"Neruda was murdered and state agents intervened," said Rodolfo Reyes, the poet's nephew. Photo: Ailén Díaz/EFE.
In an interview with Página 12, Rodolfo Reyes Neruda insisted that his uncle was murdered because he was a threat to the government of Augusto Pinochet. Last Wednesday, scientists investigating the likelihood of Neruda having been poisoned delivered their final report.
Last Wednesday, the report produced by international experts for the judge in charge of the case investigating the death of the poet Pablo Neruda was released to the public. Now, the court must decide whether the death of the Chilean poet, on September 23, 1973, was due to illness or poisoning.
The family, represented by Rodolfo Reyes Neruda, the poet’s nephew, maintains that he was poisoned. The nephew believes that the death of Pablo Neruda was the work of Augusto Pinochet, the Chilean dictator who ruled the country between 1973 and 1990.
“In Chile, nothing happened without the authorization or order of Pinochet,” Reyes told Página 12 in a recent interview. “Neruda was a [presidential] candidate and a firm opponent of the dictator, and he was about to go into exile in Mexico because his life was in danger in the country.”
As revealed by the family a few days ago, the expert report concluded that the poet was poisoned; the clostridium botulinum bacteria was found, the main cause of botulism, in an analysis. “We know that the bacteria which was found by a Canadian laboratory was injected into Pablo, and after a few hours he died,” said the poet’s nephew.
“Neruda was murdered and state agents intervened. Pinochet was responsible for Neruda’s death,” he reiterated.
“We are going to wait for the judge to give us a copy of the report that the laboratories delivered, and then for them to issue [a statement] regarding the true causes,” Reyes Neruda added. “We understand that it may take time, but the press around the world is following the case.”
“We are here so that the truth may be known,” he stated.
The judge requested patience and time to analyze the data
Paola Plaza González, the magistrate in charge of the case, in response to media inquiries about the future of the case, warned that “it is only in the investigation phase. There is no statutory time limit for the court to issue a decision. This is one proceeding among innumerable trial proceedings that have been open for a decade.”
“This case has been developing for years, led by Minister Carroza, and there was a specific evidentiary procedure pending, which is this expert report that was elaborated by a panel of experts on a very specific subject,” stated the judge. “That is what has been received. So, what needs to be analyzed is this evidence together with the others that have accumulated during the investigation.”
In addition, the magistrate clarified that the law regulates this circumstance and required a high degree of confidentiality in the development of their investigation. “It is expressly stipulated in the law,” she recalled.
Expert analysis
The group of experts that analyzed the samples found in Neruda’s body is made up of scientists from the United States, Canada, and Denmark.
The presentation of the report had been postponed twice, once due to the impossibility of one of the experts to attend due to forest fires and, the second time, due to the lack of consensus among the members of the panel.
The work presented by the panel of experts this Wednesday consists of two parts, each of 30 pages. The scientists clarified that this report contains the definitive results of the investigation, and not the preliminary ones, as had been anticipated.
How Pablo Neruda died
Pablo Neruda attended the Santa María Clinic, where he finally died days before his trip to Mexico scheduled for September 22, 1973. He died on September 23 at 10:30 p.m.
According to the medical death certificate, dated September 24 of that year, the writer died of metastatic prostate cancer. The certificate is signed by Neruda’s attending physician, Roberto Vargas Salazar, who was not present at the clinic when Neruda died or in the hours that followed.
However, the version that the poet’s assistant, Manuel Araya, sent to the director of the Chilean newspaper El Ciudadano, held that Neruda had been murdered by an injection in the abdomen, at about 4 p.m. on September 23.
Neruda’s laboratory tests showed that he had a severe urinary infection that apparently was not being properly treated, but that in no case could it have caused such a sudden death as he suffered. However, the poet was never in intensive care and the only medicines he received were those given to him by his wife.
(Página 12) Natalia López Gómez
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
OT/KW/SL
