BBC skriver om nye amerikanske arkivers åpning, som avslører USAs
undergraving av demokratiet i Chile på syttitallet mere grundig
enn hittil.
Karsten Johansen
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/americas/newsid_1022000/1022347.stm
Tuesday, 14 November, 2000, 02:18 GMT
US 'undermined Chile's democracy'
The coup ousted democratically elected Allende. The US Central Intelligence
Agency, the CIA, has released thousands of secret documents relating to
covert operations in Chile before and during the period of military rule
there.
Among the 16,000 documents is a CIA memorandum confirming US funded attempts
to undermine the democratically elected Marxist president, Salvador Allende,
who was overthrown in a bloody coup in 1973.
A researcher at the National Security Archive in Washington Peter Kornbluh,
told the BBC he thought the documents would re-write America's role in Chile.
Earlier records showed that the US turned a blind eye to political
repression against opponents of the military ruler, General Augusto
Pinochet, who came to power in the coup.
"Actions approved by the US Government during this period aggravated
political polarisation and affected Chile's long tradition of democratic
elections and respect for constitutional order and the rule of law," a White
House statement said on Monday.
Covert aid
It is the third and final batch of CIA records to be released on the period
of military rule in Chile, following a review ordered by President Clinton.
The release was ordered in 1999, to allow the public to "judge for itself
the extent to which US actions undercut the cause of democracy and human
rights in Chile".
The records show that just three weeks before President Allende was toppled,
US officials had approved $1m in covert aid to political parties and private
organisations.
The records also detail a long history of covert anti-Allende efforts,
including actions aimed at preventing him from taking office, destabilising
his government once he was in office, and helping General Pinochet
consolidate his power.
State-sponsored terrorism
Washington has long denied accusations that it played a direct role in the
coup.
One important document shows that General Pinochet once asked his Paraguayan
counterpart for false passports for Chilean agents travelling to the United
States.
The BBC's correspondent in Santiago, James Reynolds, says some people in
Chile believe this could be used as evidence against General Pinochet, to
show that he ordered the 1976 assassination of former foreign minister,
Orlando Letelier, who was killed in a car bomb attack in Washington DC.
One of the men convicted in 1993 for his role in the assassination was a
paid informant for the CIA, according to documents recently released by the
Pentagon's Defence Intelligence Agency.
The man, Manuel Contreras, was the former head of of the secret police in
Chile and one of the most feared men in Chile, second only to General
Pinochet.
The documents show that contact between the CIA and Mr Contreras - General
Pinochet's closest friend and confidant - began in 1974.
The assassination, in which a colleague of Mr Letelier also died, has been
described as one of the worst cases of state-sponsored terrorism in the US.
General Pinochet's iron rule was underpinned by the tactics of brutal
repression that saw thousands die and thousands more flee into exile. Others
disappeared or were tortured.
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