Augusto Pinochet claimed on Tuesday, during an interview on the occasion of his 88th birthday, that he was a democratic leader, a “patriotic angel” with nothing to apologize for.
On Monday, new court testimonies were published giving details of how at least 400 of the thousands of Pinochet opponents who were “disappeared” during his regime (I believe Mr. Pinochet has the dubious distinction of verbing that particularly ominous adjective) were “dumped into the ocean strapped to pieces of railroad track to make them sink.”
Yes, of course, there is nothing to apologize for. In a world where the opposition does not exist and therefore has no rights.
In retrospect, Sting’s “Cueca Solo (They Dance Alone),” written in 1987, seems grossly inadequate in its description of the effects of the Pinochet regime’s atrocities. But it’s also the humane response to the horrors that the regime brokered:
They’re dancing with the missing
They’re dancing with the dead
They dance with the invisible ones
Their anguish is unsaid
They’re dancing with their fathers
They’re dancing with their sons
They’re dancing with their husbands
They dance alone
They dance alone