Kissinger May Face Extradition to Chile Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit MIGHT KISSINGER ACTUALLY FACE JUSTICE? The Guardian - June 12, 2002 http://www.guardian.co.uk/pinochet/Story/0,11993,735920,00.html Kissinger may face extradition to Chile Judge investigating US role in 1973 coup considers forcing former secretary of state to give evidence by Jonathan Franklin in Santiago and Duncan Campbell in Los Angeles Henry Kissinger may face extradition proceedings in connection with the role of the United States in the 1973 military coup in Chile. The former US secretary of state is wanted for questioning as a witness in the investigation into the events surrounding the overthrow of the socialist president, Salvador Allende, by General Augusto Pinochet. It focuses on CIA involvement in the coup, whether US officials passed lists of leftwing Americans in Chile to the military and whether the US embassy failed to assist Americans deemed sympathetic to the deposed government. Chile's Judge Juan Guzman is so frustrated by the lack of cooperation by Mr Kissinger that he is now considering an extradition request to force him to come to Chile and testify in connection with the death of the American film-maker and journalist Charles Horman, who was killed by the military days after the coup. Horman's story was told in the 1982 Costa-Gavras film, Missing, starring Jack Lemmon and Sissy Spacek. Judge Guzman is investigating whether US officials passed the names of suspected leftwing Americans to Chilean military authorities. Declassified documents have now revealed that such a list existed. Sergio Corvalan, a Chilean lawyer, said that he could not divulge the "dozens" of names on the list. At the time of his death, Horman was investigating the murder of Rene Schneider, the chief of staff in the Chilean army whose support for Allende and the constitution was seen as an obstacle to the coup. The CIA had been involved with groups plotting Schneider's murder, providing them with weapons and advice, according to a CIA internal inquiry in 2000. It found that the agency had withdrawn its support for the plotters before the murder but had paid them $35,000 afterwards "to maintain the goodwill of the group". At the time of his murder, Schneider had five young children, who filed suit in a Washington DC court last year against Mr Kissinger and other top officials in the Nixon administration. They are seeking$3m (£2.15m) in damages. Horman's wife, Joyce, suspects that he was targeted because he unwittingly stumbled upon a gathering of US military personnel in Chile in the days before the coup. The American journalist Marc Cooper and the British journalist Christopher Hitchens have been in Santiago during the past month to give evidence in the investigation of America's role. Cooper, who was Allende's translator at the time of the coup and now writes for the Nation and LA Weekly, knew Horman and gave sworn testimony last month. Cooper said: "Guzman says that if the US doesn't act soon on his request to gather testimony from Kissinger and other US officials, he'll have no choice but to file for their extradition to Chile." Cooper, who wrote the book Pinochet and Me about his time in Chile, said that the Nixon government had been more interested in supporting General Pinochet than in investigating the deaths of its citizens at the hands of the Chilean military. This is not the first attempt to interview Mr Kissinger about the turbulent period in Latin America. During a visit to London in April, judges in Spain and France unsuccessfully tried to question him about America's role in Operation Condor, which has been described as a coordinated hit squad organised from Chile and including six South American nations aimed at dealing with leftwing opposition groups. Several declassified documents which have emerged over the past two years have shown an increasingly visible American hand in Operation Condor. Hitchens gave evidence on the Operation Condor case which he researched for his book, The Trial of Henry Kissinger, published last year. In Santiago, Hitchens said: "Today Henry Kissinger is a frightened man. He is very afraid of the exposure that awaits him." Mr Kissinger's lawyer William Rodgers, said that such questions should properly be directed to the US state department and not to Mr Kissinger. * background reports: The Guardian - April 20, 2002 http://www.guardian.co.uk/pinochet/Story/0,11993,687675,00.html> Plea to Britain in Kissinger witness case by Giles Tremlett in Madrid and David Pallister British authorities have been asked to decide whether a Spanish and a French judge representing the victims of General Pinochet's military regime in Chile can travel to London next week to interview Henry Kissinger as a witness in a terrorism and genocide