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| Kissinger Watch #4 - 06 | |
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| The Chilean Criminal Suit against Henry Kissinger et al. | |
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| By Pascale Bonnefoy (Santiago) and Germán Westphal (Washington, D.C.) | |
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| The criminal suit filed in Santiago on September 11, 2001, against Henry Kissinger and others for masterminding and running Operation Condor, although slowly, is firmly moving forward. To date, several relatives of Condor victims have testified before Judge Juan Guzman, as have Nobel Prize winner Rigoberta Menchu, from Guatemala, and Paraguayan lawyer Martin Almada, who in 1992 discovered the "Archives of Terror" detailing the military repression in the Southern Cone of South Amrica. Henry Kissinger definitely had a direct hand in such repression with respect to Argentina, as some U.S. documents in fact show. Operation Condor was the coordination of the intelligence services in the countries of the Southern Cone in the 1970s and 1980s, when most of Latin America was under military rule. Under Condor, government agents were able to arrest foreigners and hand them over to their counterparts in their countries of origin, where they were eventually tortured, killed or disappeared. One highly emblematic case of this "Prisoner Management" is that of the Chilean sociologist Jorge Isaac Fuentes, who was arrested in Paraguay on May 17, 1975, upon his arrival from Argentina, and handed over in mid September of that year to Chilean Agents who flew him to Santiago. In Santiago he was illegally held captive at the infamous detention-torture center known as "Villa Grimaldi" and eventually "disappeared". Chilean agents were notified of his arrrest in Paraguay by the U.S. Embassy Legal Attache in Buenos Aires via a letter dated June 6, 1975. Since Fuentes' address book included the names of some individuals with New York and Texas addresses, they were investigated by the FBI. The U.S. Embassy Legal Attache's letter to Santiago, which has been declassified by the State Department --at the time headed by Henry Kissinger-- promises the Chilean Intelligence Services to keep them informed of the results of the U.S. investigations. This is only one piece of evidence regarding the U.S. involvement in Operation Condor. There are others, like the message from the U.S. Embassador to Paraguay sent to Henry Kissinger on October 13, 1978, in connection to the Condor use of the U.S. Communications Instalation in the Panama Canal Zone, et cetera. Operation Condor was headquartered in Santiago under the chief of the Chilean intelligence service Manuel Contreras, also mentioned in the lawsuit. Some of Condor's most notorious victims are the former head of the Chilean army, general Carlos Prats, and his wife, Sofia Cuthbert, killed in Buenos Aires in 1974; former Chilean ambassador Orlando Letelier and his U.S. colleague Ronni Moffit, murdered in 1976 in Washington, DC; and Chilean political leader Bernardo Leighton and his wife, Anita Fresno, who were seriously injured after an assassination attempt in 1975 in Rome. The Chilean lawsuit was filed by the U.S. National Lawyers Guild, which played a key role in the Nuremberg trials, the Rigoberta Menchu Foundation, the Continental Association of American Jurists, Martin Almada and the relatives of over 20 Operation Condor victims against former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, former CIA Director Richard Helms, ex CIA Associate Director Vernon Walters, and the former dictators of Argentina, Jorge Videla; Bolivia, Hugo Banzer; Paraguay, Alfredo Stroessner; and Chile, Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet is currently living in a country estate outside Santiago, and his prosecution before Chilean courts is on hold due to alleged health reasons. Videla is under house arrest in Argentina for the kidnapping of children of the disappeared. Banzer is undergoing cancer treatment in the United States, and Stroessner enjoys political asylum in Brazil. The suit is also against former intelligence chiefs and agents and government officials in Chile, Argentina, Paraguay and Venezuela, as well as all individuals who may be found guilty of having committed crimes against humanity, war crimes, international crimes, conspiracy to assassinate, murder and torture in the context of Operation Condor. The same week the lawsuit was filed in Santiago, Chilean judge Juan Guzman sent a rogatory letter to Kissinger to inquire about the murder of U.S. journalist Charles Horman, executed by the Chilean military in September 1973. Nine of the questions Kissinger must answer were leaked to the press: 1. "That the witness say if it is true or not that former ambassador Nathaniel Davis spoke with general Augusto Pinochet on October 12, 1973, about the situation of Charles Horman, in the sense that it was a pending case that concerned the US government that had to be solved." 2. "What were the contents of the instructions that former ambassador Nathaniel Davis received from the US government in terms of dealing with the Horman case at the highest political and military levels -directly with general Pinochet- on September 17, 18, and 19, 1973." 3. "What political and legal steps did the US government take to locate Charles Horman after his arrest on September 17, 1973." 4. "That the witness say if it true that the US government, through its embassy and consulate in Santiago, Chile, as well as through its other diplomatic offices, military attachés, including intelligence services and agents, made contact with and discussed with the Military Junta and its diplomatic representatives in the United States, or with other high-ranking Chilean military officers and intelligence services, immediately after the disappearance of Charles Horman, that is, September 17, 1973, in order to take all possible measures to assure his liberty and his eventual DEPARTURE from Chile". 5. "That the witness state if it is true that during the days following the Military Coup, that is, September 11, 1973, when Charles Horman returned to Santiago from Viña del Mar with US citizen Terry Simon on September 15, 1973, in an official car of the United States driven by the US Navy captain Ray Davis, the Embassy and Consulates of the United States in Chile had already received instructions to adopt special measures to offer the necessary protection to all US citizens in Chile, without exception". 6. "That the witness state if he personally ordered or requested an investigation of the events; or if he knows if other US officials adopted similar measures so as to determine the administrative or disciplinary responsabilities for the behavior of diplomatic or consular employees, military or civilian personnel working in Chile in 1973 and the following years, for the omissions or negligence they may have committed in the excercise of their JOB/DUTIES by permitting/ALLOOWING the arrest, disappearance and murder of US citizen Charles Horman". 7. "If the witness is aware that the US government, during the period in which he was Secretary of State, carried out activities or initiatives in order to investigate and resolve the arrest, disappearance and murder of Charles Horman; if this is so, if he knows what the results and conclusions of such investigation on the Horman case were". 8. "That the witness state whether it is true that in/ON September 1973, or in/ON other occasions, he phoned Chile directly to communicate with general Augusto Pinochet, Admiral Ismael Huerta and Admiral Patricio Carvajal, both of the latter high-ranking officers of the Chilean Navy, to request information >from Chilean military authorities on the arrest, disappearance and death of US citizen Charles Horman". 9. "That the witness say if he is aware that the US government was informed, in October 1973, through its own means, and which Chilean sources confirmed, that Charles Horman had died and that he had been executed by a military patrol upon orders given under the command of general Augusto Pinochet, head of the Military Junta". Although more than six months have passed since judge Guzman issued his questionnaire, Kissinger has not responded. The same has happenned in the case of the rogatory letter processed through the State Department by French judge Roger Le Loire. In the last few hours, Spanish judge Baltasar Garzon has taken action to question Kissinger in connection to Operation Condor during his announced visit to London. Kissinger has responded through his lawyers that he will cooperate with judge Garzon provided that the questions are processed through the State Department... Given the fact that neither Chilean judge Guzman's questions nor French judge Le Loire's questions have been responded via that route, it is very unlikely that judge Garzon's questions will be in fact answered, and the only available option appears to be that Kissinger be interrogated in London as per the terms of the judicial anti-terrorist cooperation agreement that currently exists between the Kingdoms of Spain and Great Britain. Unless, of course, Kissinger cancels his visit. In this event, the only remaining option would be to request his extradition, as Chilean judge Juan Guzman has already indicated in view of Kissinger's unjustified delay to answer his questions above. | |
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