News about Pinochet

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Law lords set to overturn first Pinochet extradition ruling

London TIMES March 22 1999

JACK STRAW was forced yesterday to deny that his activities as a student disqualified him from deciding on the extradition of General Augusto Pinochet, the former Chilean dictator.
The Home Office rejected allegations that Mr Straw had met and shared afternoon tea with Salvador Allende, the President overthrown by General Pinochet, while on a visit to Chile 33 years ago. A spokesman also denied that Mr Straw had demonstrated against the general's regime after the bloody coup of 1973.
Friends of Mr Straw said both claims, which surfaced in Sunday newspapers with photographs of Mr Straw during the 1966 visit, were designed to destabilise the Home Secretary just days before the House of Lords verdict on the general's extradition to Spain. One source close to the Home Secretary said: "This is clearly designed to put him in a difficult position."
However Lord Lamont of Lerwick, the former Tory Chancellor who has been campaigning for the general's release, called for Mr Straw to make a statement to the Commons to clear up the matter.
Mr Straw had previously taken legal advice on whether his visit to Chile with a group of students to build a youth hostel barred him from assuming his quasi-judicial role in the case. He was advised it did not. The case will be back in Mr Straw's hands this week after a ruling by the law lords, which will give a boost to the former dicator's case for freedom.
The law lords, the highest court in the land, are expected to rule that the former dictator cannot be extradited for alleged crimes committed before 1988. This was the date when torture became an extra-territorial crime under British law. At the same time, a majority of the law lords, led by Sir Nicholas Browne-Wilkinson, the senior law lord, is expected to uphold the case for denying the general immunity from prosecution for alleged crimes after that date. As most of the allegations drawn up by the Spanish relate to acts in the first few months after General Pinochet seized power in 1973, the Spanish Government's case for extradition could be fatally holed.
The long-awaited ruling - believed to run to some 200 pages in total, with each judge giving his own reasons - throws a new perspective on the extradition wrangle. The law lords originally ruled before Christmas that the former dictator had no immunity from prosecution by a three-to-two majority. But that ruling had to be set aside after it emerged that one of the majority, Lord Hoffmann, had failed to disclose links with Amnesty International.
The second sitting, over 12 days by a rare panel of seven law lords, heard new evidence not aired before the previous panel of five, which has been critical to their decision. The new arguments focused on the definition of an extradition crime: whether the crimes alleged were extraditable in law.
The nub of the issue is whether the crime had to be one that was extraditable at the time it was committed both in the foreign country and in the requesting state; or whether it is enough that the crime is now extraditable in the requesting state.
The law lords have decided to follow the reasoning of the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Bingham of Cornhill, who looked at the issue when it first came before the High Court. They have been persuaded of the argument that, before 1988, no one could be tried in a British court for torture unless the alleged offence took place on British territory, and no one could be extradited for a torture charge except to the country where the alleged offence took place.
The second key point in their ruling will be whether the general has immunity as a former head of state from extradition in respect of those crimes which the law lords decide are extraditable. On this they are believed to have decided that he does not, although this then leaves a much smaller corpus of crimes to form the case for extradition.
The ruling on Wednesday will be a body blow to the case for extraditing the former dictator put forward by the Spanish Government. It means that the go-ahead to extradite originally given by Mr Straw will have to be revisited. It is also certain to prompt a succession of legal challenges.
If the Home Secretary gives the go-ahead for extradition, General Pinochet's legal team will mount a fresh challenge.

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Law Lords to muddy waters on Pinochet Dictator will not have immunity - but ruling may cut chances of conviction

OBSERVER (London) Sunday March 21, 1999
By Andy McSmith, Chief Political Correspondent

