| The Crimes of the Chilean Generals: |
2 December 2004
Pinochet faces murder probe
A Chilean court has stripped former military ruler
Augusto Pinochet of his legal immunity over the murder of his predecessor as army chief.
The decision means he can be investigated for his alleged role in the killing of Gen
Carlos Prats, who died in a car bomb attack in 1974.
------------ |
Chile's armed
forces
Unravelling a tortured past
Dec 2nd 2004
SANTIAGO From The Economist print edition
The armed forces are finally found guilty of the dictatorship's abuses. ALMOST 15
years after the end of Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship, Chileans have been confronted with
the magnitude and cruelty of the torture it inflicted. After hearing the testimonies of
35,000 political detainees, an official commission has concluded that torture was a
habitual practice of the armed forces and police throughout the dictatorship.
--------- |
November 29, 2004
Chile: Government Discloses Torture Was State Policy
Commission Calls for Reparations for Thousands
Tortured During Pinochet Era
A Chilean presidential commission has provided an
overwhelming indictment of the military dictatorship’s systematic use of torture,
Human Rights Watch said today. In a report released last night, the commission collected
testimony from thousands of torture victims who had never previously reported the abuse
they had suffered.
--------
|
Riggs Uncovers Deep Ties to Pinochet
Internal Inquiry Finds Indications of Money Laundering
By Terence O'Hara
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, November 20, 2004
A Riggs Bank internal investigation has uncovered signs of money laundering by bank
employees, including efforts in 2003 to help Argentine naval officers hide $3.8 million in
cash to prevent seizure by investors after the Argentine government defaulted on bond
payments. The investigation by a small team of former Secret Service agents hired by Riggs
last year also discovered that efforts by former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet to hide
millions of dollars at Riggs go back to 1985, nearly 10 years earlier than previously
known. Pinochet came to power in a 1973 coup and instituted several years of bloody
repression. He resigned after a 1989 election, but he remained commander-in-chief of the
armed forces until 1998.
---------------------------
|
6 November 2004
(BBC World Service)
The Chilean army has for the first time accepted responsibility
for human rights violations carried out during military rule by Gen Augusto Pinochet.
The admission is a reversal of the army's previous
position, which held that abuses of 1973-1990 were excesses carried out by individual
officers. In a statement, army commander Gen Juan Emilio Cheyre said the decision was
"difficult but irreversible".
--------------
|
ZNet |
Memories of Chile in the Midst of an American Presidential
Campaign
Ariel Dorfman (October 2004)
Day after day over the past three years, as I watched Americans respond to the terror that
unexpectedly descended upon them on September 11th, 2001, the direst memories of Chile and
its dictatorship resonated in my mind. There was something dreadfully familiar in the
patriotic posturing, the militarization of society, the way in which anyone who dared to
be faintly critical was automatically branded as a traitor. Yes, I had seen that before:
"You are either with us or against us." I had seen it far too often -- national
security trumpeted as a justification for any excess in the pursuit of an elusive enemy.
----------------
|
Róbinson
Rojas, June 1974
The Murder of Allende. And the End of the
Chilean Way to Socialism
A
Necessary Explanation
Ch 1. The Artful Staging of a
"Suicide" - The
rebel forces - The background
of the conspiracy - Staging
the "suicide" - The
contradictions - What really
happened
Ch. 2. Why was the general
assassinated? - The Schneider
case - A problem for the U.S.
