Human Rights Project a project of Urban Justice Center

Immigration and National Security

Campaign for Victor Toro

Victor Toro is a Chilean immigrant who has always been at the forefront in defending the rights of the poor in Chile and now in the Bronx. He has been in exile for over 30 years. Victor has also worked in mining, fabric, and metallurgy, and was simultaneously involved in labor and community activism.

Picture of Victor Toro on December 10thPicture of Victor Toro at home

Victor Toro speaking on Dec 10, 2007 at the release of the NYC CERD Report
Victor Toro at home in the South Bronx

 

The Human Rights Project needs your assistance for one of our brothers in the struggle, Victor Toro. Despite over 20 years of dedicated service and activism in New York City, and a wife and daughter with legal residence, Victor is currently in danger of deportation. New York City needs advocates like Victor Toro but now he needs us.

Why Victor Toro is important to us?

Thirty years ago Victor Toro was tortured in the worst way someone can ever imagine. His dreams as a young man, along with other millions of Chileans to end social and economic injustice were one day abruptly destroyed. The criminal regimen of Pinochet not only changed for ever Victor's destiny, also thousands of people were terribly tortured, killed and many are still missing. At that time the United States administration, betraying its values of freedom and democracy and violating all international conventions of human rights supported financially and militarily this brutal dictatorship.

Paradoxically, after thirty years Victor Toro is again victim of an absurd system that profiles immigrants according to their racial features. He was arrested along with other 18 people in a raid on a train in Rochester last year. He was promptly detained and imprisoned without committing any crime.

We think that despite shaming immigration policies, it is a great opportunity for our government to compensate Victor Toro for this journey of pain, anguish, and discrimination that he has been forced to travel. Victor Toro is a survivor and a symbol of his generation, an example of courage, honor and dignity. We own him something. Our government has the moral obligation to give him all the protection and guarantee him his human rights that in the past were denied with the help of our own authorities. Giving him political asylum and letting him stay in New York, his home for 25 years, would be the beginning of reparation to someone who in spite of all his suffering has taught us a magnificent lesson: that we can live in a better world if we keep dreaming and fighting to ensure equal rights to everyone to end racial discrimination.

Brief history of a survivor of Pinochet’s military concentration camps (also en espanol)

I was born on June 2nd in 1942. I was one of the founders of the MIR (Revolutionary Movement of the Left) and a member of its Central Committee. The MIR was founded in August 15 in 1965.

Because of the military coup on September 11, 1973, I was forced to live as a clandestine. After a year, agents of the SIFA (The Air Force Service of Intelligence) found me. They beat me until I lost consciousness. When I woke up I had my hands and feet tied with wires.

In 1974, I was transferred to the AGA (War Academy of the Air Force) where I stayed for almost a year as a “missing” person. During the first weeks I was forced to stand up facing the wall with my eyes covered and hands tied. I had to sleep standing, without water and food. I was often tortured and interrogated. The torture methods applied were kicks, bangs, and especially electroshocks in my ears, testicles, anus, and tongue.

During the first three months, I was subjected to two simulations of execution. Both times there were ten executers very well armed. During the first time when the soldiers shot I felt horror. The sound was real, but the bullets were false. The soldiers then began to kick me and insult me. The second simulation of my execution happened several weeks later and had similar characteristics. In September, they transferred me to Four Alamos, a military concentration camp. The cell was a hole underground. I did not have access to a toilet so I had to do “everything” there. Again, I was subjected to brutal physical aggression, diverse types of punishment and psychological tortures.

After one year, I was allowed to see my family, friends and human rights organizations for the first time. They could verify that I was alive, but sick, and physically injured.

In the summer of 1975-1976, I was transferred another concentration camp called Ritoque. I was visited by the Committee Pro Peace of Santiago, Red Cross, and the World Council of Churches once per month. It was dangerous for our families to come visit us. They were usually harassed, arrested and many of them went missing.

In 1976, because the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) and his chief Manuel Contreras suspected that we were going to escape, they transferred me to Villa Grimaldi. The general Manuel Contreras tortured me personally. I was hung from my feet in a tree; they threw me naked to the “grill” and shocked me with electricity; kicked me and insulted me. After all the time that I was isolated without any possible knowledge about the MIR activities, I concluded that the tortures were because of their hate and probably because it was their last chance to get rid of me.In 1976 my name appeared on a list along with other 20 people who were declared “non-wanted” and dangerous for the dictatorship. Cuba offered me political asylum, but I had to go through Sweden first.

Once in Sweden, I spent time providing testimonies about what had happened in Chile. My first testimony was in Geneva before the Commission on Human Rights at the United Nations.

Then I traveled to Cuba where I received medical treatment for the physical and psychological damage I had received.In 1977, the dictatorship informed the Official Newspaper that Victor Hugo Toro Ramirez was declared officially dead.As a result all this history of repression, torture, missing and exile, I have suffered of physical and psychological sequels. Until now I suffer from severe pain in my back, and my nerve system is damaged, my back and neck are practically paralyzed. All because I was tortured, battered and my human rights were violated systematically.

How you can help

Despite a family with legal residence in the United States, and over 20 years of dedicated service, Victor is now in danger of deportation back to Chile where he faces possible persecution. He needs your help and support now!