General Augusto Pinochet looks set to lose another round in his legal battle to avoid being tried for acts committed during his years as dictator of Chile, according to lawyers close to the case.
Seven Law Lords are expected to rule on Wednesday that the General's status as a former head of state does not give him blanket immunity from prosecution for murder and other crimes for which the Spanish government is seeking his extradition.
But the judgment may include a twist which will reduce the chance of a conviction. Lawyers believe the Law Lords may rule that the General cannot be tried for any offence committed in Chile before September 1988, the date on which torture became an 'extra-territorial' crime under British law.
That ruling, according to one of the lawyers involved, "would seriously disable the case". He added: "Under the extradition treaty, the Spanish can only try him on the charges on which he has been extradited. Once they have got him, they can't say, 'Thank you very much, we'll add a few more charges'."
The ruling is likely to mean that the General's enforced stay in Britain will stretch for many more months as the courts concentrate on the evidence against him. Home Secretary Jack Straw may ultimately have to decide whether to extradite Pinochet to Spain or allow him to return to Chile on compassionate grounds.
Yesterday, Chileans who lost friends and relatives to Pinochet's reign of terror, and their sympathisers, protested outside the luxury home in Virginia Water, Surrey, where the 83-year-old General is under house arrest.
On Tuesday morning they plan to plant small wooden crosses in the grass on Parliament Square to commemorate the 4,000 who died and will hold an outdoor service. The Law Lords' judgement will be delivered at 2pm the next day.
If - contrary to predictions - they rule that Pinochet is immune from prosecution, he will be allowed to leave for Chile immediately. The General arrrived for medical treatment last September.
Straw has already ruled out making Pinochet stand trial in Europe for genocide, and the Attorney-General, John Morris, has refused leave for a private prosecution to be brought against him in Britain for the alleged murder of William Beausire, a British businessman kidnapped in Argentina in 1974.
Questioned in the Commons this month by Labour MP Jeremy Corbyn, Morris said his decision was based on advice from Government lawyers that "the provision on torture in the Criminal Justice Act 1988 came into effect and applied only after September 1988, and an offence regarding hostage-taking only after November 1982." He added: "The legislation is not retrospective."
Before 1988, no one could be tried in a British court for torture unless the alleged offence took place on British territory - and no one could be extradited on a torture charge, except to the country where the offence was allegedly committed.
The Spaniards have drawn up a conspiracy charge against Pinochet within their own jurisdiction. They allege that when he visited Spain for the funeral of dictator Francisco Franco in 1975, he conspired to kill Chilean exiles. There are also charges in the deposition which relate to acts committed after 1988, but most of Pinochet's alleged victims were tortured or killed in Chile in the first few months after he seized power in 1973.

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Revealed: the house that Jack built in Chile

SUNDAY TIMES (London) March 21 1999 BRITAIN

AS Jack Straw faces one of the toughest decisions of his career as home secretary, the first pictures have emerged of his trip to Chile as a student leader 33 years ago, write Maurice Chittenden and Carey Scott.
This week the signs are that Britain's law lords may approve the extradition of General Augusto Pinochet, the former Chilean dictator, to Spain on charges of murder, torture and kidnapping. Straw will have to make the ultimate decision on whether to send him to Madrid.
In 1966 Straw was among a party of 20 students who flew to Chile to build a youth community centre. Straw has already taken legal advice on whether the trip has any bearing on his ability to make decisions in the Pinochet case. Barristers have advised him that it has no relevance.
Straw met student leaders and wrote a newspaper article on his return broadly advocating the land reform policies of a party led by Salvador Allende, the future Marxist president who died during a bloody coup when Pinochet seized power in 1973.
The seven senior judges have now made their decision on the question of Pinochet's extradition. Some are believed to favour upholding the ruling given by law lords last November denying Pinochet immunity from extradition as a former head of state.
That judgment was overturned after it was revealed that Lord Hoffmann, one of the presiding law lords, had not disclosed his fundraising ties to Amnesty International, which was a civil party to the case. However, it is understood that the new judgment will not censure Hoffman.
If the ruling goes against him, Pinochet will almost certainly brief his lawyers to embark on a protracted appeal effort that could take years. Straw's visit to Chile would be one of the issues raised.
The photographs, obtained by one of Straw's compatriots on the trip, show the students, some still in their college blazers, posing in the shell of the community centre. The students stayed with local families and spent six hours a day at the building site. Arwel Ellis Owen, then a university student at Aberystwyth, said some students visited political leaders in Santiago during their stay. He did not know if Straw was among them.
Straw has said that after almost 33 years he could not recall anything that could be defined as "political activity". On his return he wrote a 1,100-word article for Tribune, the left-wing newspaper, accusing the Americans of pouring millions of dollars into the ruling Christian Democrat party "via fake foundations". He added that the Chilean electorate might turn to Allende's communist-socialist opposition party as the "only choice left" to achieve the land reform the country needed.

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Pinochet team to question visit by Straw to Chile

