In a videotaped message marking his 85th birthday Friday, Chile's former Augusto Pinochet appeared to acknowledge excesses committed under the military junta he led from 1973-1990, without saying he was personally culpable for any misdeeds.
"I can tell you sirs, that I accept, as former president of the Republic, all of the actions said to have been committed by the army and armed forces," Pinochet said, without elaboration, at a dinner gathering of some 1,500 supporters in Santiago.
Many of his remarks focussed on his arrest and lengthy detention in London, which he described as "disagreeable."
"I always had the dignity to say that I did not accept British law," said the former Chilean president, who was unable to attend the event because of recent health problems.
Pinochet was arrested in October 1998 during a private visit to Britain under a warrant issued by a Spanish judge seeking to try him for human rights abuses during his rule in Chile.
He was held in Britain until March this year while a succession of courts debated whether he should be extradited to Spain. The British government eventually let him return home after deciding he was too frail to stand trial.
The former dictator, recently released from hospital after treatment for pneumonia, must answer to more than 170 charges filed on behalf of some of the 3,000 opponents to his military regime who were killed or abducted and presumed killed while he was in power.
Pinochet was stripped of his parliamentary immunity on August 8 by Chile's Supreme Court.
Argentina last week requested Pinochet's extradition in connection with the murder in Buenos Aires of former Chilean Army chief Carlos Prats and his wife, Sofia Cuthbert.
They were killed when a bomb exploded under their car on September 30, 1974 -- one year after the coup d'etat that inaugurated Pinochet's almost 17-year rule.
Enrique Lautaro Arancibia Clavel, a former Chilean secret police agent, was sentenced in Buenos Aires on Monday to life in prison for his role in the assassination.
The Chilean government said the Supreme Court must decide whether to grant or deny the request to extradite Pinochet – SANTIAGO (AFP)
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
