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Augusto Pinochet, the fierce anti-communist dictator who ruled Chile with an iron fist from 1973 to 1990, died Sunday from heart complications, the Santiago Military hospital reported. He was 91.

 

The brief announcement by the hospital said Pinochet' condition worsened suddenly and doctors rushed him back to the Intense Care Unit, from which he had been removed only on Thursday while recovering from an acute heart attack he suffered one week ago.

 

Relatives and friends of Pinochet were arriving at the hospital.

 

Pinochet had been admitted a week earlier to the hospital with what doctors described as an acute had attack. He underwent an angioplasty procedure in which doctors enlarge the clogged artery to allow restoration of the blood flow to the heart,

 

Pinochet died al 2:15 p.m. (1715 GMT), the hospital said.

Damnit death got him before the chilean court system did.

Enjoy hell.

And this is why justice delayed is justice denied.

R.I.P.

 

I don't agree with everything you did but thank you for not letting our beautiful country not turn into another cuba....

SANTIAGO, Chile (CNN) -- Former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, one of the world's most notorious military dictators, died in Santiago, Chile, Sunday, a week after suffering a heart attack.

 

In Chile, his death was greeted with jumps and joy from some opponents, and tears of sadness from some supporters.

 

The 91-year-old general had a history of diabetes and received a pacemaker after a stroke last year.

 

Pinochet was the Chilean army's chief of staff when he seized power in a U.S.-backed bloody coup that overthrew the democratically elected Marxist President Salvador Allende on September 11, 1973.(Watch the history of Pinochet's rule Video)

 

Pinochet ruled the country with an iron fist until 1990 and has been accused of egregious human rights violations during his 17-year dictatorship.

 

"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."

 

Leftists have accused him of ordering the torture and death of thousands of leftists during his regime, including the air force general father of Chilean President Michelle Bachelet. Over 3,000 people disappeared during his rule. Tens-of-thousands more fled the country.

 

Bachelet herself was tortured before being sent to exile in Australia.

 

Pinochet's supporters, however, praise him for rescuing the country from a communist fate such as Cuba's, for attracting foreign investment, and laying the groundwork for Chile's modern market economy.

 

Until last week, Pinochet was under house arrest in connection with charges of murdering two opponents in 1973. Chilean authorities released him from confinement on Monday, a day after his hospitalization.

 

Although Pinochet spent years battling efforts to bring him to trial in connection with human rights abuses, he never faced trial.

 

Judges threw the cases out of court when they found he was not well enough to stand trial.

 

Critics have long accused Pinochet of timing his illnesses to coincide with court rulings.

 

However, 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.

 

In an interview with CNN en Espanol years ago, Pinochet showed little regard for the concept of human rights.

 

"Human Rights?" he asked rhetorically. "That's an invention of the Marxists."

 

Nonetheless, on November 25, he marked his 91st birthday by issuing a statement in which, for the first time, he took "full political responsibility for what happened" during his dictatorship. (Full story)

Only house arrest

 

Under the terms of the constitution he wrote, Pinochet was a "senator for life" with immunity from prosecution.

 

However he was arrested in October 1998, while visiting London for an operation. In addition to freezing Pinochet's assets, Spanish Judge Baltasar Garzon charged him with genocide, terrorism and torture in the deaths and disappearance of thousands of people, including some Spaniards, during his regime.

 

Pinochet was also placed under house arrest, pending possible extradition to Spain.

 

But as his health continued to fail, Pinochet was eventually allowed to return to Chile, where last year the Supreme Court lifted his immunity and opened the door to charges of tax fraud and other crimes.

 

Pinochet's accounts at Riggs Bank between 1994 and 2002 contained $4 million to $8 million, according to a 2004 report by the U.S. Senate's Subcommittee on Investigations.

 

The 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.

 

Pinochet had allegedly stashed nearly $27 million in other overseas bank accounts, Chilean investigators later found, leading to charges against him and his family, who are accused of helping hide some of the money.

 

In August of last year, 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, passport forgery and other crimes in connection with the case.

 

A Chilean court indicted him the same month 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 and the wounds inflicted on Chilean society during his reign never really healed during his lifetime.

