Instruct: Given a question, retrieve documents that answer the question.
Query: When was General Augusto Pinochet born?
Augusto José Ramón Pinochet Ugarte (/ˈpiːnəʃeɪ/;[1] Spanish:[auˈɣusto pinoˈ(t)ʃe, -ˈ(t)ʃet];[2][upper-alpha 1] 25 November 1915 – 10 December 2006) was a Chilean general, politician and US-backed dictator[3] of Chile between 1973 and 1990 who remained the Commander-in-Chief of the Chilean Army until 1998 and was also President of the Government Junta of Chile between 1973 and 1981.[4][5][6]
This is a sad, sordid tale of money laundering involving Pinochet accounts at multiple financial institutions using alias names, offshore accounts, and close associates. As a former General and President of Chile, Pinochet was a well-known human rights violator and violent dictator.[131]
In 1970, Stange was named Administrative Chief of the School of Carabineros. Later, he was appointed the Coronel Director of the Superior Institute of Carabineros. In 1977, after the Chilean coup d'état, he became President of the Mining Company of Vallenar. During the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, Stange rose through the ranks until becoming General Subdirector of the police force in June 1982. When General Director César Mendoza Duran resigned on August 2, 1985, Stange was duly appointed to that post, serving "ex officio" as member of the military junta. Stange continued serving as general director after Pinochet's dictatorship ended in 1990.
(in Spanish) – Augusto Pinochet's Necrology on France 24 (special report) from The National Security Archive by economist Jim Cypher in Dollars & Sense magazine New English Review Hoover Digest (2007 No. 1) – video report by Democracy Now!
After the coup d'état carried out by Army General Augusto Pinochet on September 11, 1973 in Chile, which overthrew the elected government of Salvador Allende and established a military dictatorship, a significant number of Chileans emigrated to Canada in early 1974. This migration of refugees to Canada lasted until the nineties, when Pinochet's rule over Chile ended.
Pinochet returned to Chile on 3 March, 2000. His first act when landing in Santiago's airport was to triumphantly get up from his wheelchair to the acclaim of his supporters.[113][114][115] He was first greeted by his successor as head of the Chilean armed forces, General Ricardo Izurieta.[113] President-elect Ricardo Lagos said the retired general's televised arrival had damaged the image of Chile, while thousands demonstrated against him.[116]
The "Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional" () or DINA was the Chilean secret police in the government of Augusto Pinochet. DINA was established in November 1973, as a Chilean Army intelligence unit headed by General Manuel Contreras and vice-director Raúl Iturriaga, who fled from justice in 2007. It was separated from the army and made an independent administrative unit in June 1974, under the aegis of decree #521. DINA made it possible for Augusto Pinochet to come to power.
Human rights violations by the military and security forces in Chile were widespread during the rule of General Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990). Estimates of the number killed and "disappeared" during the Pinochet regime range as high as 17,000.
Over several months in 2005, Chilean judge Sergio Muñoz indicted Augusto Pinochet's wife, Lucia Hiriart; four of his children – Marco Antonio, Jacqueline, Veronica and Lucia Pinochet; his personal secretary, Monica Ananias; and his former aide Oscar Aitken on tax evasion and falsification charges stemming from the Riggs Bank investigation. In January 2006, daughter Lucia Pinochet was detained at Washington DC-Dulles airport and subsequently deported while attempting to evade the tax charges in Chile.[132] In January 2007, the Santiago Court of Appeals revoked most of the indictment from Judge Carlos Cerda against the Pinochet family.[133] But Pinochet's five children, his wife and 17 other persons (including two generals, one of his former lawyer and former secretary) were arrested in October 2007 on charges of embezzlement and use of false passports. They are accused of having illegally transferred $27m (£13.2m) to foreign bank accounts during Pinochet's rule.[134][135]
Juan Emilio Cheyre Espinoza (born October 10, 1947) is a retired Chilean Army General. He was Commander-in-Chief of the Chilean Army from 2002 to 2006. As Commander-in-Chief he attempted to distance the Army from former dictator General Augusto Pinochet, and condemned the human rights abuses of Pinochet's dictatorship.
Chile was then under a military dictatorship headed by General Augusto Pinochet, which committed numerous human rights abuses (before he died in 2006, Pinochet had been prosecuted for his role in Operation Colombo and indicted in absentia in other countries). After the effective end of military rule, in 1989, the Chilean government took steps to investigate additional activities under the Pinochet regime.
