Image of an absence: Joan and Víctor Jara, with their daughters Manuela Bunster (daughter of Joan and dancer Patricio Bunster) and Amanda (on the floor) in 1972 and the family without Víctor in 2018.

Santiago de Chile, November 14 (RHC)-- Joan Jara, human rights advocate and widow of singer-songwriter Victor Jara, died Sunday in Chile.   With her death, a voice that fought tirelessly in the search for justice for the torture and subsequent murder of her husband is extinguished.

"We regret to inform that our dear and beloved Joan Jara at 96 years of age passed away today, November 12 at 17H30 hours," said the Victor Jara Foundation on its social networks.

The organization, created by Joan to promote Jara's legacy, announced that the political activist and renowned dancer will be veiled this Monday at noon in Santiago.

Although born in the UK, Joan obtained Chilean nationality in 2009, granted by grace by then President Michelle Bachelet as a gesture for her valuable cultural contribution and commitment to Chile's democratic recovery.

When her husband was assassinated after Augusto Pinochet's coup d'état, Joan Jara returned to her country with her two daughters, only to return to Chile in the mid-1980s.

Her death occurred just two weeks before the United States extradited to Chile retired Chilean Army lieutenant Pedro Barrientos, convicted in the United States as the perpetrator of the crime and torture of the singer-songwriter and the director of prisons of Salvador Allende's government, Littré Quiroga.