A panel of legal and medical experts began Tuesday, January 24 in Santiago the final analysis of scientific evidence to determine once and for all if the Chilean poet and Nobel Prize for Literature Pablo Neruda was assassinated during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990).
Local and international experts are gathered for at least nine days to analyze the results of a series of studies on the remains of the Chilean poet, who died on September 23, 1973, twelve days after General Pinochet's coup against the socialist president. Salvador Allende, great friend of the poet.
Neruda poisoned?
According to the official version of the military regime, Pablo Neruda died of an aggravation of prostate cancer.
A version that was completely invalidated in October 2017 by a group of 16 experts, who however could not determine the cause of his death.
But a new investigation was then launched on a toxin (Clostridium botulinum) found in the remains of the poet whose body had been exhumed in 2013.
The group of experts currently assembled will have to determine if there is enough evidence to say that this toxic substance caused the death of Neruda, and if it could have been inoculated into him while he was in a private clinic in Santiago. .
They will submit their conclusions on March 7 to Judge Paola Plaza, who is leading the investigation opened in 2011.
Read alsoPablo Neruda: the truth about the poet's death finally revealed in October
Pablo Neruda, Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971, died at the age of 69 as he prepared to leave the country for Mexico where he was to play a role in opposition to the Pinochet regime.
The dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, whose 2023 marks the 50th anniversary, left some 3,200 dead and more than 38,000 people were tortured, according to official figures.