.jpg)
.png)
Row on Pinochet erupts in Chile
A political row breaks out in Chile because the centre-right government changes the way school textbooks refer to the military rule of Augusto Pinochet.
On 11 September 1973, Augusto Pinochet led a coup that removed President Salvador Allende and established a military dictatorship which lasted from 1974 to 1990.
From now on, Chilean schoolchildren will be thought that Pinochet's reign was a "regime", and not a "dictatorship".
Left-wing opposition parties have accused officials of trying to whitewash history. Government however says the decision to use what it calls a more general term is not politically motivated.
The controversial decision was taken by Chile's National Education Council.
Education Minister Harald Beyer who was only appointed last week, defended the decision, but said the government had not been directly involved.
He said the decision to change the term is in line with the terms used in other countries. However the new Minister admitted that he personally recognises that Pinochet led a dictatorial government.
The change to the school curriculum has provoked outrage among left-wing opposition parties. Senator Isabel Allende, said this move "unacceptable". Allende's father, Salvador was President and was later overthrown and died in the 1973 coup led by Pinochet
Allende said "it goes against all common sense, because the whole world knows that for 17 years what we had in Chile was a ferocious dictatorship with the most serious violations of human rights".
More than 3,000 Chileans disappeared or were killed by the armed forces during Pinochet's rule, which lasted 17 years.
Many thousands more were tortured or illegally detained, and the legacy of his reign is still bitterly disputed.
John Mifsud •
Pinochet saved Chile from going the way of Cuba.
He left a strong economy, negligible foreign debt, and a nation with a Western European standard of living. It is thanks to him and the Chilean and foreign advisers he consulted that this was achieved. The country was saved the defaults, currency collapses and misery which characterised practically all Latin American countries in this period.
Most important, he left office peacefully when the people voted him out in a free and fair referendum. Fat chance of Raul Castro doing likewise!
•
As it always happens with right wing politicians, they write history as it suits them, same thing in Malta when they keep repaeting that Malta was under a dictaorship in the 80s, ad nauseum.