In that case Pinochet's immunity was set off by the Appeal Court of Santiago, and this was confirmed by the Supreme Court on 19 October 2005. The judiciary procedure could eventually have led to a trial for Pinochet, as well as for his wife Lucia Hiriart, and one of his sons, Marco Antonio Pinochet, sued for complicity. Judge Juan Guzmán Tapia remained however, at the time, skeptical of the probability of a trial, either for human rights violations or for fiscal fraud. However, some medical examinations reported that the physical and mental health condition of the former dictator would have allowed him to be judged. On 23 November 2005, judge Carlos Cerda charged Pinochet for fiscal fraud and ordered his arrest. Pinochet was freed under caution, as following the judgment minutes, "his freedom did not represent a danger for the security of the society". It was the fourth time in seven years that Augusto Pinochet was indicted and charged for illegal behavior.
In January 1971, Pinochet was promoted to division general and was named General Commander of the Santiago Army Garrison. At the beginning of 1972, he was appointed General Chief of Staff of the Army. With rising domestic strife in Chile, after General Prats resigned his position, Pinochet was appointed commander-in-chief of the Army on 23 August 1973 by President Salvador Allende just the day after the Chamber of Deputies of Chile approved a resolution asserting that the government was not respecting the Constitution. Less than a month later, the Chilean military deposed Allende.
Pinochet was born in Valparaíso, the son of Augusto Pinochet Vera, a descendant of an 18th-century French Breton immigrant from Lamballe,[23] and Avelina Ugarte Martínez, a woman whose family had been in Chile since the 17th century and was of partial Basque descent.[24][25] Pinochet went to primary and secondary school at the San Rafael Seminary of Valparaíso, the Rafael Ariztía Institute (Marist Brothers) in Quillota, the French Fathers' School of Valparaíso, and then to the Military School in Santiago, which he entered in 1931. In 1935, after four years studying military geography he graduated with the rank of alférez (Second Lieutenant) in the infantry. In September 1937, Pinochet was assigned to the "Chacabuco" Regiment, in Concepción. Two years later, in 1939, then with the rank of Sub-lieutenant, he moved to the "Maipo" Regiment, garrisoned in Valparaíso. He returned to Infantry School in 1940. On 30 January 1943, Pinochet married Lucía Hiriart Rodríguez, with whom he had five children: Inés Lucía, María Verónica, Jacqueline Marie, Augusto Osvaldo and Marco Antonio.
Inés Lucía Pinochet Hiriart (born December 14, 1943) is the eldest daughter of former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet and Lucía Hiriart de Pinochet.
On a military junta toppled President Salvador Allende in a coup d'état and installed General Augusto Pinochet as head of the new regime. This was a dictatorial, authoritarian regime which trampled on human rights with the use of torture, disappearances, illegal and secret arrest, and extrajudicial killings. Thousands were being detained, and hundreds killed by the regime. It was in this context, that the first opposition to the Pinochet regime appeared in 1973, when several religious groups led by the Archdiocese of Santiago organized the Committee of Cooperation for Peace in Chile in 1973 in order to support human rights of those persecuted by the regime of General Augusto Pinochet.
Canadian Jean Charpentier of Télévision de Radio-Canada was the first foreign journalist to interview General Pinochet following the coup.[32]
In 2006, General Manuel Contreras, head of the Chilean secret police DINA under Pinochet, alleged in testimony sent to Judge Claudio Pavez (in charge of the Huber case) that Pinochet and his son Marco Antonio Pinochet were involved in the clandestine production of chemical and biological weapons, and the production (under Eugenio Berríos's direction), sale and trafficking of cocaine. These allegations were never fully investigated by the Chilean courts, and neither was a government commission set up to establish their veracity.
The junta members originally planned that the presidency would be held for a year by the commanders-in-chief of each of the four military branches in turn. However, Pinochet soon consolidated his control, first retaining sole chairmanship of the military junta, and then proclaiming himself "Supreme Chief of the Nation" (de facto provisional president) on 27 June 1974.[43] He officially changed his title to "President" on 17 December 1974. General Leigh, head of the Air Force, became increasingly opposed to Pinochet's policies and was forced into retirement on 24 July 1978, after contradicting Pinochet on that year's plebiscite (officially called Consulta Nacional, or National Consultation, in response to a UN resolution condemning Pinochet's government). He was replaced by General Fernando Matthei.
