ministers, ministers and artists. He walked them through some significant places in La Moneda Palace, such as the Ministry of the Interior and Morandé 80, the door used by the presidents to enter the Government House before the coup d'état and from where the remains of President Salvador Allende were removed. There, they observed a memorial installed in honor of the former president, his assistants and La Moneda officials who died on September 11th and the shoes worn by the former Head of State on that day.
The event ended with a ceremony at the Palacio de La Moneda with the participation of pianist Maria Paz Santibáñez, who was shot during the dictatorship, a representative of the Vicaria de la Solidaridad, and the group Illapu together with the Agrupación de Familiares de Detenidos Desaparecidos and the Agrupación de Familiares de Ejecutados Políticos.
