Sebastian Brett (London Observer): Justice a step closer in Chile

EDITED for typing

From the London Observer (Sunday supplement of the Guardian Unlimited)
Dated Sunday May 30

Justice a step closer in Chile
By Sebastian Brett in Santiago

The decision by a Chilean appeal court on Friday to strip former dictator Augusto Pinochet of his immunity, in order to face a new trial for human rights atrocities, was as unexpected as it was welcome. The astonishment was palpable, when lawyers, journalists, and relatives who were awaiting the start of a quite separate human rights hearing first heard the news. The white-haired judge, who had chaired the panel responsible for the decision, was greeted with applause as he walked past. As is from nowhere, demonstrators appeared outside the building. The hallways were filled with jubilant cheers.
General Pinochet, the brutal former dictator whose health problems have repeatedly enabled him to avoid standing trial for torture, murder and kidnapping during his 17-year rule, is expected to appeal. His lawyers may again plead his mental unfitness to stand trial, as they have already done on four previous occasions - once in London and three times in Chile. Friday's verdict will, however, remain a source of enduring comfort to his victims. It shows how tenacity in the cause of justice can still prevail against all the odds. It was a remarkable victory for Juan Guzmán, the judge who came close to convicting Pinochet for murder in 2001. The court's reasoning has not yet been published. According to some reports, however, a decisive factor was an interview Pinochet gave to a Miami television station last year. In that interview, he coolly announced that it was his victims who owed him an apology, and that he considered himself a "good angel."
The crimes Guzmán is investigating were part of "Operation Condor," a clandestine scheme by the military regimes of Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, and Paraguay in the 1970s to kidnap and 'disappear' dissidents from each other's countries, or smuggle them back home for torture, interrogation and imprisonment. So far, no one has been held accountable for these crimes, which were planned carefully to cover the state's tracks. Argentine and Uruguayan perpetrators escaped under amnesty laws which were tailored to shield them for trial. But Chilean courts have repeatedly refused to apply the self-amnesty which Pinochet ordered in 1978, to draw a veil over his brutal crusade against the opponents of his regime.
Of more than 200 former officers now facing trials, 15 have received jail sentences, including Pinochet's former intelligence chief, Manuel Contreras. On the same day as the Pinochet decision was announced, the Supreme Court began hearing Contreras's appeal, which challenges the interpretation of the amnesty now current in the criminal courts and calls for the amnesty to be applied immediately.

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Bush and his buddies better watch out!

Now the Bushies know what they have to look forward in the furture.