(25. April 2023, taz/npla) Chile is preparing to set up a non-profit private corporation to prepare the necessary measures for the construction of a memorial and a documentation center in the Ex Colonia Dignidad. Representatives of the Chilean government presented guidelines for this on April 18 in Berlin as part of the 11th meeting of the “Chilean-German Mixed Commission for the processing of Colonia Dignidad and the integration of victims into society” for processing Colonia Dignidad.
According to a joint statement by the two governments, this facility should involve all victim groups and civil society organizations and also develop proposals for the situation of the people currently living on the site. The German side supports these plans, which are intended to speed up the construction of a memorial and documentation site, and will examine possibilities for financial participation, the statement said.
The head of the department for human rights in the Chilean Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Tomás Pascual, said after the commission meeting: “We will quickly clarify which form of organization is best able to solve the complex tasks and then clarify possibilities for German participation”.
According to Pascual, the facility to be created could be based on a concept for a memorial, documentation and educational site that German and Chilean experts had already created in 2021 on behalf of the “Mixed Commission”.
“A memorial and educational site in the Ex Colonia Dignidad should fulfill three functions,” says
Jens-Christian Wagner, head of the Buchenwald and Mittelbau-Dora Memorials Foundation, is one of the authors of the memorial concept. “Firstly, a commemorative function, that is, the various groups of victims should be remembered. Secondly, a documentary function, which means that the evidence of the crimes committed there must be documented, preserved and explained in exhibitions.”
The third component, the educational function, is a concept of decentralized exhibitions “in which the different groups of victims are remembered at the relevant historical locations,” says Wagner. In addition to victims of torture, murder and enforced disappearance on the site during the Pinochet dictatorship (1973 to 1990), this also includes Chileans from the surrounding area and German residents of the settlement who were subjected to forced labor and sexualized violence.
However, complex issues need to be resolved when implementing the concept. At the moment, however, a tourism business in the Bavarian style is thriving on the site of the settlement, which is now called Villa Baviera. Visitors come to drink beer and eat pork knuckle with sauerkraut, they come for walks in the fresh air and for tours in the Unimog across the site. This kind of pleasure tourism could not be passed on with a memorial. According to the present concept, the approximately 120 people who still live in the settlement founded in 1961 at the foot of the Andes could continue to live and work in certain areas of the site, explains Elke Gryglewski, director of the Bergen-Belsen memorial is one of the experts who wrote the concept for a memorial. She assesses the results of the meeting of the “Mixed Commission” positively: “They show a well thought-out strategic approach in which concrete measures are planned”.
The Bundestag member Renate Künast (Greens) also considers the establishment of a foundation or a sponsoring association to be a key issue. The possibility of financing from German and Chilean government funds depends on it. Above all, the clarification of ownership of the site and the buildings that have been placed under monument protection and are to become part of the memorial is crucial. “There are different legal avenues. One could make an expropriation”, but that is complicated and lengthy, emphasizes Künast. “But you can also try to find an amicable solution.” For today’s residents, it must be clarified where they can find suitable living space in the long term. In addition, the Chilean judiciary continues to examine the site for traces of people who have disappeared, which of course also has to be taken into account during conversions.
Jan Stehle from the Research and Documentation Center Chile-Latin America also welcomes the fact that the memorial site process is progressing. “In view of the joint responsibility of Germany and Chile for the crimes of Colonia Dignidad, both governments should be equally involved in the implementation of the memorial concept and its sponsorship,” he explains, because the overall responsibility for this should not be shifted to Chile.
The “Mixed Commission” is also planning to put up twelve commemorative plaques at historically relevant locations in the Villa Baviera, as the settlement is now called. The Chilean side is preparing the inauguration in the context of official events marking the 50th anniversary of the coup in Chile.
According to the joint declaration, the “Mixed Commission” also wants to make progress in the social support of the victims of Colonia Dignidad, who grew up in the German cult settlement. As part of the federal government’s support plan for victims of Colonia Dignidad, a “Care and Age” fund has been approved but has not yet been implemented. This fund is primarily intended to support former residents of the settlement who now live outside of Villa Baviera in other places in Chile and receive hardly any support. Renate Künast (Greens) explains, “we have to create this fund in the current legislative period”. As a member of a “joint commission” made up of members of parliament and the federal government, she is directly involved in the drafting.
According to their statement, the “Mixed Commission” also wants to examine the economic and legal structure of Villa Baviera. Since the end of the 1980s, the settlement has been constituted as a non-transparent holding company for closely intertwined stock corporations. Few people occupy key posts on the company’s governing bodies. An investigation should make this structure more transparent and facilitate a possible restructuring with the aim of promoting equal participation of all residents.
A group of current and former residents known as a social corporation criticizes the unequal distribution of power, shares and assets in the Villa Baviera and has applied to the bilateral government commission for professional support for a restructuring of the company holding company.
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