- Allende, the new president - Now what? - The hard-liners - Strength and weakness - The constitutionalists
Ch. 3. The bosses conspire and the
workers mobilize - The empty
pots - The area of social
property - A minister general
- To advance or not to advance
- A new military plot - October 1972
Ch. 4. The Pentagon tells the
generals to go ahead - The
political failure - The
elections - The generals -
Now or never
Ch. 5. The general is not an
honorable man - The last
message - A new step forward
- A new military insurrection
- A long meeting - The pawns - A murder - Prats's ruin - And the Navy - The last days - The oath
Ch. 6. The inferno - Operation Pincers - The tortures - The women - Corruption
Notes for chapter 6 - NOTES
- INDEX |
Rebeca Evans, 20
October 2004
Pinochet and the Chilean Military's Tarnished Legacy
Pinochet’s current troubles, as well as the
ongoing legal proceeding against other officials of the former regime, demonstrate that
the unfinished business left over from the era of the military rule continues to preoccupy
Chile. This has frustrated military officials like General Cheyre, who recently criticized
the fact that the military has been made the scapegoat for all the excesses committed
under the military regime and called for an end to interminable human rights trials. Yet
so long as officials from the previous regime deny responsibility and information on the
fate of the disappeared only comes to light in periodic, fortuitous finds – such as
the recent discovery of sections of rail track that had been used to weigh down the bodies
of dissidents dumped at sea – the search for truth and justice will have to continue.
------------------
|
From The Economist,
21 October 2004:
Chile's new constitution
Untying the knot
Chile looks set to purge the vestiges of dictatorship
from the constitution
WHEN Ricardo Lagos became Chile's president in March 2000, he promised “a
constitution that passes the test of full democracy”. Thanks to a new cross-party
agreement, that promise now seems close to being fulfilled. The constitution, written by
General Augusto Pinochet's 1973-90 dictatorship, was approved by a plebiscite in 1980, but
its legitimacy was as thin as the transparent voting papers used in the plebiscite, and
its intentions were just as undemocratic...
-----------
|
TNI: The Pinochet
Precedent:
NEWS
Dossier Orlando Letelier
LINKS
SEARCH |
BBC News (28 May
2004)
Court lifts Pinochet's immunity
Chile's Pinochet victims testify
13 May 04
US revisits Pinochet 'secrets'
04 May 04
Pinochet's police chief jailed
18 May 04 |
| |
The National
Security Archive:
Chile
Documentation Project |
Report by the Committee on Truth and Reconciliation
(1991)
(Rettig Report. Chile)
Contents
Foreword
Introduction
to the English Edition
Guide
to the English Edition
Guide
to the Editor's Notes
Acronyms
Introduction
Supreme
Decree No. 355
-
PART ONE
Chapter
One
Chapter
Two
PART TWO
Chapter
One
Chapter
Two
Chapter
Three
Chapter
Four
PART THREE
Chapter
One
Chapter
Two
Chapter
Three
Chapter
Four
Chapter
Five
PART FOUR
Chapter
One
Chapter
Two
Chapter
Three
Chapter
Four
APPENDICES
Appendix
I
Appendix
II
Appendix
III |
| Institute for
Police Studies: Bring
Pinochet to Justice |
| |
| H. O'Shaughnessy: Pinochet, a
master of duplicity |
| H. O'Shaughnessy: Revealed:
Pinochet drug smuggling |
| How a 'fat fish' finally
slipped through the net |
| The ghost of Chile's
repressive past |
| Still imprisoned by his past |
| British government justification
to grant freedom to a serial killer named Augusto Pinochet Ugarte |
| |
| New Amendments to the Chilean
Constitution Confers Absolute Immunity to General A. Pinochet |
| The Economist: Releasing Pinochet (The murderer returns a
pitiful figure) |
| The Economist: The Pinochet Affair. Blackwashing Allende |
| Tony Karon: Pinochet's Life Sentence |
| On "Pinochet and the Politics of Torture", by H.
O'Shaughnessy |
| Amnesty
International: The case of general Pinochet |
| The Black Book of the Chilean Judiciary (1999) (Spanish) El Libro Negro de la Justicia Chilena (1999) |
| |
| Amnesty International on Chile |
Notorious Chilean School of the Americas Graduates
SOA: Students and instructors from Chile 1951-1996
SOA: Estudiantes e instructores chilenos 1951-1996 |
| M. Cooper: Chile and the
end of Pinochet (2001) |
The House of Lords' resolution on
general Augusto Pinochet immunity (November 1998) |
The House of Lords' resolution on
general Augusto Pinochet immunity (March 1999) |
| M.
