HELSINKI — Her name is
Joan Turner. She is the widow
of the poet and singer of the
Chilean revolution, Victor Jara,
a Communist-and one of the
best-known popular figures in
Chile.

She was-one of the witnesses
at. the Helsinki International
Commission investigating the
crimes of the Chilean junta.
Soviet journalists Genrikh Bo-
rovik and Karen Khathaturov,
who met her there, tell of Joan’s
horror story in the terrible days
following the coup:

An exhibition on the subject,
“Prevent Civil War’, was to be
opened at the Santiago Techni-
cal University the morning of
Sept. 11. Salvador Allende was
to attend the ceremony, and Vic-
tor was to sing his songs there.

On hearing the first news of
the coup, Jara did not yet under-
stand how serious it was. He
made up his mind to go to the
university just the same. Victor
kissed his wife and two daugh-
ters and, taking his guitar, went
away.

Joan thought that her husband
would not get to the university,
that he would be stopped by sol-
diers. But he did get there. She
learned about this from him.
Victor phoned home at four
o’clock and said that he was in
the university and everything
was all right but he could not
return home that day because of
the curfew. Victor said he loved
her and told her to stand firm.

Victor Jara did not tell his
wife that the university was
already surrounded by junta
troops and that soldiers shot at

everyone who tried to go out of
the building. .

It was the last time Joan talk-
ed with her husband. _

Taken to Stadium

She and her daughters lis-
tened to the radio. She phoned
her friends and acquaintances,
trying to find out where her hus-
band was. Next day they heard
on the radio that troops occu-
pied the university and “neu-
tralized a large group of extre-
mists”. The word “neutralize”
could mean arrest or kill. The
evening of Sept. 13 a woman
phoned Joan Turner to say that
Victor had been arrested and

taken to the stadium. The
woman immediately hung up.

Joan rushed to the British em-
bassy, asking them to help her.
She was politely told that the
embassy was ready to help her
as a British subject but that
nothing could be done for her
husband.

On September 18 Joan Turner
was visited by someone whose
name she could not reveal. The
man; who worked in the muni-
cipal office in charge of death
registrations, said that her hus-
band was dead and had been
lying for three days in the cen-
tral. morgue of Santiago. Thanks
to her friend’s help, she was let
into the morgue.

At first she went into a room
on the ground floor which was
full of corpses, all riddled with
bullet wounds. Many of their
hands were still tied behind their
backs. The corpses lay in dis-
order, one on top another.

Joan did not find her husband
on the ground floor. She was
allowed to go up to the first
floor. The staircase was heaped

~ up with corpses and she walked

carefully, trying not to step on
them. On the first floor corpses
lay in the halls and rooms, along

SAT
agit}

SOLIDARITY

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, APRIL 5, 1974—PAGE 6

with the typewriters standing
on the office desks.
Hands Smashed

At last Joan found her hus-
band. His face was _ blood-

stained; a deep knife wound ran >

across his cheek, his feet were
tied. His breast was riddled with
bullets. Victor Jara was killed
by a submachine gun. There was
a large wound in his right side,
while his hands had _ been
smashed by something heavy —
either a hammer or rifle butt. A
number and a notice stuck to his
breast with adhesive tape said
that the “unidentified body was
found in a street in the Rinco
district” (a poor area of San-
tiago).

Joan Turner filled in some.
papers and received the corpse
of her husband. At four o’clock
the-same day she buried Victor
Jara. in the cemetery near the

morgue and‘told her daughters .

of their father’s death only in
the evening.

Much later she learned from
the people who were at the sta-
dium how Victor died. He was
tortured, but not for the sake of
wringing any information from
him. What, information could a
poet and singer have? Victor
Jara was tortured because the
junta hated his songs and feared
that the poet would die without
betraying his ideals.

Had to be Killed

An officer demanded that the
poet shout: “Long, live the
junta!”, but, instead, Victor Jara
began to sing his song of the
revolution. His hands were
smashed so that he understood
he would not be able to hold a
guitar even if he remained alive.
Blood-stained, with his hands
smashed, he sang, and all who
were around him took up the
song.

Victor Jara was killed in the
National Stadium. His body was
then taken to the Rinco district
and thrown onto the street, as
a pretext so the junta could say
that Jara was killed by soldiers
-whom he attacked with a sub--
machine gun. The same was
done to many of those killed in
the stadium.

To all appearances, propa-

. ganda has not yet been coordi-

nated properly by the junta. One
of the generals recently ex-
plained the killing of Victor Jara
and other poets in this way: “It
was necessary to stop their
songs. For this purpose some of
‘them had to be killed.” If you
don’t like the song, kill the
singer. .

The death of Victor Jara — where wal

HELSINKI — A month after
the murder of Victor Jara, his
wife, Joan Turner, returned to
Britain (where she was born)
with her two daughters, aged 9
and 13.

Not very many people in
Britain know about Victor Jara
and how he was murdered. And
during the last few months, less
and less has been said in the
press about anything at all in
Chile.

Soviet reporters at the Hel-
sinki International Commission
investigating the crimes of the
Chilean military junta tell the
following story:

_ After Joan Turner finished
testifying, a British member of
the Commission came up to her.
He is Arthur Boot, a member of

- the singer’s death.

World Dis 4

the Society of Friends (Quik:
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Mr. Boot said that i
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“But didn’t you know ab
before?”’, she asked.

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“No”, Mr. Boot replied, ™
ing a helpless gesture.
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Many participants in the Com
mission, Soviet journalists xh
rikh Borovik and Karen sof:
chaturian went on
during the breaks that very oat
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By JAMES LEECH

The Canadian Government will
spend $2,250,000,000 of the tax-
payers’ money this year on de-
fence. Few Canadians will ever
know where the money went.

On the other hand, the ordi-
nary wage-earning Canadians
who finance the activities of
World Disarmament Week
(April 2-28) in this country will
do so to promote a change of
course for Canada, to make Ca-
nada a leader in disarmament,
not the arms race.

At a time when detente and
peaceful co-existence are mak-
ing progress, Defence Minister
James Richardson, and the Tru-
deau Government, raised this
year’s “defence” budget by
$150,000,000 over 1973.

Next year, and every year
from now till 1978, it will jump
another 7%. After that we’ll be
handing over more than 3-bil-
lion each and every year for “de-
fence”. A lot of money. Most of
it goes to multi-national cor-
porations and their subsidiaries
who are in the lucrative “de-
fence” business for the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization
and other Pentagon-directed ar-

hoards: keep ae WO +
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the Canadian Pe igh
are seen as 4 lava
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This country is 09
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Could Set an Example

and peaceful development, is left
unsaid, these mammoth weapons

During the sessions of the In is
ment Lorraine Schneider, artist, creator of the wer i
logo presents a banner in Russian to Professor
‘USSR Academy of Sciences.

the Charter, 1? gift
its work, it od che

What this treasure chest J Duncan WO nittel jing
would buy in terms of health, cial NGO- ce pe 8 ing
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