Augusto Pinochet

From dKosopedia

Category: Chile people

Gen. Augusto José Ramón Pinochet Ugarte was the miltiary dictator of Chile from 1973 to 1990. The Nixon administration and large American corporations with investments in Chile sponsored the coup d'etat that overthrew what was then the oldest liberal democracy in latin America and gave him the power to tyrannize the Chilean people. Thousands died, many under sadistic torture, and thousands more were driven into exile.

Born on November 25, 1915, Pinochet climbed the ranks of the Chilean Army as an intelligence officer.

The most prominent victim of this violent right-wing extremist was Salvador Allende, the democratically elected President of Chile, who was killed defending the Moneda, the Chilean presidential palace. See Missing a film about the murder and disappearance of Americans by the Pinochet regime.

Pinochet spent the last years of life trying to escape justice. In March 1998 Spanish Judge Garcia Castellon issued international arrest warrants for Pinochet and 38 other Chilean officers and civilian officials of the Pinochet miltiary regime, including officers of DINA, the secret police. They were charged with conspiracy to murder and the murder of Spanish citizens in Chile. Another arrest warrant was issued by Spanish Judge Baltazar Garzon in October 1998 and served on Pinochet while he was in London to receive medical treatment at the London Clinic. He was charged with the torture and conspiracy to torture of Spanish citizens in Chile.

Links

• Victor Jara

Sources

• Pamela Constable & Arturo Valenzuela. 1991. A Nation of Enemies: Chile Under Pinochet. New York: W.W. Norton. ISBN 0393309851.
• Naomi Roht-Arriaza. 2005. The Pinochet Effect: Transnational Justice in the Age of Human Rights. Philadelphia: University of Philadelphia Press. ISBN 0812219746.