CHE GUEVARA'S LAST DAYS

His last mission in Bolivia as recounted by a journalist
who went on his foot steps in the Bolivian jungle,
50 years after his execution

This narrative ties in with the 50th anniversary of the Che's death (Oct. 9th, 1967), executed in the Bolivian hamlet of La Higuera after one year of a guerrilla war which will abort. Argentinian backpacker, motorcyclist from Patagonia to the Mexican jungle, Ernesto Guevara entered history in Cuba, where he fought as a guerrilla before he became a minister. But it is in Bolivia that the man became a myth. For almost a year, starting from his arrival in La Paz (Nov. 3rd, 1966) under an alias, helped only by a 40 troops, Che attempted to set fire to Latin America. “Never, in history, as a man undertaken such a huge task”, wrote Fidel Castro.

So as to recount this epic, Frédéric Faux relied on the writings of the guerrillas, including the famous newspaper of Bolivia, of the Che. He met researchers as well as people close to the Che: Carlos Soria, who updated and studied Guevara's diary; Loyola Guzman, who managed in La Paz the network of guerilla's support. He spent one month in Nancahuaza zone, to meet witnesses: some Muyumpampa's inhabitants who were Che's soldiers; Gary Prado Salmon, the officer who captured him

He tells about his trip to the terra guevarista, a story following closely the upheavals of the guerrillas, but also providing a sensitive, personal testimony on the Che's last days.

THE AUTHOR
Journalist and traveller, Frédéric Faux, 48, has lived since 2012 in La Paz (Bolivia) where he is the correspondent of European medias such as the RSR (Swiss radio), French and Swiss dailies Le Figaro and Le Temps. After an assignment in Australia, he lived six years in El Salvador, where he followed Latino gangs. In Bolivia, he wrote on cocaine traffics Coca!, an investigation in the Andes, Actes Sud, 2015) and on Bolivian Rebels (Ateliers Henri Dougier, 2016).