La Secretaría General de la Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales (FLACSO) ha iniciado la coordinación del proyecto “América Latina ante la Segunda Administración Bush”.  

Como parte de este  proyecto, la Secretaría General de FLACSO ofrece otro canal de información con un resumen noticioso semanal sobre lo que se publica acerca de América Latina en algunos de los principales diarios de los Estados Unidos.  Esto permitirá identificar   cuales son los temas que despiertan mayor  interés en Estados Unidos sobre la región latinoamericana y su tratamiento en la prensa estadounidense.  Las noticias correspondientes a la semana del 07 al 14 de diciembre del 2006 han sido clasificadas bajo las categorías de:
 

COMERCIO
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GUACHALá, ECUADOR – A quarter of the bouquets of roses sold across the US are first cultivated, cut, and bundled in Ecuador - in greenhouses that dot this valley of snow-capped peaks near the equator where roses are said to strive straight for the sun.

Ecuador's $350 million flower industry has transformed communities across the Cayambe Valley, nestled in the Andes about 37 miles north of the capital, Quito. Thanks in large part to US trade benefits that have been in place for 15 years, 70 percent of Ecuador's flowers head to the US.

But the heady days for rose growers here could be numbered. Congress agreed Dec. 7 to extend benefits for six months that allow roses and other goods to enter the US duty-free. But the trade perks, which were originally conceived to ply Ecuador, Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia away from producing narcotics, are not permanent. Bilateral trade agreements were intended to eventually replace them.

MIGRACION
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La semana pasada El Salvador se convirtió en el primer país de ingresos medios bajos en beneficiarse de la Cuenta del Reto del Milenio (MCC, según siglas en inglés),el programa de ayuda exterior del Presidente Bush diseñado para asistir a países en desarrollo pero bien gobernados. A través de un plan de asistencia por $461 millones de dólares, Estados Unidos se unirá así a los inmigrantes salvadoreños en el envío de dinero al sur.

Esos $461milliones tal vez parezcan poco comparados con los $2,800 millones de dólares en remesas enviados el año pasado por los salvadoreños en este país, particularmente teniendo en cuenta que esa suma se repartirá en el curso de cinco años. Pero eso no quiere decir que los salvadoreños acá no tengan ciertas sugerencias para el MCC como también la esperanza de que el programa los ayudará a cambiar la forma en que las remesas están afectando a su país.

Los inmigrantes salvadoreños se sienten frustrados ante el hecho de que sus dólares no están cosechando beneficios de desarrollo en su país. Aunque las remesas han demostrado ser un elemento vital para miles de familias en pobreza extrema, los inmigrantes salvadoreños temen que el dinero esté creando una cultura de dependencia en su país de origen.

POLÍTICA INTERNA
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NEWS ANALYSIS
A BITTER LEGACY OF DIVISION SURVIVES PINOCHET
The New York Times
December 12, 2006

SANTIAGO, Chile, Dec. 11 — On Chilean television Sunday afternoon, supporters of Gen. Augusto Pinochet were pummeling demonstrators celebrating the death of the former dictator. “Look at that,” complained the manager of a car rental agency in the southern town of Pucón. “Even now that he’s dead, Pinochet continues to perturb this country.”

Chile seemed calmer on Monday, with the general’s few remaining admirers filing by his coffin at the military academy here and the rest of the country going about its normal workday activities. But the timing of his death has not only brought back to the surface many of the divisions he created but has also left a host of troubling legal and political questions unresolved.

Victims of the general’s human rights abuses, for instance, expressed frustration that he had died “without paying his enormous debt to justice” or even standing trial, in the words of Lorena Pizarro, director of the Relatives of the Detained and Disappeared Group.

HAVANA - Regla, a 38-year-old security guard, is precisely the type of married woman the Cuban government is worried about: She had a baby 17 years ago and called it quits.

Money is tight and so is housing, so she had an abortion each of the four more times she got pregnant. Her teen daughter terminated a pregnancy last year, too.

''With this economic situation, who can have more children?'' Regla said. ``We're in the special period that never ends. Abortions are free and have no stigma attached. Everybody does it. Everybody.''

HIPPOCRATES MEETS FIDEL, AND EVEN U.S. STUDENTS ENROLL
The New York Times
December 8, 2006

HAVANA, Dec. 7 — Anatomy is a part of medical education everywhere. Biochemistry, too. But a course in Cuban history?

