Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador joined other heads of state in Santiago, Chile September 11 to mark the 50th anniversary of the coup d’etat in which the Chilean armed forces toppled President Salvador Allende, who in 1970 had become the first democratically elected Marxist leader in Latin America.
Speaking at a ceremony near a wall dedicated to the thousands of Chileans who disappeared in the subsequent 17 years of military dictatorship, Mexico’s leftist president reflected on his admiration for Allende, whom he called “a humanist, a pacifist, a good man … a victim of scoundrels (víctima de canallas).”
Chilean President Gabriel Boric described Allende as “a flawless democrat, a social fighter, and a reference for those of us who believe in a better Chile.”
Others participating in the commemoration recalled the support Mexico offered to Chilean citizens forced to flee the country after the military takeover.
Among these was Isabel Allende Bussi, daughter of the Chilean president, who shot himself rather than surrender as troops under the command of General Augusto Pinochet closed in on his office in the National Palace during the coup d’etat.
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