SUNDAY TIMES (London) March 21 1999 BRITAIN
by Maurice Chittenden

THIS is the house that Jack built. Thirty-three years on, it could challenge the foundations of the home secretary's authority. Jack Straw put in a six-hour working day for six weeks helping to build a youth community centre in Chile while a student at Leeds University.
This week the law lords will decide whether General Augusto Pinochet, the former Chilean dictator, should be extradited to Spain to face charges of murder and torture. Pinochet's one loophole may be a legal point - that his alleged crimes occurred before the 1988 Criminal Justice Act brought crimes against humanity under UK jurisdiction. If the law lords sanction his extradition, the ultimate verdict on whether he is put on a plane to Madrid lies with Straw.
Pinochet's supporters and the home secretary's political opponents will question whether Straw's visit to South America compromises his ability to make the decision on extradition. They say Straw's apparent support for the policies of Dr Salvador Allende, who died during a coup by Pinochet in 1973, could mirror the position of Lord Hoffmann, whose membership of Amnesty International enabled Pinochet to win an earlier appeal against a House of Lords decision saying he was not immune from prosecution as a former head of state.
Straw has said he cannot recall any "political activity" during his visit to Chile. However, one of his fellow students revealed yesterday that some of them had gone to the Chilean capital to meet political leaders. He could not recall if Straw was among them.
The visit was organised in July and August 1966, by the Fund for International Student Co-operation. A party of 20 students from universities all over Britain flew to Chile to help build the youth centre in Viqa del Mar, a seaside town a few miles north of Valparaiso, Chile's main port.
At the time Chile was run by President Eduardo Frei, a former Catholic youth leader. Allende's Marxist government was four years away but there were growing demands for land reform from the masses of landless peasants. Student leaders were to take up their cause in 1967 and form the guerrilla group MIR (the Movement of the Revolutionary Left).
The British students were hosted by the Catholic University of Valparaiso's student federation.
Eduardo Vio, a long-time socialist, who was president of the student federation at the time, said he did not recall meeting Straw, but he recognised his face when he saw it on Chilean television after Pinochet was arrested in a London hospital last year.
Straw's travel companions included Alun Evans, then students' president at the London School of Economics, and Arwel Ellis Owen, who later became head of programmes for the BBC in Northern Ireland. They stayed in the homes of student families.
Owen said yesterday that other student leaders, including Geoffrey Martin and Trevor Fisk, who both, like Straw, went on to become presidents of the National Union of Students, visited them during their stay. One of the student group later became an unsuccessful Labour candidate.
Owen, who was studying international politics at Aberystwyth, said: "Most of us were student leaders at the time. Jack Straw was at Leeds. We did the work as part of the trip. It was good physical stuff that kept us in shape. We were working in a very tough, poor area. It was good to see the building go up; it was an expression that would stay after our visit. We met the community every day because they came when we ate our lunch. It was open air, lovely weather, quite informal.
"I did not get involved in politics apart from meeting ordinary people. I know others got involved. They went to see different political leaders when we were in Santiago. I chose to go on holiday in a bus."
He added: "Jack was just an ordinary member of the gang. At that time if you were spotting future leaders there were strong competitors. He was quite shy and withdrawn."
On his return to Britain, however, Straw penned a 1,100-word article for Tribune, the left-wing newspaper. Under the headline "Can Frei reform Chile?" he wrote an account of the political scene in the country, claiming that Frei's Christian Democrat government was being propped up by the Americans and that people might turn to Allende's communist-socialist Frente Accion Popular (FRAP) as the only choice left for land reform.
He wrote: "Thus the entire underlying trend in Chilean politics is a burning desire for reform. At the last election, the Chileans decided they would prefer this reform to be brought about by the more moderate Christian Democrat party than by the communist-socialist alliance FRAP. But party loyalties in Chile are very tenuous."
The Home Office said last week that Straw had not engaged in any political activity while in Chile. Lord Williams of Mostyn, the Home Office minister, said in a Commons written answer last month: "The home secretary tells me that during his stay he met a number of Chilean students in the Chilean Students' Federation and talked about politics and other subjects. But after 32 years he cannot recall anything which could be defined as 'political activity' beyond that."

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Law Lords To Rule On Ex-dictator Pinochet's Fate

From the Press Association
Sunday March 21, 1999 3:40 am

General Augusto Pinochet is to learn whether he may return to Chile or must remain in England to face possible extradition to Spain on charges of human rights crimes. The House of Lords will give its ruling on whether the former Chilean dictator enjoys sovereign immunity from arrest and the legal process at 2pm on March 24. A panel of seven Law Lords has been considering since February 4 whether the 83-year-old's arrest in London in mid-October was unlawful. It is deciding whether his status as a former head of state endows him with immunity from extradition to Madrid over abuses carried out by his security forces during his 1973-90 reign. The Spanish authorities, backed by Amnesty International, argued during the 12-day hearing before the Law Lords that Pinochet was liable to prosecution under international customary law and conventions incorporated into English law. The conventions and Acts left him vulnerable, in spite of the State Immunity Act 1978, and the long-standing act of state doctrine under which courts traditionally decline to judge another state's official acts. Amnesty argued that the SIA afforded Pinochet no immunity as his crimes were not acts carried out in the exercise of his functions of a head of state. Knowing that Pinochet's lawyers would say that neither conventions nor Acts could apply retrospectively, the prosecution argued that a code of international law had evolved to the point where, even before Pinochet's 1973 coup, torture and hostage taking were internationally recognised crimes. It was also argued that Pinochet could not be immune over pre-coup crimes, including torturing marines in a bid to keep the plot secret. In contrast, Pinochet's lawyers argued that they could call on clear-cut statute and long-established doctrine, while the prosecution was trying to present still evolving principles as established law.