Pinochet (Ugarte), Augusto (1915-2006)

Chilean soldier and military dictator 1973-90. He came to power when a coup backed by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) ousted and killed President Salvador Allende. He governed ruthlessly and crushed all political opposition, including more than 3,000 people who ‘vanished’ or were killed and over 30,000 who were tortured. He presided over the country's economic expansion in the 1980s, stimulated further by free-market reforms. He was voted out of power in the 1989 general elections, but remained head of the armed forces until 1998 when he became senator-for-life. In January 2001, he was arrested on the charge of organizing the killings of 77 left-wing activists and union leaders. In May 2004 Chile's supreme court ruled that he was capable of standing trial, and at the time of his death around 300 criminal charges were still pending against him for human rights abuses and embezzlement.

In October 1998, he was arrested in London, England, where he was undergoing medical treatment, on a warrant from Baltasar Garzon, a Spanish lawyer investigating the crimes of his regime and seeking his extradition. Pinochet was placed under house arrest while appealing the legal authority of the British and Spanish courts to try him. In January 2000, British home secretary Jack Straw ruled that Pinochet was medically unfit to stand trial in Spain, and he was allowed to return to Chile in March 2000. This move was protested by European countries and human rights campaigners, as it seemed unlikely he would be prosecuted in Chile due, in part, to his immunity as senator. The position of senator-for-life had been created by a constitution he wrote while president, and was intended to give him legal immunity; however the Chilean courts stripped him of this immunity in May 2000.

Pinochet was placed under house arrest in January 2001, after medical tests established that he was fit to stand trial. However in July of that year Chile's appeals court ruled that he was suffering from vascular dementia and was unfit to stand trial for human rights abuses. Pinochet resigned his senate seat in 2002, but in May 2004 Chile's supreme court ruled that he was capable of standing trial, and in December 2004 he was charged with crimes. In November 2005, he was indicted on tax evasion charges and placed under house arrest .

Born in Santiago, Pinochet was educated at Chile's military academy and served in Chile's army. He became a major in 1953, a brigadier general in 1968, and general chief of staff in 1972. On 11 September 1973, he led the military junta which overthrew President Salvador Allende, after Chile's parliament had ruled that Allende had violated the constitution. His decline in power began in 1988 when he called and lost a plebiscite to ratify him as sole nominee for the presidency.