The Latin American School of Medical Sciences, on a sprawling former naval base on the outskirts of this capital, teaches its students medicine Cuban style. That means poking at cadavers, peering into aging microscopes and discussing the revolution that brought Fidel Castro to power 48 years ago.

Cuban-trained doctors must be able not only to diagnose an ulcer and treat hypertension but also to expound on the principles put forward by “el comandante.”

It was President Castro himself who in the late 1990s came up with the idea for this place, which gives potential doctors from throughout the Americas and Africa not just the A B C’s of medicine but also the basic philosophy behind offering good health care to the struggling masses.

MEXICO LEADER SWIFTLY EMBRACES POLICIES OF HIS LEFTIST OPPONENT
The New York Times
December 8, 2006

MEXICO CITY, Dec. 7 — Felipe Calderón’s presidency got off to a bumpy start last Friday when leftists heckled him during his oath of office, but during his first several days in the president’s chair he has moved quickly to adopt some of their pet issues.

Right off the bat, he slashed his salary and those of other top officials by 10 percent and said the money would go toward social programs, adopting in one fell swoop one of his leftist rival’s favorite campaign promises.

Then Mr. Calderón introduced a budget that slashed spending in his office and the Interior Ministry while raising spending steeply for public security and health care.

Finally, on Thursday, the president used his first out of town trip to highlight the poverty in Guerrero State and announced a program to pump money into 100 of the poorest towns in Mexico. He said closing the gap between rich and poor would be one of his top priorities.

CUBAN CHURCHES FEEL PRESSURE FROM GOVERNMENT TO STIFLE DISSENT
The Miami Herald
Dec. 09, 2006

Carlos Lamelas, a Cuban evangelical pastor who spoke up about religious freedom on the island, first found himself booted from his church, and then jailed.

But the former Church of God president does not stand accused of political dissent or other counter-revolutionary activities. His alleged crime: human trafficking.

Lamelas went on trial this week for allegedly smuggling people out of the island, and if found guilty faces nine years in prison.

''Persecution of pastors is subtle,'' said Alexandri Sosa, a pastor who left Cuba this summer after having problems with the government. ``The methods have changed. So if a wall collapses and you rebuild it, you go to jail for illegal construction.''

FEDERAL RAID ON OFFICES IN TROUBLED MEXICAN STATE
The New York Times
December 9, 2006

MEXICO CITY, Dec. 8 — Six days after President Felipe Calderón took office, federal agents raided the prosecutor’s office and state police headquarters on Friday in the troubled southern state of Oaxaca, where state law-enforcement authorities have failed to arrest anyone in the killings of at least 11 antigovernment protesters and a New York City journalist.

Around 4:15 p.m., dozens of federal police officers flooded into the offices of the state prosecutor, Lizbeth Caña, and secured the arms cache used by the state judicial police responsible for investigating crimes, according to local news reports.

A police commander, Ardelio Vargas, told the newspaper La Reforma that the federal authorities intended to seize all the police weapons to determine whether they had been used against protesters in recent months. There have been widespread allegations that the local police and municipal officials had abused demonstrators and in some cases killed them.

GALAPAGOS ISLANDERS CONFRONT THE HAZARDS OF TOURISM BUILT ON CONSERVATION
The Washington Post
December 9, 2006

PUERTO AYORA, Ecuador -- An unremarkable day on the archipelago. A taxi honks at a meandering pedestrian. Shirtless men play dominoes by the market, shooing away fearless seagulls that vie for fish scraps. Dockworkers empty another cargo boat, while sunburned tourists listen to their guides explain how the unique fauna here inspired Charles Darwin to develop his theory of evolution.

Domingo Navarrete has observed scenes like this in the Galapagos Islands for 38 years -- long enough for him to develop a theory of his own.

His theory explains how the permanent population here jumped from about 2,000 in the 1960s to about 3,000 in the early 1980s, then exploded in recent years toward the estimated 30,000 that has conservationists and local officials scrambling for stricter migration controls. His explanation of change has nothing to do with natural selection, but it's so beautifully simple that he can outline it without words, just by rubbing his thumb and index finger together.

SIGNIFICANCE OF PHOTOS OF AN ILL CASTRO DEBATED
The Miami Herald
Dec. 11, 2006

As the head of a Cuban revolutionary radio station and newspaper, there was a time that Carlos Franqui worked a great deal on Fidel Castro's image.