Neumann: The crimes of Augusto
Pinochet |
| Human
Rights Watch: The Pinochet
Decision |
| The truth about Pinochet |
| A tale of two Chileans: Allende and Pinochet
compared |
| The Chile Committee for Justice |
| Derechos Chile: Human Rights in
Chile |
| Chile Vive |
Lieutenant
Junior Grade C. Ruefli USN: A denial
R. Rojas: The Chilean Armed Forces: a political
organization
R. Rojas: The Chilean Armed Forces: a band
of criminals
R. Rojas: The Chilean Armed Forces: training
dogs to rape political prisoners
H. O'Shaughnessy: Chile's family torture
sessions shock nation
P. O'Brian: Pinochet and his secret police
crimes
|
| Books
on Salvador Allende AMAZON Bookshop |
| CIA, State, NSC
documents declassified on Chile (June 1999) |
U.S. State
Department (The Pinochet Files).-F.O.I.A.
Document Collections
Summary
State Department Collections
• FOIA Released Documents
• Allegations of Drug Trafficking in L.A.
• Argentina Declassification Project (1975-1984)
• State Chile Declassification Project Tranche I (1973-1978)
• State Chile Declassification Project Tranche II (1968-1972)
• State Chile Declassification Project Tranche III (1979-1991)
• CIA Creation Documents
• El Salvador Churchwomen Documents
• Guatemala Collection
• Raoul Wallenberg
• El Salvador Collection
• Amelia Earhart Collection
• International Agreements Collection
• International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITARs)
Argentina Declassification Press Releases/Statements
• State
Department Press Release
Chile Declassification Press Releases/Statements
• 06/30/1999 State
Department Press Release
• 10/08/1999 State
Department Press Release
• 11/13/2000 State
Department Press Statement
• 06/30/1999 White House Press
Statement
• 10/08/1999 White House Press
Statement
• 11/13/2000 White House Press
Statement
Other Agency Chile Declassification Documents
NARA- National Archives and
Records Administration
CIA- Central Intelligence Agency
DOD- Department of Defense
FBI- Federal Bureau of
Investigation
DOJ- Department of Justice
NSC- National Security Council
Church Report - (Covert
Action in Chile, 1963-1973)
Hinchey Report - (CIA
Activities in Chile)
|
| FBI Report on Directorate of National Intelligence (DINA) |
| Report of CIA Chilean Task Force Activities, 15 Sept/3 Nov 1970 |
| P.
Kornbluh: Declassified
documents relating to the military coup, September 11, 1973. |
| P.
Kornbluh: The Chile Coup - The U.S. Hand |
| |
| George
Washington University: The National Security
Archive |
| U.S.
Senate: Covert Action in Chile 1963-1973 |
| L.
Komisar : Kissinger declassified |
| L.
Komisar : Into the
Murky Depths of 'Operation Condor' |
| L.
Komisar : Documented complicity |
| School of the Americas Watch |
|
Socavón
Cantata para los mineros del carbón
Dirección, música y canciones:
Mauricio Venegas-Astorga
Texto : Jorge Lagos Urra
Junio 2001 |
|
Andre Gunder Frank (1995)
The
Underdevelopment of Development
"I intend to undertake a political sociology of
knowledge of the study of development based on my own experience and perspective. I review
the three varieties of development economics; neo-classical (right), Keynesian (center)
and Marxist (left) and autobiographically my own participation in all of them. Perhaps I
can also clarify how on further reflection my choice for the study of development is now
none of the above. I would not wish to find myself in any of these camps when H.W. Arndt
(1987: 162-3) can write:..."
(Note by Róbinson Rojas: I do recommend readind here the section on Chile
and the Popular Unity .)