On 23 February 2006, Pinochet's wife Lucia Hiriart, children Augusto, Lucía, Jacqueline, Marco Antonio, and Maria Verónica, daughter-in-law, and personal secretary were indicted on charges of tax fraud, including failing to declare bank accounts overseas, and using false passports. Lucía fled to the US, but was detained and returned to Argentina, her country of departure, after attempting unsuccessfully to claim political asylum. Pinochet's wife, five children, and 17 other persons (including two generals, one of his ex-lawyer and his ex-secretary) were arrested in October 2007 on charges of embezzlement and use of false passports in the context of the Riggs affair. They are accused of having illegally transferred $27m (£13.2m) to foreign bank accounts during Pinochet's rule.
The Chilean Military Dictatorship under General Augusto Pinochet erected a complex web of legal instruments that it used to repress anyone deemed to be "subversive." Pinochet was extremely tactical in his attempts to camouflage the human rights violations committed by the state. He called for a National Plebiscite in 1980 to approve the 1980 Political Constitution of the Republic of Chile— a seemingly democratic motive. The General promised to cut back inflation, which was around 30-35% in 1978; he was intent on restructuring both the economic and political institutions of the region. These agendas were part of a broader scheme to garner approval from the state, making it more feasible to prosecute, imprison, and execute civilians suspected of subversion. The military and armed personnel under Pinochet were able to operate offensively without restrictions, as the Chilean Government had been restructured to Pinochet's liking. Even the Constitution was drafted to give the General impunity. The military dictatorship utilized its own justice system to adjudicate the regime's enemies.
Additionally, the Amnesty Law decreed in 1978 by the General, guaranteed impunity to those responsible for the "systematic and widespread human rights violations and was a major obstacle to bringing Augusto Pinochet to justice in Chile. Even today, "the Amnesty Law is still in force. It was recently applied by the Chilean Supreme Court in December 2007." While Pinochet was detained under house arrest on October 30, 2006, over "charges including, murder, torture and kidnapping in the years following his 1973 coup, he was never formally convicted. He died before the investigation process reached a conclusion. Pinochet's Amnesty Law effectively insulated the military regime from retribution for even the most brutal and horrific human rights violations.
This tax fraud filing, related to Pinochet's and his family secret bank accounts in the United States and in Caribbean islands, for an amount of USD $27 million, shocked the Pinochetist sector of the Chilean public opinion more than the accusations of human rights abuses. Ninety percent of these funds would have been raised between 1990 and 1998, when Pinochet was Commander-in-Chief of the Army, and would essentially have come from weapons traffic (when purchasing Belgian Mirage fighter aircraft in 1994, Dutch Léopard tanks, Swiss Mowag tanks or by illegal sales of weapons to Croatia, in the middle of the Balkan war; the later case has been connected by the Chilean justice with the assassination of Colonel Gerardo Huber in 1992). General Pinochet was reckoned to owe to the Chilean tax administration a total of $16.5 million.
After the military coup, Guzmán became a close advisor to General Augusto Pinochet and a highly influential policy maker in Chile at this time, including being summoned by Pinochet to take part in the Comisión Ortúzar charged with drafting a new constitution. He also was a key participant in the drafting of Pinochet's Chacarillas speech of 1978, one of the founding texts of the military regime.
He purged the Air Force of left-wing officers such as General Alberto Bachelet (the father of Michelle Bachelet, future Chilean president) and repeatedly called on Chileans to denounce left-wingers to the new authorities. Nonetheless he clashed with Augusto Pinochet, the leader of the junta over the latter's refusal to name a date for a return to democracy. Leigh opposed Pinochet's growing power within the junta. In 1978, when Pinochet called a vote to request that Chileans reject the United Nation's condemnation of the regime's human rights record, Leigh called the move "typical of governments in which power is in the hands of a single dictator." Pinochet believed Leigh wanted to challenge him to lead the country. "Pinochet always felt that I was interested in taking over from him, something that never even entered my mind," Leigh said in one of his last television interviews.
Chile: When Will It End? () is a 1986 Australian documentary film produced by David Bradbury. The film portrays the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.