Chilean legislator, activist to give human rights talk

Chilean legislator and human rights activist Juan Pablo Letelier will deliver the International Institute’s Annual Human Rights Lecture.

Letelier is the son of Orlando Letelier, the Chilean diplomat who was assassinated in 1976 in a car-bomb attack in Washington, D.C. Orlando Letelier had been Chilean defense minister in the government of President Salvador Allende, which was ousted by General Augusto Pinochet in a bloody military coup in 1973. Pinochet is currently facing extradition to Spain on charges of human rights abuses.

Details: Juan Pablo Letelier will speak Monday, Nov. 1, at 4 p.m., Pyle Center’s Lakeshore Room, 702 Langdon St.

In court hearings last year, Letelier testified that he believed the plot against his father was carried out by a “hit squad” dispatched by the Chilean secret police or DINA, and that there was evidence the DINA was directly under the control of Pinochet. Two top officers of the dictatorship’s secret police are serving prison sentences for Orlando Letelier’s murder. According to Letelier, Pinochet’s detention is legal.

“Diplomatic immunity,” he says, “does not grant a license to kill. Immunity should not be confused with impunity.”

Louis Bickford, associate director of the Global Studies Program, says Letelier offers the Madison community a rare chance to understand the global struggle for human rights.

“Beyond his active involvement in the Pinochet case,” Bickford says, “Letelier has spent the last decade working within the Chilean political system to strengthen democracy by promoting basic human rights, judicial reform, labor laws, and mechanisms for accountability and transparency in politics and decision-making.”

Letelier was elected a deputy or member of Chile’s parliament in 1990 as a Socialist and has served on numerous legislative committees. He is currently the leader of the Socialist Party’s parliamentary delegation.

Letelier, an economist, holds degrees from Georgetown University and the Centro de Investigaciones y Docencia Economicas in Mexico. During his three-day visit to campus, Letelier, as distinguished visitor in international studies, will meet with faculty and students.

His visit is sponsored by the International Institute and two of its member programs, the Global Studies Program and the Latin American and Iberian Studies Program.