“BRITISH COLUMBIA \ WORLD

Consul confronted
on Chile terror

Four angry Chilean exiles confronted
Chile’s consul-general in Vancouver March
27 and accused him of spying on members
of the Chilean community opposed to the
dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet.

In a morning meeting with Consul-
General Joaquin Grubner, the four —
Marcos Uribe, Maria Rojas, Miguel
Chacon and Rosa Chacon — said remarks
by the official quoted in The Vancouver
Sun reveal he is sending information to
Chile’s ruling junta on the activities and
names of exiles in Vancouver.

Grubner, who said he was just sending
press clippings to his government, was also
presented with a letter protesting his activi-
ties and demanding an end to torture and
confinement of some 450 political prison-
ers in Chile’s jails.

The four — three of who are named on
a special list the junta provides to its
embassies and consulates advising which
individuals are not allowed to return to
Chile — entered the downtown office of
the consulate unannounced, at 10:30 a.m.
Friday.

Informed that Grubner, whose office
has been the target of numerous demon-
strations against the junta, was out, the
four stated they would wait until the
consul-general returned.

Between that period and the time of
Grubner’s arrival at approximately 11:30
a.m., an RCMP officer — who had been
in the offices and had departed earlier —
entered and conferred in.a private office
with consular staff.

Shortly after the arrival of the officer,
the outer door of the consulate was locked
and reporters from several broadcast and
print media were barred from entering.

The RCMP officer was later joined by
building security staff, who stayed until
the meeting between Grubner and the Chi-
leans — with a Tribune reporter present
— concluded.

During the hour-long meeting, con-
ducted partly in English and partly in
Spanish, Grubner defended his record of
representing the Chilean junta. At one
Point he insisted, “I’m not speaking for
Pinochet, I’m speaking for Chile.”

ie

Grubner upheld his claim of neutrality,
noting that he has served in various
capacities — vice-consul, consul and
consul-general — under the former Chris-
tian Democratic government of Eduardo
Frei, the “1,000 days of the Allende
government” and Pinochet “after Allende
was replaced.”

“After Allende was killed, you mean,”
said Rojas, referring to the bloody, CIA-
backed military coup of 1973 in which
Popular Unity president Salvador Allende
was murdered, along with thousands of
his supporters.

“What about Cambodia?” Grubner
retorted when reminded of the thousands
killed, tortured or exiled during the 14-
year reign of the Pinochet junta.

The consul-general said he files all press
reports on activities in Canada that con-
cern Chile, and denied he was maintaining
surveillance on Vancouver’s 5,000-strong
Chilean community.

Displaying at one point in the conversa-
tion copies of a computerized list of names
and a booklet containing names of exiles
or refugees, Grubner claimed the junta has
been reducing the number of Chileans not
allowed to return to their homeland.

He also denied the contention that
some returned exiles who subsequently
disappeared and later found murdered
after arriving home were the victims of the
junta.

The exiles reminded Grubner of the
death of Rodrigo Rojas de Negri, a 19-year
old returned exile who with companion
Carmen Gloria Quintana was doused
with gasoline and set on fire by Chilean
soldiers last year. Quintana miraculously
survived the ordeal and has since pres-
ented her story to UN human rights offi-
cials.

Grubner’s response: Those who return
to Chile with the intention of engaging in
political activities cannot complain if they
run afoul of the authorities. Referring to
his own job, through which he has
incurred considerable attention from the
media, he remarked, “If you can’t stand
the heat, get out of the kitchen.”

Vancouver’s Chileans are particularly

Chileans protest ‘‘ban”’ list, torture and detention of returnees, to Chilean consul-
general, Joaquin Grubner (r).

concerned about remarks Grubner made
in an interview with The Vancouver Sun
for a Jan. 17 article, in which the consul-
general acknowledged the consulate mon-
itors the activities of the community. He
admitted that the information provided to
the Chilean government could affect the
status of individuals wishing to return to
Chile.

Grubner in the article also displayed
some knowledge of this community, say-
ing of the banned persons: “These people
are known in the community for signing
pamphlets, being very outspoken members
of the opposition ....

He said that such people were “active”
in the Chilean housing co-operative in east
Vancouver, La Quena coffeehouse (spe-
cializing in cultural and political events on
Latin America) and Co-op Radio’s Amer-
ica Latina A Dia broadcast.

Claiming during the meeting that his
was not a “political” office, Grubner
agreed to forward to the Chilean embassy
in Ottawa a letter protesting his activities
and calling for certain rights for Chilean
political prisoners.

The letter charged that information on
the activities of Chilean exiles has led to
assassinations by the junta’s agents, citing

the well-known murder of former Allende
ambassador, Orlando Letelier, in Wash-
ington, D.C. in 1976.— a murder linked
to the secret police agency, DINA, now
known as the CNI.

The letter also demanded “the Chilean
government eliminate torture as a practice
in Chile that it release the political prison-
ers, over 450 of whom are presently on a
hunger strike in the jails of Chile... .”

The exiles further called on Santiago
military prosecutor Fernando Torres Silva
of the Second Military Court to allow the
prisoners to meet with their defence lawy-
ers, and demanded an end to the solitary
confinement of Vasili Carrillo Nova, son
of miners’ union leader killed in 1973, who
is reported near death froma hunger strike
in Santiago Public Jail.

After the meeting, Uribe, a former hos-
pital union leader now living in Van-
couver, said Grubner has acknowledged
his role in providing information on exiles
and refugees to the junta.

Uribe, a provincial leader of the
National Federation of Health Workers
until the coup toppled Allende, escaped
death after witnessing the military massa-
cre without trial of 15 political detainees at
the barracks in the city of Serana.

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Left-wing coalitions have scored key vic-
tories in two state elections in India, show-
ing that anti-imperialist sentiment is on the
rise, a local journalist who represents the
progressive Indo-Canadian community in
Vancouver said in an interview.

‘These victories show that the integrity of
the union of India is respected, that the
people are anti-separatist, because separa-
tism is the aim of imperialism,” Amarjit
Soofi, editor of the Punjabi-language news-
paper, Lokta, told the Tribune.

He was commenting on state races that
saw left coalitions overwhelmingly elected
in West Bengal and Kerala on March 23.

The Left Front took 251 of the 294 seats
in the West Bengal legislature, winning a
third term in office. The front, including
India’s two Communist parties — the
Communist Party of India (Marxist) and
the CPI (International) — the Forward
Block and the Revolutionary Socialist
Party, rode to victory with Jyoti Basu as its
chief minister.

The remaining seats went to the state

wing of the nation ruling Congress Party
(40) and other groups (3).

The Left Democratic Front in Kerala
took 76 seats for a first-time victory com-
pared to 60 seats for the United Democratic
Front, ending the rule of the group which is
aligned with the Congress Party. The Left
Democratic Front, with E.K. Nayeanar as
chief minister, includes the same parties as
are in the Left Front in West Bengal.

The electoral victories mean three states
now have left administrations. A coalition
of the CPM and the CPI has 50 of the 60
seats in the state of Tripura, with C. Char-
kervarti as chief minister.

Soofi said the victories presage the down-
fall of Prime Minister Rajiv Ghandi’s ruling
national Congress Party, which has become
discredited by seeking to accommodate
“U.S. imperialism” and for its “bankrupt
economic policies.”

The Lokta editor said moves are under-
way to form a new opposition running as a
“people’s democratic government” which
will include as its policies a united India,
closer ties with the Soviet Union and more
trade with other countries.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE, APRIL 1, 1987 e 3