http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/americas/12/10/pinochet/
I feel that its about time that he's dead - although I am sad that he was charged with stuff when he came back to Chili given immunity. The US shouldnt have been involved with his coming to power though.
Trying to stay alive wtih all these surgeries but died in the end.
SANTIAGO, Chile (CNN) -- Augusto Pinochet, who died Sunday, was one of Latin America's most controversial and notorious former military dictators.
The 91-year-old former strongman, who rose to power following a U.S.-backed coup, was accused of torturing and killing thousands of people during his 1973-1990 regime.
He was under house arrest in the capital last Sunday when he suffered a heart attack; his wife, Lucia Hiriart, and a number of his children took him to Santiago Military Hospital.
Pinochet, who had been in frail health for years, underwent angioplasty to boost blood flow to his heart. But soon after, his lungs began to fill with fluid, a condition called pulmonary edema, and a priest gave him the last rites.
At 1:30 p.m. Sunday (11:30 a.m. ET), Pinochet suffered heart failure and was taken in critical condition to the hospital's coronary care unit, Dr. Juan Ignacio Vergara told reporters.
Attempts to resuscitate him proved futile, and he was declared dead at 2:15 p.m., surrounded by family members.
"The founder of modern Chile has died," said Ivan Moreira, who told a reporter that he was with Pinochet shortly before he died. (Watch the history of Pinochet's rule Video)
A military funeral is scheduled for Tuesday, though it will not be a state funeral nor will there be any days of mourning, a military spokesman said. His remains will be cremated after a memorial service, to be held at 11 a.m. Tuesday, the spokesman added.
Pinochet's body will be transferred Monday to the Chilean military academy, and flags outside government and military buildings will be lowered to half staff, he said.
The government has approved four military ceremonies, he said.
Outside the military hospital, where a Chilean flag was lowered to half staff, several thousand pro-Pinochet demonstrators gathered to mourn his death, chanting "Long live Pinochet!" and singing the national anthem. At one point, several thousand demonstrators tossed plastic bottles of water at journalists, whom they accused of criticizing Pinochet unfairly.
In the Plaza Italia, about 6,000 anti-Pinochet demonstrators gathered in celebration of his death, waving Chilean flags, dancing, opening bottles of champagne and tossing confetti into the air.
Demonstrators clash
Police detained dozens of people, and dispersed demonstrators who began to throw objects and breached a perimeter surrounding the presidential palace by spraying them with water cannon and then tear gas, TV Chile reported.
"We require force only to establish order," Gen. Jorge Acuna, director of order and security at el Palacio de La Moneda, the presidential palace.
Similar violence between riot-clad police and demonstrators occurred in Valparaiso, the birthplace of Pinochet.
More than 5,000 people joined demonstrations in 10 regions throughout the country, said Felipe Harboe, sub secretary of the Ministry of the Interior, who called on parents to keep their teenagers home Sunday night.
"We don't want to see people affected in the present by deeds of the past," he told reporters.
"I call on the citizens to manifest in peace and tranquility."
Still, as night fell, plastic barrels intended to direct traffic out of certain areas were set afire in the Plaza de la Ciudadania -- near the presidential palace.
TV Chile reported that a memorial service is to be held Tuesday at 11 a.m. at the military school, with attendance limited to family and close friends.
Pinochet had been confined to his house in connection with charges of murdering two opponents in 1973. Chilean authorities had released him from house arrest a day after he was hospitalized.
Pinochet, who celebrated his 91st birthday on November 25, had a history of diabetes and had suffered several minor strokes since the late 1990s.
A pacemaker was implanted in his chest in 2005, after he suffered a stroke.
Chile's Supreme Court had lifted his immunity from charges of misusing public funds and cleared the way for murder charges stemming from alleged human rights abuses.
But Pinochet was deemed medically unfit to stand trial.
And even if he had been tried and found guilty, he was too old under Chilean law to serve time in prison and would have remained under house arrest.
