International experts will reveal on Wednesday that the bacteria found in the remains of Chilean Nobel laureate Pablo Neruda “was in his body at the time of death,” which can show that he was “poisoned” twelve days after the military coup of 1973, his family told EFE exclusively.
“We know now that the ‘clostridium botulinum’ should not have been in Neruda’s bone. What does this mean? That Neruda was murdered, there was intervention in 1973 by agents of the State, “said Rodolfo Reyes, nephew of the poet.
The bacterium, responsible for botulism, was found in 2017 in Neruda’s tooth by another panel of experts, who dismissed the version of the dictatorship and rejected that the cause of death was the advanced prostate cancer that afflicted him since 1969.
Clostridium botulinum
The “clostridium botulinum” is a bacillus that is usually found in the earth, but experts from McMaster University (Canada) and the University of Copenhagen concluded in the report to be presented this week that “it did not leak to Neruda’s corpse from inside or around his coffin”, but that he already had it before he died.
The question remains how and who introduced botulinum toxin into the body of the author of “Twenty Love Poems and a Desperate Song.”
“Neruda’s fatal bullet was found, which had it in his body. Who shot her? That will be seen soon, but there is no doubt that Neruda was killed. Intervention directly from third parties,” Reyes emphasized.
Much of Neruda’s family supports the version of Manuel Araya, his former driver and who maintains that he was poisoned by an injection in the abdomen by a secret agent of the regime who posed as a doctor at the Santa María Clinic in Santiago.
“Neruda was not seriously ill, he only had cancer. I walked with difficulty, I was in pain, but I was not ready to die,” Elizabeth Flores, the family’s lawyer, who acts as a plaintiff in the case initiated in 2011 with the Communist Party, in which Neruda was a member, told EFE.
Reyes recalled that the writer, whose challenges were exhumed in 2013 from his garden in Isla Negra, on the central Chilean coast, had planned to travel to Mexico a few days before he died, at age 69, and that in exile he would have become the “great opponent” of dictator Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990).
The conclusions of this new expert report were to be known on February 3, but the hearing was canceled twice – first due to technical failures and then due to alleged disagreements between the experts – and rescheduled for this Wednesday.
“The lawyers are going to ask for other types of proceedings that may or may not be scientific,” Flores added.
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