Political arrest, torture reported rising in Chile

September 9, 1980

Amnesty International said Tuesday that political arrests and systematic torture are on the increase in Chile. It said reports of arrest and torture had been increasing since May but leaped dramatically after the assassination on July 15 of the director of the Army intelligence School, Lt. Col. Roger Vergara Campos. Since the assassination more than 1,000 and possibly as many as 2,000 people had been arrested, and dozens of reports of torture have filtered out.