Thaindian News

Santiago, March 12 (IANS/EFE) The family of late Chilean President Salvador Allende have agreed not to oppose a possible exhumation of his remains as part of a probe into his death during the military coup of Sep 11, 1973.

“We will collaborate and do all that is necessary, present our testimony and if a new exhumation is necessary, an exhumation will be done,” the late head of state’s daughter, Sen. Isabel Allende, told reporters Friday after the family completed the procedure of formally becoming a party to the case.

The senator - not to be confused with novelist Isabel Allende, whose father was a cousin of Salvador Allende - said she and the rest of the family remain convinced that her father took his own life to avoid capture.

“We have to set the example if we’re asking that other actors provide complete cooperation,” Sen. Allende said, abandoning her earlier opposition to a second exhumation of her father’s remains.

The push to exhume Salvador Allende’s body comes from a group representing families of some of the more than 3,000 people killed during the 1973-90 dictatorship of the late Gen. Augusto Pinochet, who led the ouster of the Socialist president.

Allende’s family points out that the president’s body has already been examined twice: at his death and again when his remains were moved from the coastal city of Vina del Mar to Santiago after the restoration of democracy.

Surviving bodyguards have testified that Salvador Allende shot himself as the presidential palace was under aerial bombardment and Pinochet’s troops were trying to force their way in.

–IANS/EFE
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