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THE GUARDIAN
April 2023

Chile takes on ‘moral duty’ of finding the disappeared of Pinochet regime


As the 50th anniversary of Augusto Pinochet’s bloody coup nears, Chile’s government launches a new plan to find and identify those who went missing
usana Barra’s home in a quiet suburb of Santiago, Chile, is only a few miles from the site of the former notorious Simón Bolívar death camp, which was operated by the secret police during the Pinochet dictatorship. Susana was eight years old when her 23-year-old sister, Jenny, was taken there in 1977, never to be seen again.

“No one left alive,” said Susana Barra, who wears a grainy, black and white picture of Jenny pinned to her chest – a symbolic gesture adopted by families still searching for relatives who disappeared during the Pinochet dictatorship.

Susana Barra looking at the government proposal. Photograph: Charis McGowan/The Guardian

This September will mark the 50th anniversary of Augusto Pinochet’s bloody coup which overthrew Chile’s democratically elected government. During the 17-year regime which followed, an estimated 40.000 people were tortured, and more than 3,000 killed. Only 310 of the forcibly disappeared have been identified and estimates for those still missing range from 1109 to 1469.



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 Hi, I'm Charis McGowan, a British-Caribbean writer based between London, UK, and Santiago, Chile.

I’ve been a regular news stringer in Chile for over eight years, contributing to outlets including The Guardian, Al Jazeera, the BBC, The Telegraph, and more. My work primarily focuses on human rights and social justice. Additionally, I am the former Music Editor-at-Large at gal-dem, where I wrote extensively about music and culture with a focus on Latin America and the Caribbean.

I’m open to commissions, collaborations, talks, and projects.
 
Please get in touch via the form. 

Or email me at: charismcgowan at gmail.com