Lawyers bid to set back Chile Pinochet appeal

Former Chilean dictator Gen. Augusto Pinochet waves to supporters at his residence in Santiago, Chile, during a November picture

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SANTIAGO, Chile (Reuters) -- Human rights lawyers sought on Wednesday to delay an appeal set for Thursday that seeks to block an order to place Augusto Pinochet under house arrest on charges of kidnap and murder during his 1973-1990 rule.

Lawyers wanting to put Pinochet on trial for alleged abuses during his 17-year authoritarian regime asked the three judges of a Santiago appeals court to set back the appeal hearing and ruling date to allow them more time to prepare, court sources said.

The three judges will decide early Thursday whether to delay or to go ahead with the appeal against the arrest order that has been launched by the retired general's legal team, judiciary sources said.

The detention order against Pinochet, 85, the military's father figure, has sparked concern within Chile's armed forces, which wield enormous power in the South American nation of 15 million people.

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President Ricardo Lagos met on Tuesday with the four commanders in chief of the military to discuss the order to arrest Pinochet, who ran Chile with an iron fist after ousting elected socialist President Salvador Allende in a bloody coup.

The military chiefs urged Lagos to call a meeting of the National Security Council -- which only convenes to discuss events that are provoking institutional crises and tensions -- to consider the arrest order.

President calls for Security Council gathering

In an address to the nation on Wednesday, Lagos said he would call the meeting, which would bring together the president and the heads of Congress, the Supreme Court and the armed forces, only after the appeal against the order for Pinochet's arrest had run its course.

"So that nobody in the judiciary feels they are being infringed upon, it will be called when the appeal process has ended," Lagos said.

Chilean President Lagos enters the presidential palace of La Moneda in Santiago on Tuesday and gets the honors of the presidential guard

In practice, that could mean the council might not meet for up to two weeks because Thursday's appeal -- if it goes ahead without being delayed -- can be re-appealed to the Supreme Court, the country's highest tribunal.

Pinochet, who has recently recovered from pneumonia, had been regarded as largely untouchable in Chile.

But that changed last week when a crusading judge, Juan Guzman, ordered Pinochet placed under house arrest for allegedly planning and organizing the deaths and possibly also the disappearances of 77 leftists and unionists.

They were victims of a so-called Death Caravan, a military squad that flew around Chile in a helicopter in the weeks after Pinochet's September 11, 1973, coup.

Judges at a Santiago appeals court decided on Tuesday that until the appeal was heard -- by the same court -- the house arrest order was suspended against Pinochet, who has not been officially notified of the charges he faces.

Court sanctions crusading judge

In a setback for Guzman, Chile's Supreme Court sanctioned the judge on Wednesday, sending him a written note warning him not to show bias in his investigation.

Osvaldo Faundez, one of the judges of the Supreme Court, told reporters that the nation's top tribunal believed that Guzman had acted improperly recently by sending a letter of support to one of the lawyers bidding to put Pinochet on trial.

A supporter covers the face of Pinochet on a poster during a Tuesday demonstration against Judge Guzman outside the Supreme Court, in Santiago, Chile

Pinochet has made no comment on the order, which he was told of while at his rural residence in Bucalemu, 80 miles (130 km) west of Santiago.

The appeal presented by Pinochet's lawyers on Saturday seeks to block Guzman's order on grounds of irregularities -- including not waiting for tests on Pinochet's psychological state. He cannot be tried if he is declared mentally ill.

Guzman, who has investigated the deaths of people believed killed by the military during Pinochet's dictatorship, is probing more than 180 lawsuits against Pinochet.

More than 3,000 people died or disappeared under Pinochet's authoritarian regime in which witch hunts of leftists were common. Tens of thousands of Chileans fled the country.

Pinochet returned to Chile from Britain in March after spending 503 days under house arrest near London. He was detained in Britain in October 1998 at the request of a Spanish judge who wanted to try him on charges of torture, but Britain ruled he was too old and sick to be tried.

Pinochet has a heart pacemaker, and his doctors say he suffered at least two strokes while he was in Britain.

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Chilean court suspends Pinochet house-arrest order- December 4, 2000
December 5, 2000
Court orders judge to explain charges against Pinochet
December 4, 2000
Human rights groups hail Pinochet arrest
December 2, 2000
Pinochet to stand trial in Chile
December 1, 2000
Pending prosecution mars Pinochet's 85th birthday
November 25, 2000
Pinochet undergoes treatment at Chilean hospital for pneumonia
October 29, 2000
Chilean Supreme Court strips Pinochet of immunity
August 8, 2000
Defense: Pinochet never ordered executions, kidnappings
July 21, 2000

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