 

Journalist Lucia Newman contributed to this report.

Source

 

I can't help but smile anytime one of the Latin American dictators meets their fate.

He won't be missed. One of the bigger mistakes by the CIA.

CNN is now showing footage of riots and violence in the streets of Chile, where groups supporting the former leader, and groups that hated the former leader, are clashing violently.

He won't be missed. One of the bigger mistakes by the CIA.

I'm sure it went beyond just the CIA, but yeah.

 

Just a reflection of that era unfortunately.

He won't be missed. One of the bigger mistakes by the CIA.

Yea if your a communist.....

 

like i said i dont agree that all those people were killed long ago.. but if it wasn't done chile would still be lining up for toilet paper and rice and riding in 57 chevy's....

 

instead now they are the most advanced south american country with the best army and economy....

He won't be missed. One of the bigger mistakes by the CIA.

Yea if your a communist.....

So you would take a Hitler, huh? He was anti-Communist as well. Mobutu Sese Seko? Suharto? Yeah, you're a real saint.

He won't be missed. One of the bigger mistakes by the CIA.

Yea if your a communist.....

So you would take a Hitler, huh? He was anti-Communist as well. Mobutu Sese Seko? Suharto? Yeah, you're a real saint.

 

Not even remotely comparable. Chile is a modern market economy with a real middle class as a result of his rule. He never rounded up folks for reasons of race or creed, and the number of people he is accused of imprisoning or killing for ideological/political reasons is very small compared to the population of Chile, and small compared to any shameful period in any other western nation. It certainly doesn't excuse it, but does put it in perspective.

He won't be missed. One of the bigger mistakes by the CIA.

Yea if your a communist.....

So you would take a Hitler, huh? He was anti-Communist as well. Mobutu Sese Seko? Suharto? Yeah, you're a real saint.

 

Not even remotely comparable. Chile is a modern market economy with a real middle class as a result of his rule. He never rounded up folks for reasons of race or creed, and the number of people he is accused of imprisoning or killing for ideological/political reasons is very small compared to the population of Chile, and small compared to any shameful period in any other western nation. It certainly doesn't excuse it, but does put it in perspective.

 

See Suharto. And political beliefs are pretty much a creed.

We overthrew a democratically elected government to put him in there. That's not right.

He won't be missed. One of the bigger mistakes by the CIA.

Yea if your a communist.....

So you would take a Hitler, huh? He was anti-Communist as well. Mobutu Sese Seko? Suharto? Yeah, you're a real saint.

 

Not even remotely comparable. Chile is a modern market economy with a real middle class as a result of his rule. He never rounded up folks for reasons of race or creed, and the number of people he is accused of imprisoning or killing for ideological/political reasons is very small compared to the population of Chile, and small compared to any shameful period in any other western nation. It certainly doesn't excuse it, but does put it in perspective.

 

See Suharto. And political beliefs are pretty much a creed.

 

I was referring to the assinine Hitler comparison.

 

We overthrew a democratically elected government to put him in there. That's not right.

 

Would overthrowing the Hamas government be wrong?

Yes.

 

Only under extreme circumstances should we have to overthrow a government again. We don't need another Iraq.

Yes.

 

Only under extreme circumstances should we have to overthrow a government again. We don't need another Iraq.

 

What if they were to steal hundreds of millions of dollars from US citizens?

I read this very fast and thought, "Why would they be reporting that Pinocchio died in the Bull Pen forum?"

 

 

I'm definitely overworked and underslept.

He won't be missed. One of the bigger mistakes by the CIA.

I'm sure it went beyond just the CIA, but yeah.

 

Just a reflection of that era unfortunately.

 

 

 

its the thing that is never really talked about and reagan for whatever reason is far too often given a free pass on all this crap he did during the 80s.

He won't be missed. One of the bigger mistakes by the CIA.

I'm sure it went beyond just the CIA, but yeah.

 

Just a reflection of that era unfortunately.

 

 

 

its the thing that is never really talked about and reagan for whatever reason is far too often given a free pass on all this crap he did during the 80s.

 

WTF does Reagan have to do with Pinochet taking power in 1973?