CHILE: General Augusto Pinochet, (88) the former dictator of Chile, and his wife Lucia, (80) are facing an assault on three fronts as they try to counter evidence that they made immense financial gains during of his 25 years in power.
Large amounts of cash came to him from the sale of state assets, particularly in the insurance business. He was also linked to the drug trade through the Chilean army he commanded. His wife shared his bank accounts and received cash from a charity fund fed by cash from the football lottery.
Action against Pinochet in the courts on financial charges is expected to fare better than those on human rights issues which the Chilean judiciary have stalled.
A report published by the US Senate's Permanent Sub-Committee on Investigations on July 15th concerning money-laundering and foreign corruption, reveals that the general and his wife controlled accounts at the Washington-based Riggs Bank which held up to $12 million. When he resigned in 1998 his annual pay as army commander-in-chief came to no more than $15,000.
On the eve of the publication of the report the disgraced Riggs Bank was sold off by its former owners for $779 million, a fraction of what they paid for it.
From the moment he was arrested at the London Clinic in October 1998 at the insistence of the Spanish investigating magistrate Baltasar Garzón until the Blair government allowed him to sidestep the Spanish courts and return to Chile in March 2000 the branch of Riggs in London's West End assisted Pinochet.
While he was confined in a house in Surrey the bank transferred the equivalent of many millions of euros around the world though there was supposed to be a freeze on his assets. Riggs aided its valued customer in his financial manoeuvres with no objection from the British authorities who were detaining him.
When President Lagos of Chile met President Bush in the White House on July 19th, the US president pledged his help in a complete investigation of the affair.
Mr Bush remarked. "You're seeing a transparent society dealing with allegations. And we'll make sure that people know the truth."
Evidence of the involvement of the Chilean army under Pinochet's command in the export of narcotics from Chile was provided by Corporal Frankell Baramdyka, a former US marine convicted of drug charges. As set out in this correspondent's biography of the general, Baramdyka testified that 12 tons of cocaine were exported in 1986 and 1987 from FAMAE, the army's weapons factory, concealed in packages of Chilean-manufactured cluster bombs which were being exported to Iraq and Iran.
The narcotics were dropped off on the way to the Middle East at Port-au-Prince, the capital of Haiti, or in the Canary Islands. No such undertaking could have been attempted without Pinochet's blessing, according to Chilean military experts.
He constantly boasted of knowing of everything which went on in Chile and in October 1981 famously declared: "Not a leaf moves in Chile if I don't move it, let that be clear."
Apart from action by the US Senate, Pinochet faces two judicial inquiries in Santiago. Judge Juan Guzmán who had been investigating his part in the so-called Caravan of Death, the murder of various supporters of the civilian government of President Salvador Allende in the weeks following his 1973 coup, is looking into his financial affairs at the instance of the families of his victims.
Additionally this month the Chilean Court of Appeal asked Judge Sergio Muñoz to look into the possibility that Pinochet or his wife, or both, avoided tax on the sums in question or broke regulations about the maintenance of foreign bank accounts.
Those seeking justice against Pinochet feel that financial wrongdoing will be more easily proved against the dictator's wife. She has never benefited from his immunity from prosecution, nor has any court declared that her mental capacities were impaired, as the courts found after medical tests were carried out on him in 2002.
She was the beneficiary with him of three Riggs bank accounts set up in their joint names and it was to her that Riggs issued 38 cheques, each for $50,000 which were cashed in Santiago between August 2000 and April 2002.
In 1974 she also took over a fund financed by the Chilean mothers' union, CEMA, and received sums from it.
Under Pinochet's authority Polla Chilena, the football lottery, was ordered to make contributions to the fund whose accounting procedures were defective.
In his book La Familia Militar the leading Chilean journalist Hernán Millas reported that in 1998 CEMA-Chile received some $600,000, from the Polla.