RIGHTS-CHILE: Lagos Vetoes Promotion of General Accused of Torture

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Gustavo González

SANTIAGO, Oct 6 2001 (IPS) - The good relations between Chile’s centre- left coalition government and the armed forces could cool off as a result of President Ricardo Lagos’ decision to veto the promotion of an air force general accused of torturing political prisoners during the 1973-90 de facto military regime.

General Hernán Gabrielli, the second highest-ranking officer in the Chilean air force after commander Patricio Ríos, will be forced into retirement once the annual promotion process comes to a conclusion within the next few weeks.

Lagos’ decision was not made public, but was leaked to the local press, which reported the news Friday. Defence Minister Mario Fernández neither confirmed nor denied the reports.

Three former political prisoners who were held at the Cerro Moreno air force base in Antofagasta, 1,200 kms north of Santiago, during the dictatorship claimed last February that Gabrielli worked as a torturer in the base after the Sep 11, 1973 coup that overthrew the democratically-elected government of socialist president Salvador Allende.

Carlos Bau, Héctor Vera and Juan Ruz said Gabrielli, a lieutenant at the time, tortured engineer Eugenio Ruiz-Tagle, who was also held in the Cerro Moreno base in October 1973.

Ruiz-Tagle was killed that month by the “death caravan”, a special army mission that flew to several cities on the orders of dictator General Augusto Pinochet.

The former dictator was prosecuted this year in connection with 57 murders and 18 kidnappings of political prisoners allegedly committed by the death caravan. However, the case was closed by the courts after medical exams found that Pinochet suffered “dementia.”

Bau, Vera and Ruz spoke out about Gabrielli’s past when he temporarily served as air force chief while General Ríos was on vacation.

Gabrielli denied the charges, and sued the three former political prisoners on the basis of the now-defunct “law on state security”, which protected the president, senior military officers, judges and cabinet ministers from slander.

The three men refused to agree on a settlement with Gabrielli, and responded by filing their own lawsuits against the general, as did the family of Ruiz-Tagle.

In June, the Appeals Court threw out Gabrielli’s lawsuit, arguing that it was groundless. The ruling was unprecedented, as up to then the courts had admitted suits based on the controversial slander clause in the law on state security.

Throughout Pinochet’s de facto regime and up to last year, when it was revoked in August after a new “press law” went into effect, the law on state security led to the prosecution and imprisonment of a number of journalists.

Gabrielli decided not to appeal the verdict handed down by the Appeals Court. Meanwhile, the courts in Antofagasta continue to process the suits brought against the general by the former political prisoners and the family of Ruiz-Tagle.

The question of torture has not been specifically addressed during Chile’s transition to democracy, during which several special laws have been passed providing for reparations for the families of political prisoners murdered or “disappeared” by the Pinochet regime, and for those who were dismissed from their jobs in state entities after the 1973 coup.

Sources at the government palace of La Moneda said the president vetoed Gabrielli’s promotion because it was “unseemly” to have an officer accused of being a torturer as commander-in- chief of the air force.

The press reported that the government’s position was made clear in private conversations with General Ríos on the promotion process.

According to laws still on the books since the dictatorship, the president cannot remove military commanders from their posts, but has the power to veto promotions and to confirm the make-up of the high command during the annual promotions process.

The mechanism of previously reaching a consensus with the military brass through private conversations has been used to avoid what could be interpreted as a public insult to an officer by the executive branch.

Although government sources said Gabrielli’s forced retirement would not trigger a row between the Lagos administration and the air force, it was reported that the situation ruffled feathers in the military, especially those of General Ríos.

Gabrielli, considered the right-hand man of the current air force chief, has been the driving force behind efforts to upgrade that branch of the armed forces. It was he who played the key role in the process of choosing the sophisticated US-made F-16 fighter- bombers, to replace the air force’s obsolete combat planes.

The air force corps of five generals will be completely renewed, with the sole exception of commander Ríos. Gabrielli will be forced into retirement, generals César Topali and José Ignacio Concha will retire voluntarily, and General Angel Campos died.