Nevertheless, his critics accused him of timing his illnesses to coincide with court rulings.
Dictatorship marked by purges of leftists
Pinochet swept to power on September 11, 1973, in a bloody U.S.-backed military coup that overthrew Chile's democratically elected Marxist President Salvador Allende. He was hailed by some as the man who rescued Chile from chaos and the clutches of Marxism.
"Chile was on the way to self-destruction," Pinochet once said. "Chile's armed forces were obliged to put their patriotism before any other consideration."
One of the considerations he put aside was human rights. His 17-year dictatorship was marked by purges of leftists in which thousands of people were tortured, died or disappeared. Tens of thousands more fled the South American nation.
"A hero? Pinochet? A hero of what? Of death?" asked Carmen Vivanco, who lost five members of her family after the coup and is a member of the Missing Persons Association.
In Washington, the White House said Chile's rule "represented one of most difficult periods in that nation's history."
"Our thoughts today are with the victims of his reign and their families," White House spokesman Tony Fratto said. "We commend the people of Chile for building a society based on freedom, the rule of law, and respect for human rights."
Although Pinochet is credited with laying the groundwork for Chile's modern market economy, he was criticized internationally for his disdain for human rights.
Years ago, in an interview with CNN en Espanol, Pinochet showed little regard for the concept. "Human rights?" he asked rhetorically. "That's an invention of the Marxists."
Amid growing popular pressure, Pinochet lost a 1988 referendum in which Chileans were allowed to vote for a return to democratic rule. A decade later, he retired as commander-in-chief of the army to become, under the terms of the constitution he wrote, a "senator for life" with immunity from prosecution.
In October 1998, Spanish Judge Baltasar Garzon issued an arrest warrant for Pinochet, along with an order freezing his assets, while he was visiting London for an operation. He was placed under house arrest, pending possible extradition to Spain. Pinochet was charged with genocide, terrorism and torture in the deaths and disappearance of thousands of people, including some Spaniards, during his regime.
The judge said he froze Pinochet's assets as a guarantee that victims would receive indemnity payments if Pinochet were ever convicted.
But with his health failing, Pinochet eventually was allowed to return to Chile, only to see his immunity lifted and face charges of murder, torture and tax fraud.
In 2004, a report by the U.S. Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations said Pinochet's accounts at Riggs Bank between 1994 and 2002 contained $4 million to $8 million.
That investigation led to charges against the bank, which paid a $16 million fine and admitted it failed to report suspicious transactions of more than $10 million by Pinochet.
Chilean investigators later found that Pinochet had allegedly stashed nearly $27 million in other overseas bank accounts, which led to charges against the former dictator and his family, accused of helping hide some of the money.
In August 2005, a Chilean court indicted Pinochet's wife of more than 65 years, Lucia Hiriart, on charges of being an accomplice to her husband on tax evasion.
Three months later -- just days before his 90th birthday -- Pinochet was indicted on tax fraud and passport forgery in connection with the case.
That same month, he was also indicted by the Chilean court on human rights charges related to the kidnapping and disappearance of three dissidents who were arrested by Pinochet's security services in late 1974.
Their bodies turned up in Argentina, along with 116 others, in what was called Operation Colombo, an attempt by Chile's secret police to cover up the killings of leftist opponents.
Herman Felipe Errazuriz, Chile's ambassador to the United States during Pinochet's rule, said of the dictator, "He restored democracy in the country and he changed the social and economic system in the country. That's his legacy."
But Pinochet was a deeply divisive force in Chilean society, which was never able to heal the wounds of its traumatic past during his lifetime.
Journalist Lucia Newman contributed to this report.
I feel that its about time that he's dead - although I am sad that he was charged with stuff when he came back to Chili given immunity. The US shouldnt have been involved with his coming to power though.
Trying to stay alive wtih all these surgeries but died in the end.
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