------------------------- |
From The Economist:
Country briefings: CHILE |
From The Economist
print edition
Chile's army
Frozen in time
May 26th 2005 | SANTIAGO
A tragedy exposes military flaws THE Chilean armed forces have long had a high opinion of
their own professionalism, whatever some of their fellow-countrymen think of their abuses
under the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet. The death last weekend of some 40
troops, killed in a freak Andean blizzard, was not just the army's worst peacetime loss.
It has shaken confidence in the institution just as it had finally started to reform.
----------------------- |
From The Economist
print edition
Chile
Reshuffling the electoral cards
May 19th 2005 | SANTIAGO
A surprise presidential candidate may signal a new era in Chilean politics Get article
background UNTIL last week, Chile's opposition parties were pretty much resigned to losing
the next presidential election, due in December, and seeing the centre-left government
coalition take a fourth term in office. But now, following a rebellion in the National
Renewal (RN), the smaller of the two main opposition parties, the race has been thrown
wide open.
------------------ |
From The Economist
print edition
The
Organisation of American States
Leading from the south
May 5th 2005 | SANTIAGO
Right man, tough job
THE United States, Winston Churchill noted, can always be relied upon to do the right
thing—once it has exhausted all the alternatives. So it proved last week, albeit in a
matter of less moment than Churchill had in mind: finding a new secretary-general for the
Organisation of American States (OAS). Having tried fruitlessly to secure the election of
two other candidates, the Americans finally threw their weight behind José Miguel
Insulza, Chile's interior minister. On May 2nd, he was elected with the support of 31 of
the OAS's 34 member states.
-------------------- |
From The Economist
print edition
Peru and Chile
Refighting a war
May 5th 2005 | LIMA
Injuries, real and imagined
ALONG with colonial churches and mansions and pleasant parks and beaches, Lima has much
urban squalor. It is, after all, the capital of a fairly poor country. But understandably
enough, Peruvians were not amused when LAN-Peru, the country's biggest airline, recently
aired an in-flight video made in 1997 promoting "adventure tourism". This showed
filthy streets and ragged homeless people urinating in them. LAN's parent company is
Chilean. The affair...
-------------------- |
|
ECLAC - 2003
The capital
account and real macroeconomic stabilization: Chile and Colombia
R. Ffrench-Davis and L. Villar
CEPAL Review 81 - Diciembre 2003
The unremunerated reserve
requirement and net capital
flows: Chile in the 1990s
G. Le Fort and S. Lehmann
ECLAC - Women and Development Unit - 2000
Part-time work in Chile. Is it precarious employment?. Reflections from a gender perspective
S. Leiva
ECLAC - 1996
Restructuring in manufacturing: case studies in Chile, Mexico, and Venezuela
C. Macario
CEPAL Review 68 - August 1999
Trade and Growth in Chile
M. R. Agostin
ECLAC
Chile: structure of merchandise trade. 1987-2002
Based on
national figures
----------------------
|
Chile: Low-intensity democracy
Despite its economic stability and the substantial
improvements that the Government has achieved in the rates of poverty and education, 52%
of Chileans “feel they are losing out, and 74% have negative feelings about the
country’s economic system”. This is no paradox, since according to the World
Bank, Chile is among the 15 countries with the worst income distribution in the world.
Things are not much better in politics, where the principle of “one person, one
vote” is not viable in the “protected democracy” inherited from the
military dictatorship. Centro de Estudios de la Mujer (CEM) Solidaridad y Organización
Local (SOL) Programa de Ciudadanía y Gestión Local Fundación de Superación de la
Pobreza ACTIVA Ana María Arteaga / Carlos Ochsenius, 2004
-
Chile: The brutal rationale of
privatisation
. «Beyond euphemisms, privatisation of health, social
security and education operated by neo-liberals has imposed a brutal rationale: depending
on the amount of money you have, you will have so much health care, quality of education
for your children and pension upon retirement. If you are privileged, you will have access
to privileged services. If you are poor, you will have to make do with what the public
system is able to give you.» ANA MARÍA ARTEAGA. 2003.
