U.S. Visa Holdup Forces Chileans to Cancel Show

A Chilean singing group that was scheduled to perform in Cambridge tonight will not be allowed to do so, because its members have not received visas from the U.S. government due to alleged Communist Party connections.

William Diedrich of the Public Affairs Office of the State Department said last night that members of Quilapayun may not be allowed to enter the country because the U.S. embassy in Paris, where the group is currently located, has classified them as Communist Party members.

He said that under immigration and naturalization laws Communist Party members are "excludable types" and require a special U.S. government: waiver before they are allowed to enter the country.

Diedrich said the State Department, the Immigration and Naturalization Service and the Latin American Affairs Bureau within the State Department are conferring about whether to grant visas to members of Quilapayun.

All seven members of the folk-singing group were members of the Communist Youth Organization in Chile during the regime of former President Salvador Allende. They now live and perform in exile.

Sarah Kafatou, an organizer of the concert and third-year graduate student in English, said last night that sponsors of the group will hold a press conference at 11 a.m. today at the Faculty Club.

She said she expects the government to reach a decision on the visas sometime this morning.

Kafatou said Peg McCarter, member of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom and another organizer of the concert, will answer questions about Quilapayun's current plans and U.S. -Chile relations at the press conference.

Rain Check

James Ritter, an organizer of the Cambridge concert which was to be held in the Rindge Technical School's auditorium at 8 p.m., said that ticket-holders will have the option of returning their tickets or holding on to them until Quilapayun can re-schedule the concert.

Kafatou said if the group receives its visas it will most likely re-schedule the concert for next Monday or Tuesday.

George Wald, Higgins Professor of Biology, said last night that the organizers of the concert will hold a talk tonight on the current Chilean situation.

Kafatou said that neither the time nor the building had been arranged for the talk. She said a slide show on Chile will also be shown at tonight's meeting.

Quilapayun, formed in 1965, has toured Latin America and Western Europe. Kafatou said Quilapayun was one of a number of Chilean groups that sprang up in Chile in "an attempt to strip Chilean music of American influence."

Folk Art Revival

She said that the "Chilean Song" movement was linked to a resurgence of folk art under Allende.

"Quilapayun was the best known and most popular group to come out of the movement," Kafatou said.

The group had been scheduled for a series of 12 concerts around the United States before departing for Mexico sometime next week. It has already had to cancel engagements in New York last Friday and Amherst last night.