Chile to investigate death of Allende general

Judge agrees to inquiry into death of Alberto Bachelet, who was tortured and imprisoned for supporting Allende before the 1973 coup A Chilean judge has agreed to investigate the death of a general who was tortured and imprisoned for supporting President Salvador Allende before the 1973 military coup. Alberto Bachelet, whose daughter Michelle later became Chile’s first female president, died in prison in 1974 after Augusto Pinochet’s military convicted him of being a traitor. Judge Mario Carroza said in an interview with Chile’s Radio Cooperativa on Thursday he had agreed to review a complaint alleging that Bachelet was tortured to death. The complaint was presented by relatives of political prisoners executed during Chile’s dictatorship from 1973-1990. Carroza has already been investigating the events surrounding the death of Allende and hundreds of his allies who were killed or disappeared as Pinochet consolidated power. General Bachelet was 51 when he died. He had told his family of being tortured by the same young air force members he had trained. “They broke me from the inside,” Bachelet wrote in a letter from prison. “At one point they had morally torn me apart. I never thought to hate anyone, I always thought that the human being is the most marvellous of this creation and should be respected as such, but I found myself confronted with air force comrades whom I’ve known for 20 years, my own students, who treated me like a delinquent or a dog.” In 1972, as other high-ranking military officers were conspiring with the US Central Intelligence Agency to lay the groundwork for the coup, Allende put Bachelet in charge of Chile’s commerce agency, where he was responsible for overseeing food sales nationwide. Food and many other products were in short supply partly because Allende’s rightwing opponents held goods back to create a sense of chaos. Bachelet remained loyal to Allende to the end, refusing to endorse the 11 September coup in 1973 even after Allende committed suicide while taking his last stand in the bombed-out presidential palace. He was arrested the same day, convicted that December and survived in prison until 12 March 12 1974. Pinochet’s junta also arrested the general’s wife, Angela Jeria, and Michelle Bachelet in 1974. They were tortured in a secret jail for two weeks before leaving Chile. Michelle Bachelet returned in 1979 and served as president from 2006-2010. She now runs the United Nation’s women’s agency. Chile Augusto Pinochet guardian.co.uk

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