Chile: the balanced view : a recopilation of articles about the Allende years and after

gentlemen. Mr. Chairman, Messrs. Representatives, the difference in numbers finds an explanation in other reasons that I shall presently disclose to you. . In the meantime, I submit to the session the original cargo manífests. On November 10, 1971, Fidel Castro arrived in Chile on a 1O-day visit, but he remai ned there for 23 days. As shown yesterday by the Ambassador of Uruguay, Castro took advan– tage of his visit to Chile to contact leaders and couriers of the so-called "revolutionary armies" of Uruguay and Argentina. In Argentina, the armed executors of the LASO ideals are known as the "Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo", ERP, and during the past years they have carriedout countless murders, kidnappings, and assaults. In August 1972, 23 dangerous members of that "Ejército Revoluciopario del Pueblo" escaped from the ¡ail at Rawson, in southern Argentina, causing the death of a policeman and wounding several others. Ten of these fugitives managed to highjack a commercial plane ordering the pilot to proceed to Puerto Montt, in southern Chile. This originated an international process that came close to rupturing the relations that happily existed and have always existed between the governments of Chile and Argentina. The revolutionary curriculum of the ten fugitives who arrived in Chile is categorical. In order not to tire the Council with details ofthe biographical delinquency particulars of the group, I shall confine myself to one of them, who has once again headed violent action in Argentina, at the cost of fives and destruction. Mario Roberto Santucho, a native of Tucumán, 30 years old at the time of his escape, considered as the key figure in the clandestine structure of the "Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo" (ERP), ideolQgist and organizer of the movement. He studied at the School of Economic Sciences of the National University in Tucumán, obtaining his accountancy degree in the same class with manyother Marxist leaders ofthe ERP. Atthe beginning ofthe movement, Santucho fel! in the hands of the police and was remitted to the Villa Urquiza penitentiary. He obtained transfer to the Padilla Hospital, from where he escaped with outside support, and went undercover. He subsequently reappeared in Rosario, where he was arrested and from where he also managed to escape. In 1971 he was picked up in the city of Córdoba. He was in possession of forged documents, so only after the clandestine movement itselfdenounced his arrest was he identified after several days. He was taken to the Devoto penitentiary in Buenos Aires, and subsequently to the Rawson jail, fer security reasons. Dr. Allende's government was informed by its official agents in Buenos Aires on the danger of the ten escapees, particularly Santucho's pointing out that "the importance ofthe kidnappers is significant" (verbatim phrase). According to the communication of the Chilean Reprssentation in Buenos Aires, they are the most important members of the Argentine extremist movement. This information sent by his representative in Buenos Aires was in possession of pro Allende, when the highjacked plane landed at Santiago's interna– tional airport. In the meantime, he had received a personal call from the President of Argentina, informing him of the dangerous naiure of thé escapees and requesting neces– sary security while the extradition request was made official. Dr. Allende assured the President of Argentina that the group would be left "in the hands of Chilean justice". In a few hours, the flame of the so-called "continental solidarity" ignited all over the continent, under orchestration by the local LASO official or undercover agencies. The story is too well known. After evading the issue for several days, Allende successively retained, granted política! asyl um to, and later sent the group often members ofthe Argentina branch ofthe LASO sUbsidiary "subversive army" in that country in aplane of the Compañía Cubana de Aviación that traveled especially to rescue them. . The circle was closed in an incredible manner. Back in Cuba once again, from where they had started and where they had received their original training, the ten revolutionaries improved their techniques and, conven ienHy prepared, have returned undercover to Argen– tina once again. The permanent and extensive falsification of documents, so expEútly practiced by the LASO agents, allowed these criminals to return along the same way they used to escape. 99