Santiago: Chile has announced it will move to draft a new constitution and replace one dating back to the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship -- a key demand of protesters who have rocked the country for three weeks.
The new constitution will be drafted by a body called a constituent assembly and then put to a referendum for ratification, Interior Minister Gonzalo Blumel said Sunday.
Blumel made the announcement after meeting with a coalition of center-right and right-wing parties, which had been reluctant to change the constitution inherited from the era of the US-backed general Pinochet (1973-1990).
The government was in the process of preparing "a draft amendment of the constitution,” President Sebastian Pinera said in an interview by the daily El Mercurio. (AFP)
The new constitution will be drafted by a body called a constituent assembly and then put to a referendum for ratification, Interior Minister Gonzalo Blumel said Sunday.
Blumel made the announcement after meeting with a coalition of center-right and right-wing parties, which had been reluctant to change the constitution inherited from the era of the US-backed general Pinochet (1973-1990).
The government was in the process of preparing "a draft amendment of the constitution,” President Sebastian Pinera said in an interview by the daily El Mercurio. (AFP)