August and September have seen mounting tensions in Chile: in late August, the shopkeepers' strike and armed demonstrations by the fascists in Santiago, while in the countryside peasant militants were assassinated by the landowners' gangs; in September, violent clashes between the fascists and the Left; fascist barricades in Santiago, and a demonstration of 750,000 for the second anniversary of the election of Popular Unity. Throughout the year, faced by the re-organisation of the right and movements beyond their control on the left (land occupations Political Prisoners!
This month 15 people go on trial in Buenos Aires accused of the murder of Oberdan Sallustro, the director of FIAT in Argentina, on 10 April. The military regime is accusing the ERP (People's Revolutionary Army): but many Argentinians accuse the government of breaking off the negotiations between the ERP and FIAT, and it is also held that the police provoked Sallustro's death by breaking into the house where he was held. It is not even known whose bullet killed Sallustro. Well-informed circles in Argentina say that the tribunal may well deliver at least three death sentences.
The following facts should be made known internationally:
The judges of the criminal courts hearing the case have all been directly appointed by the military government. It is therefore a special tribunal of a kind which violates the Argentinian Constitution, which has stood since 1853. 2. Article 18 of this Constitution expressly abolishes the use of the death penalty for political reasons. The tribunal is acting on the decrees of the regime, not according to the Constitution. 3. The constitutional principle of the right of defence is being violated: the prisoners have been taken over 900 miles from where the tribunal will be held, and communication with their lawyers is extremely difficult. Furthermore, these lawyers will receive copies of the terms of the accusation, which consist of 15 volumes of material, five days before the trials. 4. Seven of the 15 accused were arrested a day before Sallustro died, and could therefore have had no part in the events. But one of them, Osvaldo de Benedetti, is spoken of as one of the most likely candidates for the death penalty, because of his record as a dedicated revolutionary.