translated from Spanish: Leonor Varela retracted his sayings against Nicolás López: “I inadvertently participated in the public lynching”

Leonor Varela caused a stir after publishing a letter to the director in El Mercurio, where he retracted the harsh message he gave to Nicolás López when the allegations of sexual abuse against him met. At the time, the actress gave her support to the actresses who denounced the filmmaker. “How heavy your Nicolas Lopez for having worked with you doesn’t surprise me what’s being said here. All my support for the brave speaking actresses,” he wrote, adding that “even though you never touched me (contrary to what you were telling a lot of people) it’s time to take charge of a nefarious attitude.” However, through a missive, Varela took a step back and nuanced his words. “I’ve been feeling uncomfortable about it for months. That is why today I want to clarify a couple of things: at the time I spoke with anger and desire to defend myself, because it was said in the article that López boasted that he had slept with me, a statement that is false,” he wrote. She added that she spoke “driven by my solidarity as a woman. I know from experience what it’s like to be in that place and the courage it takes to speak publicly when you are a victim of sexual violence,” he said. With this, he replied that “at the time I was not close or collaborating with Lopez because I just had a way and a humor that made me uncomfortable.” However, he reiterated that “Lopez never attacked me or tried to abuse me. In my personal experience I remember a rather immature, puerile person with a humor that reflected more insecurity than violence.” “That’s why today I would ask the plainten lawyers to stop using my name and my purposes to support your case. I’m not part of the women’s group accusing Lopez of sexual abuse. On the other hand, I must also do a mea culpa: I participated, without realizing Lopez’s public lynching,” the actress wrote. With this, he insisted that while he erased the tweet with the criticism against Lopez “is not enough. A year later it continues to cause me rejection to see the same violence that we were supposed to condemn deploy. That’s why I’m making this statement.” And he concluded by stating that “it is not my intention or my place to comment more on Lopez’s innocence versus guilt, nor about the truth versus lying about the accusations made by women. I think things fall by their own weight. And I am confident that the Chilean judicial system will know how to do its job.”

Original source in Spanish