Chilean diplomat Orlando Letelier was assassinated in a car bombing on Embassy Row in Washington, D.C., fifty years ago. This infamous attack also claimed the life of his colleague, Ronni Moffitt.
A statue of Orlando Letelier stands outside the Chilean ambassador’s residence in Washington, serving as a solemn reminder of the tragic events that unfolded years ago.
On a Monday, half a century ago, Virgilio Paz Romero, a young militant refugee from communist Cuba, allegedly triggered a bomb using a remote control. The explosive was planted beneath the driver’s seat of another man’s car. As the car circled Sheridan Circle on Embassy Row, the explosion resulted in the deaths of two of the three passengers.
Now, there may be a new development as one of the assassins implicated in this heinous act faces possible deportation. This decision reignites interest in the brutal assassination that shook the political landscape decades ago.