-
Chile: growth without equity
At the beginning of the twenty-first century, Chile
shows paradoxical characteristics. While Chile is being touted as a champion of economic
liberalisation, the country is finding that the free trade measures adopted are not
reactivating its economy or reducing the persistent and high unemployment rate and the
serious and prevailing inequality. The private sector is not receptive to monetary and tax
incentives, and the old government is financing thousands of emergency jobs, an
intervention that reminds us of the hardest times of the 1980s. C. Pey, D. Donoso and L.
Arellano. 2002
-
Chile: Stagnant and
disenchanted
In 2000, the countries of the region were strongly
affected by a variety of problems: the political crisis in Peru; sharp social unrest in
Bolivia, which literally paralyzed the country; and the strong financial, political,
ethical and social crisis affecting Argentina. In this company, Chile appears to be an
exception, demonstrating a “healthy economy” and political stability. L.
Arellano, D. Donoso and C. Pey.2001
-
Chile: precarious progress
...«having created an efficient system for
controlling movements of capital.»... The weight and presence of transnational capital in
the Chilean economy has kept growing, however, and the decisions and interests of those
who control this capital are becoming more powerful in determining not only the economic,
but also the social, political and cultural structure and dynamics of Chile. D. Donoso, M.
Hidalgo and O. Torres. 2000.
-
Chile: Inequality. The latest data
The nineties show no reduction of social inequality in
the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean. The region maintains growth rates of
greater than 5% per year but this is not reflected in a reduction of inequality. High and
sustained economic growth has not assured greater social equity. On the contrary, economic
processes have increased income concentration. (United Nations, ECLAC, «The Equity Gap.
Latin America and the Caribbean in the Social Summit» ). The Chilean economy is
characterised by high and sustained growth rates. In the last decade, it has shown the
enduring nature of income concentration in the hands of the rich and a tendency towards
regression in income distribution. .. X. Valdés. 1998
-
Chile: Economic growth and poverty
The economic growth sustained in Chile over the last
ten years requires a detailed analysis to ascertain the directions taken by the Chilean
economy and society in the nineties. The figures which have been published lately in the
CASEN Survey1 carried out in November 1994, show the tendencies with which this huge
economic growth has been distributed within society. Four main conclusions can be derived
from these facts:... X. Valdés, T. Valdés and J. Bengoa. 1997
|
Róbinson Rojas,
1997
15 years of monetarism in
Latin America: time to scream
For the majority of countries in Latin America the new
gospel of 'free-market plus non-intervention of the state in economic affairs' began to be
standard economic policy in the early eighties. For Chile, though, the new gospel was
inaugurated earlier, in 1974, and the military junta in charge of imposing it did that via
murdering, torturing, imprisoning, and exiling score of thousands of workers, peasants and
intellectuals who tried to oppose the implementation of yet another variety of
"savage capitalism". For those who praise savage capitalism, Chile is an
"economic miracle" and the rest of the Latin American nations are
"deregulating", "rolling back" and "liberalizing" to become
the "miracles" following the one created by the murderous Chilean military
junta. |
Róbinson Rojas,
1997
The Chilean way to
socialism. Popular Unity
In 1970, before the presidential election, the income
differentials for the urban population ( 75 % of the population), were as follows (taking
average income of blue-collar workers as one): Employers 40.0, High rank civil servants
20.8, White-collar workers 3.3, Blue-collar workers 1.0, (Source: R.Rojas, "La Unidad
Popular, Hacia donde?", 1973)... By 1970, a large sector of the Chilean population
was openly advocating a revolution. The prevailing revolutionary ideology was one based in
the enormous economic power of the "mobilising state". This ideology posed the
strategy of "making the revolution from inside the state", gaining the
