Pinochet loses immunity

By Louise Egan

SANTIAGO, Chile - Chile’s Supreme Court has stripped former dictator Augusto Pinochet of immunity from prosecution
in a notorious human rights case, raising hopes of victims that he may finally face trial for abuses during his 17-year regime.

The 9-8 ruling on Thursday upheld a lower court decision in May that removed the immunity granted Pinochet as a former head of
state.

The lower court said the retired general, 88, could be charged in connection with the disappearance of 19 leftists in the
mid-1970s as part of "Operation Condor," a joint effort by South American dictators to wipe out dissidents.

"The country is a little more democratic than yesterday because this Supreme Court verdict confirms that nobody is untouchable,"
Eduardo Contreras, a human rights lawyer, told reporters at Santiago’s main courthouse.

Human Rights Watch and the Latin American Human Rights Association applauded the ruling, saying it opened the doors for
justice.

Pinochet took power in a coup in 1973 and at least 3,000 leftists were killed during his rule. He has been out of office since 1990,
but has remained untouchable in the courts during six years of back-and-forth rulings in scores of cases.

He was arrested in London in 1998 on an extradition request from Spain to face genocide charges, but Britain released him 17
months later on grounds of poor health.

Human rights lawyers say the odds are now against Pinochet as public opinion has turned further against him after the recent
discovery of secret, multimillion-dollar accounts, leading to new accusations of fraud and embezzlement.

"We’re happy and we’re going to keep pushing," said Lorena Pizarro, president of the association of relatives of the
disappeared.

SOUTH AMERICAN SPY NETWORK

Operation Condor was the military code name for an intelligence-sharing network between Chile and other South American
dictatorships in the 1970s that rights groups say aimed to eliminate dissidents throughout the region.

Pinochet’s lawyers told the Supreme Court in hearings this week that the cross-border collaboration in Operation Condor was
comparable to current anti-terrorism efforts in Europe since the September 11, 2001, attacks in the United States.

The highest court removed Pinochet’s immunity once before, in 2001, but his defence lawyers successfully argued that his mild
dementia made him unfit to stand trial. In Chile, previous court rulings do not set precedent.

His lawyers said the same defence will work again.

"Sooner or later, the case will be dismissed due to medical reasons," said defence attorney Pablo Rodriguez.

Pinochet’s close friend and adviser, retired General Guillermo Garin, told Reuters, "there are medical reports that show he is
incapable of directing a defence and therefore this is not a fair trial."

But human rights lawyers say Pinochet jeopardised his mental-health defence when he gave a lucid interview to a Miami
television station in December. A psychiatrists’ analysis of the broadcast, presented by plaintiffs to the Supreme Court this week,
concluded he was in good mental health.

Chileans were outraged in July when a U.S. Senate committee’s report revealed that Pinochet held up to $8 million (4.5 million
pounds) in secret offshore bank accounts. (Reuters)

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