Chilean police recover $3 mn worth of looted goods

Santiago, March 10 (IANS/EFE) Chilean police have recovered roughly $3 million worth of goods that were looted in the southern city of Concepcion and neighbouring towns after the Feb 27 earthquake, authorities said.

A total of 168 people have been arrested for acts of pillage and vandalism, police Col. Hermes Soto told radio Cooperativa Tuesday.

He added that the operations to find and recover looted goods are going to continue in the area “until definitive calm is provided” to the people.

Just 10 percent of the people arrested for looting have criminal records and the great majority are workers and lower-middle-class people who live in communities around Concepcion, Talcahuano and other neighbouring towns, Soto said.

In some towns, homeowners have admitted stealing some of the items. “There are all types of people, this crosses all social classes,” the colonel said.

Normalcy has been gradually returning to the area with the reopening of shops, banks and the resumption of basic services such as water, electricity and telecommunications.

As a result, authorities decided to curtail the curfew schedule, thereby “permitting a greater traffic flow”, the military chief in the zone, Gen. Guillermo Ramirez, told reporters.

The major anxiety among the people, according to media accounts, stems from the aftershocks that continue to shake the region.

Last month’s magnitude-8.8 temblor left around 500 confirmed dead and some 2 million people injured or displaced.

–IANS/EFE