There followed a brutal dictatorship, headed by General Pinochet , which tortured, executed and ‘disappeared’ thousands of civilians, forcing many more to be exiled. Yorkshire and Humberside received approximately 400 Chilean refugees during that time.
As Sarah Cundy wrote in the Manchester Historian: “The 1973 US-backed coup d’état carried out by the Chilean military against the democratic socialist government of Salvador Allende was characterised by widespread human rights violations and economic turmoil.
In the immediate aftermath of the coup, thousands of activists and trade unionists faced torture and execution. Meanwhile the implementation of a neoliberal economic “shock treatment” effected a rise in unemployment, food shortages, and the privatisation of utilities which left thousands without water or electricity.”
Chile provided the ‘perfect laboratory’ for this economic programme now known as ’neoliberalism’ and it was later adopted by governments internationally.
On Sat 9th September, the Chilean Solidarity Network in Sheffield will be assembling to mark the 50th anniversary of the coup that changed the lives of the Chilean people and also to mark the economic policies that were first used, which have since come to define the modern world.
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