A great moral shift has happened because of this trial ... whether he returns or not. I have no problem, if he's on his deathbed, for him to return to Chile.

Life may unfold chronologically for the body and for bureaucracies that keep track of such things as births, marriages, deaths, visas, tax returns, expulsions, and identity cards, but memory does not play this game in quite the same way, always manages to confound the desire for tidiness.

There's a tendency, especially among revolutionaries, to only show the good side of yourself and then when you come to power, the bad side comes out.

Responsibility without power, the fate of the secretary through the ages.

Mining created Chile. The story of men who go down into the mountain and chip away at minerals in the darkness and then suffer an accident that leaves them at the mercy of that darkness is part of the DNA of Chile, an integral part of the country's history.

I think to be in exile is a curse, and you need to turn it into a blessing. You've been thrown into exile to die, really, to silence you so that your voice cannot come home. And so my whole life has been dedicated to saying, 'I will not be silenced.'