- Title: Documentary tells story of Scottish workers' boycott against Chile coup
- Date: 10th September 2018
- Summary: SANTIAGO, CHILE (SEPTEMBER 9, 2017) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF PEOPLE MARCHING DURING PROTEST TO MARK THE 45TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE COUP
- Embargoed: 24th September 2018 17:22
- Keywords: Documentary Nae Pasaran Scottish factory workers strike Chile coup documentarty film film director Felipe Bustos Sierra Bob Fulton
- Location: LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM / UNIDENTIFIED FILMING LOCATIONS / SANTIAGO, CHILE
- City: LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM / UNIDENTIFIED FILMING LOCATIONS / SANTIAGO, CHILE
- Country: United Kingdom
- Topics: Arts / Culture / Entertainment,Film
- Reuters ID: LVA00B8X1O3ER
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: When Chilean Air Force jet engines arrived for repair at a Rolls Royce factory in Scotland in 1974, inspector Bob Fulton swiftly decided he would not touch them.
The World War Two veteran had been shaken by violent images thousands of miles away in Santiago of Hawker Hunter jets bombing La Moneda presidential palace in the September 11, 1973 military coup that toppled democratically elected socialist president Salvador Allende.
Despite risking his job, Fulton refused to let the engines through the maintenance and with the fellow trade union workers led an act of international solidarity against the coup and ensuing dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.
Documentary "Nae Pasaran", meaning they shall not pass, takes a look at the boycott of Chilean Air Force engines by the engineers in Scottish town of East Kilbride and the impact it had.
"Bob and his colleagues, their action, they weren't expecting anything, it really was a compassionate movement," film director Felipe Bustos Sierra told Reuters.
The son of an exiled Chilean journalist living in Belgium, Bustos Sierra said he first heard of the Scottish workers' actions as a child.
The workers labelled the engine parts "black", meaning they would not be touched on the factory assembly line for months. They were then put and left outside, until they disappeared in 1978. The workers were told they had gone back to the Chile.
"Nae Pasaran" shows Fulton, now in his nineties, and colleagues, who were honoured by the Chilean government in 2015, look back on their actions and hear stories from Chileans jailed after the coup. A Pinochet-era general is also interviewed.
The documentary, which got an ovation at a festival in Glasgow and is released in Britain in November, has yet to be screened in Chile, where Bustos Sierra said he had seen positive comments on social media about it and some who thought the story was "science fiction". He hopes for a 2019 cinema release there. - Copyright Holder: FILE REUTERS (CAN SELL)
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