Overview of Land and History 35violations and, wherever possible, bring the accused to
trial. It was non-confrontational and served to defuse the
issue, but many argue that it did not go far enough. A new
approach was adopted by the families of human rights
victims. They filed civil lawsuits, arguing that the human
rights abuses were committed by agents of the state; or
that the Amnesty Law passed during the Pinochet years
is not applicable in the case of the desaparecidos because
these people were ‘kidnapped’, so the case remains open
until they are found. According to the Rettig Report (the
document issued by the reconciliation commission), there
are over 1,000 documented cases where violations were
committed by state agents, making them eligible for this
type of lawsuit.
The Concertación Years
In 1993, the Concertación candidate, Eduardo Frei Ruiz-
Tagle, a Christian Democrat and the son of Eduardo
Frei Montalva, was elected president by a wide margin.
Towards the end of an uneventful term in office, the Frei
administration had to deal with the complicated and divisive
issue of the arrest in Great Britain of former General and
‘Life’ Senator Augusto Pinochet, at the request of a Spanish
judge, for human rights abuses. After being under house
arrest for 18 months in London, Pinochet was finally released
by the British government on grounds of health. This case
is considered a landmark for the trial of former Heads of
State for the violation of human rights and other crimes.
Back in Chile, he was stripped of immunity and indicted
for human rights abuses, yet, due to poor health wound up
never standing trial.
In 2004 it was discovered that Pinochet had secret accounts
with a US bank and later investigations in Chile found that
he had close to US$ 27 million hidden in various overseas
accounts. This resulted in additional charges being brought
against the former dictator and members of his family, mainly
for tax evasion. Some of his supporters felt betrayed, even
as members of his family argued that these were emergency
funds in case he were to be expelled from Chile.