“Chile has nationalized copper, its basic resource, which accounts for over 70 percent of its exports. Little regard has been given however to the fact that the nationalization process, with all its implications and consequences, including the establishment and payment of indemnities, has been the clearest and most categorical expression of the will of its people, and has been carried out in full accord with a precise mandate of provisions established in the nation's Constitution. Little regard has been given the fact that the foreign companies which exploited the mines have drawn profits many times greater than the value of their investments. These companies which amassed huge fortunes at our expense, and assumed that they had the right to burden us indefinitely with their presence and their abuse, have stirred up forces of every kind—including those of their own state institutions, in their country and elsewhere—to attack and injure Chile and its economy.”
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