A group representing the victims and families of Chilean exiles in Britain will initiate a private prosecution against the former Chilean dictator, Gen Augusto Pinochet, it announced yesterday.
Chile Democratico said last night it had decided to go ahead with the prosecution because his arrest had for the first time given it the opportunity to lay criminal charges before a British court. The decision means Gen Pinochet faces the prospect of spending a substantial amount of time in Britain even if the Spanish attempt to extradite him fails. The group will prepare legal papers later today.
In a statement Chile Democratico said: "We have always had in our possession direct evidence of the complicity of Pinochet in the murder of certain British and European nationals in Chile . . . In our view he undoubtedly has a case to answer."
Yesterday a group of Chilean officials visited Gen Pinochet at the London Clinic where he has remained under arrest since the Metropolitan Police acted on an international warrant alleging state-sponsored terrorism and genocide during his 17-year regime in 1973-1990.
The group, which included members of two right-wing opposition parties, Renovacion Nacional and Union Democratica Independiente, spent 30 minutes with Gen Pinochet, who is recovering from back surgery.
Mr Alberto Espina of Renovacion Nacional said Chile must be allowed to resolve its own problems: "We don't want to interfere in Britain's problems and for the same reasons we want to resolve our problems with our laws and through the democratic system that we have at this moment in time."
The human rights group, Amnesty International, appealed to the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Paul Condon, to investigate the disappearance of a British citizen, Mr William Beausire, in Chile in 1975. It said a prosecution could be brought under the 1988 Criminal Justice Act.
A further dimension to Gen Pinochet's arrest is the possible opposition of the US government to his extradition. Reports suggest that Washington fears details being uncovered about its role in providing advisers to the Pinochet regime before and after the 1973 coup. It has expressed its displeasure to London at the move.
The Foreign Office and Home Office yesterday insisted it had received no official US contact.
A spokesman for Baroness Thatcher yesterday described suggestions that she had frequently had tea with Gen Pinochet in London as "somewhat exaggerated".
Acknowledging that Baroness Thatcher had met the former dictator "on a handful of occasions" in London and Chile, the spokesman said they had met 11 days before his arrest last Friday and before that the last time she had met him was about four years ago in London.
The British Foreign Secretary, Mr Robin Cook, yesterday ruled out any government intervention in the extradition proceedings. "The legal system is totally separate from the government. Government institutions have no right to put pressure on courts," he said during a visit to Bulgaria.
The Irish Embassy in London said yesterday that as far as it could establish, no Irish citizens were victims of Gen Pinochet's regime. But it is understood several Irish missionaries were expelled from Chile during his term in office.