government, that is. That was the basis for the political programme presented by the
Popular Unity (Unidad Popular) for the presidential elections in 1970... |
S. B. Crofts Wiley,
1997
Becoming Modern: Capitalism, Agency and the Left in Neoliberal Chile
In Chile, a significant segment of the left has moved into the state and finds itself
co-governing one of the most radically capitalist societies in Latin America. |
Pilar Vergara,
1996
Structural adjustment in
Chile
Over the past decade, the social reforms carried out by the Chilean military regime have
been celebrated as a model for other Latin American countries anxious to overcome the
endemic crises of their social-security systems. The policies introduced by the Aylwin and
Frei governments to reduce poverty levels within the free-market system, and the initial
success of those efforts, reinforced the belief that Chile was a viable model for other
countries engaging in social reform. Little attention has been paid, however, to the way
the Concertacion governments' redistributive efforts have been hampered by the new social
institutions established by the Pinochet regime. An examination of the successes and
limitations of Chile's social policy reveals how neoliberal social reforms have
fundamentally restricted the scope and impact of the Concertacion's attempts to achieve
"growth with equity." |
Chile:
The Popular Unity's
Programme (A case of Alternative Development)
This programme, in 1970, represented an alternative way for development, based on ECONOMIC
GROWTH WITH EQUAL ACCESS TO ECONOMIC RESOURCES AND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT WITH EQUAL ACCESS TO
POLITICAL RESOURCES for the Chilean population. Students of development should take a deep
look at this text, because today, thirty years after the murderers led by the White
House and the Chilean generals killed Salvador Allende, still is a valid and consistent
"programme for sustainable development" alternative to the capitalist model
which exclude a large portion of society from the fruits of economic growth, and which
also unleashes environmental destruction and "unhuman" development. (Róbinson
Rojas, 2003) |
Salvador Allende
Speech to the UN General
Assembly, 4th Dec. 1972
Salvador Allende's speech is a historical document
which scholars should read when trying to understand what kind of reality is faced by
societies struggling for development in a context where national strategies are brutally
constrained by "international forces". These forces being grouped under banners
like "defense of the democratic system" during the Cold War, or "market
forces"/ "globalization" in the post-Cold War era. In this excerpts of
Salvador Allende's speech the "international forces" are very well
individualized...there is no difference between those forces in 1972 and now, in the
1990s... (Robinson Rojas, 1998) |
S. Kangas:
The Chicago boys and the
"Chilean economic miracle"
|
| O. Letelier:
Chile: economic 'freedom' and political
repression |
Andre Gunder Frank
Economic Genocide in Chile.
Monetarist Theory versus Humanity |
| K. Coughlan:
The dark side of
Chile's economic miracle. 1992 |
A. Hejslet:
The Chilean
Experience 1974-1998
|
| C. Schneider:
Chile: the underside of the miracle
|
| Washington
Post: Chile |
| CIA World Factbook 1997:
Chile |
| The World Bank: Chile |
Interamerican Development Bank
Chile: as seen by the IADB
|
| Chile Sustentable (Sustainable Chile) |
| UNESCO: Chile |
| R.Rojas: Dependent capitalist development: Chile(1960s)(notes) |
| S. Larrain: Chilean Ecological Action Network |
| Chilean Ecological Action
Network (RENACE) |
J. Jontz : Chile,
forests, investments and NAFTA
Chile Sustentable (Sustainable Chile)
__________________
Bolsa de Comercio de Santiago
Bolsa Electronica de Chile
Camara Nacional de Comercio de Chile
Chilean-American Chamber of Commerce
Chile Electronic Yellow Pages |
Universidad de Chile: Centro de Economía Aplicada
Working papers 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 |
Export Promotion Bureau of Chile [Prochile]
Trade Data [U.S.A.I.D.]
Chile Business Guide 1996/97
Chile Trade and Investment Guide
Foreign Direct Investments 1974-1996
|
|
Official statistics
Banco Central de Chile-Central Bank of Chile
Instituto Nacional de Estadisticas -Agosto 1998
(National Institute of Statistics -August 1998)
Instituto Nacional de Estadisticas
|
| Business News Americas |
|
