Chilean unionist, 2 others found dead

Press, 1 April 1985, Page 6

Chilean unionist, 2 others found dead

NZPA-Reuter Santiago

The bodies of three kidnapped men, one an antiGovernment unionist and another a human rights worker, have been found with their throats slit in a ditch on the outskirts of Santiago, the Government said.

An official communique named the men as Manuel Guerrero, aged 36, leader of a teachers’ union opposed to the military Government, Jose Parada, aged 39, a member of a church human rights organisation, and Santiago Nattino, aged 64, a draftsman.

Guerrero, regional president of the Professional Association of Teachers, and Parada were abducted on Friday morning by armed civilians as they talked outside Guerrero’s school.

Another teacher, Leopoldo Munoz, was shot in the stomach when he tried to intervene.

The Government statement did not say when Nattino was abducted, but relatives said he disappeared on Thursday afternoon from a street in a exclusive Santiago suburb. That evening the offices of the teachers’ union, where Nattino once rented a room, were raided by civilians who took away four union officials. The four were released on Friday saying they had been blindfolded, beaten and questioned by their captors.

Farmworkers who found the three bodies near Santiago’s international airport said they showed signs of having been badly beaten and their throats were slashed.

The Archbishop of Santiago, Juan Francisco Fresno, who is responsible for the Vicaria of Solidarity where Parada worked condemned the killings and called for an investigation.

Archbishop Fresno issued another plea for an end to violence after a week in which five other people died violently. The Government said that a woman was killed when she resisted a police raid on a house where large quantities of weapons were found. Two brothers, aged 17 and 20, described as common criminals, were killed in another police raid in which a policeman was wounded. Their parents who work at the Vicaria said the brothers were active in social organisations. Two security agents were killed by a bomb in the southern city of Concepcion. The national president of the teachers’ union, Mr Jorge Pavez, called for a protest strike by teachers and students and said the Government was responsible for the deaths of the three men because it had been unable to protect them.