No problem, I've only really become versed in these events recently myself after a trip to Chile. During the reign of Augusto Pinochet thousands of people were 'disappeared' - most were executed and buried in the desert, there's a decent bit of information here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augusto_Pinochet#Suppression_of...
Nowadays relatives (mostly female) of those missing still systematically search the deserts of northern Chile for the remains of their loved ones. For anyone interested there's a film - Nostalgia for the Light (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1556190/) which examines the search of the families alongside the rather different 'searching' of the astronomers working in the same deserts. Personally I wasn't crazy on some aspects of the film, but it's a good insight into the ongoing work that victim's families are doing in the Atacama desert around the city of Calama.