Edmundo Pérez Yoma

Edmundo Jaime Pérez Yoma (born 10 January 1939 Antofagasta) is a Chilean politician from the Christian Democrat Party of Chile. He was twice the Minister of Defense during the administration of President Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle, and he served as the Minister of the Interior for President Michelle Bachelet's administration.

Pérez Yoma is the son of Edmundo Pérez Zujovic, the assassinated minister under President Eduardo Frei Montalva, father of President Frei Ruiz-Tagle. As a boy, he came to Santiago, the capital, with his family, enrolling in Saint George's College and then the University of Chile, where for two years he studied engineering. Pérez Yoma then returned to Chile, marrying Paz Vergara Larraín in 1965, with whom he has had six children.

Political career

Frei Ruiz-Tagle administration

Due to Pérez Yoma's closeness with the army, President Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle—a personal friend due to the closeness of their fathers—appointed him Minister of Defense in 1994.

Within the Frei administration, Pérez Yoma was in conflict with Minister of Public Works Ricardo Lagos. Lagos refused to assent to the creation of Punta Peuca, a prison built specifically for the military convicts detained for violations of human rights, whose first occupants were General Manuel Contreras and Brigadier Pedro Espinoza for the murder of former Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier.

On January 16, 1998, Pérez Yoma left office to become the ambassador to Argentina On June 22, 1999, he returned to the administration as Minister of National Defense. In that stint, he created the Mesa de Diálogo (English: Bargaining Table), a body that sought to resolve problems concerning the violation of human rights during the military regime.