José Celestino Díaz Iturrieta

José Celestino Díaz Iturrieta (29 January 1906 – 14 May 1987) was a Chilean mechanic, worker and communist politician.

Biography He was the son of José Celestino Díaz Cerda and Rafaela Iturrieta Molina, and married Rosa Inés Flores Villalón in Chuquicamata on 1 February 1941.

He worked as an automobile mechanic and as a nitrate worker. He was a militant of the Partido Progresista Nacional, the name used by the Communist Party between 1941 and 1945, after the Electoral Registrar erased its legal existence based on a 1932 law.

He helped organize the Industrial Union of the Chuquicamata Plant in 1933, becoming its first president. He also served as regidor of Calama (1938) and Secretary-General of the Industrial Mining Federation of Copiapó (1939).

Political Activities He was elected Deputy for the 2nd Departamental Group—Antofagasta, Tocopilla, El Loa and Taltal—for the 1941–1945 legislative term, joining the Committees on Internal Government and on Labour and Social Legislation. He was re-elected for the 1945–1949 term and served on the Committee on Foreign Relations.

He suffered imprisonment and persecution during the application of the Ley de Defensa Permanente de la Democracia—the “ley maldita”—under the government of Gabriel González Videla. He was twice relegated to Pisagua. During the second government of Carlos Ibáñez del Campo, he was again imprisoned and relegated to Curepto.

Following the 1973 military coup, he was detained and tortured in the Estadio Chile and the Estadio Nacional. He went into exile in Venezuela in 1978, returning to Chile in 1985 in poor health. He died in Santiago on 14 May 1987.