case. The unprecedented request to interview a former US secretary of state has come from crusading Spanish magistrate Judge Baltasar Garzon, who had General Pinochet arrested in London, and Judge Sophie-Helene Chateau from France. The Home Office confirmed that both requests had been received and were being considered "in the normal way." If the requests are granted, Mr Kissinger will be summoned to give evidence on oath in a magistrates court where he can be questioned by the presiding district judge or the foreign judges. The Spanish request, sent from the national court in Madrid on Thursday, said that Mr Kissinger would be quizzed about recently declassified CIA documents. It goes on to request the presence of "the Spanish judicial authority", who is Judge Garzon himself, and the private or public prosecutors involved in the genocide and terrorism case that is still being pursued against General Pinochet and others in Madrid. Lawyers in Madrid said the request had been sent after British police, via Interpol, confirmed that Mr Kissinger was due to give a speech at the Institute of Directors' convention in the Royal Albert Hall next Wednesday. The prosecution lawyer most likely to accompany Judge Garzon would be the same man who directed the Spanish extradition case against General Pinochet on behalf of his victims, Joan Garces. Mr Garces is a former aide to Salvador Allende, the socialist Chilean president killed by General Pinochet's troops during the 1973 coup. "I represent 4,000 victims who disappeared or were killed," Mr Garces explained yesterday. Although the case being pursued in the Spanish courts stretches back to the 1973 coup itself, the request to interview Mr Kissinger refers explicitly to the so-called Condor Plan - a secret agreement believed to have been conceived by General Pinochet designed to suppress leftwing opposition across southern Latin America. The plan allegedly caused the arrest, torture, disappearance or deaths of thousands of people who were illegally deported back to their home countries of Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia and Brazil. Mr Kissinger has avoided similar requests to give evidence as a witness to courts in Chile investigating the crimes allegedly committed by General Pinochet's regime. He has similarly avoided approaches from Judge Chateau, who is investigating the deaths of four French citizens in Chile. Mr Kissinger's spokesman has explained that, while the former secretary of state is prepared to help the courts, he believes all questions should be answered by the state department. * The Guardian - April 17, 2002 http://www.guardian.co.uk/pinochet/Story/0,11993,685844,00.html> Pinochet judge asks to question Kissinger Staff and agencies The Spanish judge who attempted to prosecute General Pinochet for crimes against humanity has requested permission to question Henry Kissinger, it emerged today. The former US secretary of state is wanted for questioning by Baltasar Garzon over his alleged involvement in a plot by former South American military dictatorships to persecute and eliminate their opponents in the 1970s and 1980s. Mr Kissinger is expected to attend a convention at the Royal Albert Hall in London a week today. Mr Garzon has filed a request via Interpol to question him under the European Convention on Terrorism, which requires signatories to cooperate with other states' judicial processes relating to terrorism. Juan Garces, a lawyer involved in Mr Garzon's investigation into General Pinochet, said the Spanish judge had not yet received an answer. Mr Kissinger served as Richard Nixon's assistant for national security from 1969-1973 and secretary of state between 1973-1977 for Nixon and his successor Gerald Ford. Ever since General Pinochet's arrest in 1998 there have been attempts to show what part the US government played in the 1973 coup that brought him to power. Mr Garzon attracted international attention when he ordered General Pinochet's arrest in 1998, but is also known for his unrelenting pursuit of drug traffickers and terrorists in Spain and abroad. The proceedings against General Pinochet were ultimately unsuccessful but Mr Garzon is now investigating accusations against him of genocide and international terrorism. He is also probing the disappearance of hundreds of Spanish citizens in Argentina during the military dictatorships between 1976-1983. Mr Garces said Mr Garzon wanted to speak to Mr Kissinger about his alleged role in Operation Condor, a plot by the military governments of Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay against their enemies. Judges in Argentina and Chile also want to question Mr Kissinger over his links to their countries' dictatorships. ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nytact-06.12.02-06:49:21-10477