The commander in chief of the Army, Javier Iturriaga, testified before the prosecutor of High Complexity North Center, Ximena Chong, following the investigation for crimes against humanity and responsibility of the high command of Carabineros registered during the social outbreak of 2019.
According to La Tercera, the instance took place last Monday, April 3, where the then head of National Defense in the Metropolitan region recalled that, after being appointed to the post, he was summoned to La Moneda, where former President Piñera “was very brief, spoke about 10 minutes, did, somehow, an analysis of what was happening, why I had come to that decision.”
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“That this disturbance to public order had been increasing during the week and that day the fact of the fire in the Enel building had alarmed him and had been the breaking point in the severity he analyzed. That gravity was shared with the mayor (Karla Rubilar), Ministry of the Interior (Rodrigo Delgado), and he had come to the conviction that it was necessary to decree the State of Exception, with all that it meant, which was the first time since 90, “said Iturriaga.
In addition to the above, the general revealed that “it was complex to make that decision, because it was difficult to know the exact point of whether the carabineros were really overwhelmed or not.”
“I remember well that after doing all this analysis and explaining the powers he had by law (President) recognizes that the task he is assigning me is very difficult, because understanding the primary work of the Army, which is not Public Order, and that the Carabineros was overwhelmed. He understands that it is something very difficult what I was in charge of which was to resume public order and at the same time respect human rights, that it is difficult this balance of imposing order and on the other hand respecting the law, “he added.
Subsequently, the persecutor of High Complexity North Center asked Iturriaga about the famous phrase of the former president “we are at war against a powerful enemy”, which according to former minister Andrés Chadwick, arose “spontaneously” by Sebastián Piñera.
In that sense, Chong asked him if “was the realization of this statement evaluated with you as head of the Defense?” When asked, Iturriaga replied “no.”
“The President participated that Sunday in the daily briefing at 8:00 p.m. He went to my command post, there the situation was exposed, he was briefed on the circumstances and environment, on what happened during the day. He took note and after that he asked me to accompany him to the press point, but there was no interaction with him of what he was going to say, nothing,” he said.
“We assumed an organization behind this, but we had no evidence, we had no concrete intelligence,” Iturriaga lamented.
Finally, for General Iturriaga, their relationship with Sebastián Piñera was one of “trust, in extremely complex times, and I feel that I was in some way another advisor for him. After that we have not cultivated any other type of relationship other than in time let’s say he ratified his trust and appointed me to two positions that are of presidential trust.”
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