Now he looks at the unflattering photographs and videos the Cuban government has released of the 80-year-old Castro since he got sick four months ago and wonders: What are they thinking?

Or rather, what was Castro thinking, for Franqui believes that it is the Cuban leader himself who has been directing the release of the images from his sickbed.

''Evidently, it shows he has lost mental control,'' Franqui said by phone from his home in Puerto Rico. ``If he was in his right mind, he would never have published those pictures.''

AUGUSTO PINOCHET, DICTATOR WHO RULED BY TERROR IN CHILE, DIES AT 91
The New York Times
December 11, 2006

Gen. Augusto Pinochet Ugarte, the brutal dictator who repressed and reshaped Chile for nearly two decades and became a notorious symbol of human rights abuse and corruption, died yesterday at the Military Hospital of Santiago. He was 91.

Dr. Juan Ignacio Vergara, head of the medical team that had been treating him, said he died at 2:15 p.m., a week after being hospitalized and undergoing angioplasty and another operation after an acute heart attack. Dr. Vergara said his condition degenerated sharply yesterday morning, and he was moved to the intensive care unit, where he died.

General Pinochet seized power on Sept. 11, 1973, in a bloody military coup that toppled the Marxist government of President Salvador Allende. He then led the country into an era of robust economic growth. But during his rule, more than 3,200 people were executed or disappeared, and scores of thousands more were detained and tortured or exiled.

JOY, AND VIOLENCE, AT DEATH OF PINOCHET
The New York Times
December 11, 2006

SANTIAGO, Chile, Dec. 10 — Thousands of demonstrators took to the streets in celebration here on Sunday almost immediately after news circulated of the death of the former dictator Gen. Augusto Pinochet. But within hours the revelry was marred by violence, with confrontations breaking out and the police using tear gas and water cannons against a large group marching toward the presidential palace.

Gen. Jorge Acuna, of the capital police force, said that six police officers had been wounded in the scuffles and that seven demonstrators had been arrested in the capital, while dozens of others were detained in police vehicles and more arrests were expected.

The government called for calm on Sunday night. “We call on the detractors and supporters, if they’re going to demonstrate to do it peacefully. And for this, we’ve deployed a major security force,” said Felipe Harboe, the under secretary of the interior.

After General Pinochet’s death, at 2:15 p.m., President Michelle Bachelet met briefly with cabinet ministers and then released a terse announcement through her spokesman, Ricardo Lagos Weber, covering only funeral and memorial considerations with no other comment. Mr. Lagos said that General Pinochet would not receive a state funeral, but would receive military honors. The president authorized flags to fly at half-mast at military installations, but did not decree a period of national mourning.

MEXICO CRACKING DOWN ON DRUG STRONGHOLD
The Miami Herald
Dec. 13, 2006

APATZINGAN, Mexico - Helicopters clattered over remote mountaintops while soldiers set up checkpoints Tuesday in western Mexico, a region President Felipe Calderón has vowed to take back from smugglers challenging authorities with beheadings and large-scale drug production.

Soldiers were ordered to set fire to marijuana and opium fields and round up traffickers in Michoacán -- Calderón's home state. Navy ships also were patrolling the state's Lázaro Cárdenas port, a hub for drugs arriving from Central America and Colombia on their way to the United States.

Cornelio Casio, one of several generals overseeing the operation begun Monday, said 6,500 soldiers and federal police were fanning out across the state.

JUSTICE STILL DEMANDED FOR CHILE'S U.S. VICTIMS
The Miami Herald
Dec. 12, 2006

WASHINGTON - Despite the death Sunday of former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, a small band of Americans is vowing to seek justice for the murders of loved ones committed in the aftermath of the U.S.-backed coup that brought Pinochet to power 33 years ago.

Joyce Horman still regrets that the United States never ordered an investigation into the death of her husband, Charles, who disappeared in the days after the Sept. 11, 1973, coup and whose body was found months later buried in a cemetery wall.

Janis Page Teruggi, whose brother, Frank, apparently died in a soccer stadium that was converted into a torture camp, says Pinochet's death will never squelch her urge for justice.

And Sherry Weiss is still searching for answers in the death of her cousin, Ronni Karpen Moffitt, an American who died in Washington when a bomb exploded under a car carrying Orlando Letelier, Chile's former defense minister and a Pinochet critic.

DEAD CHILEAN DICTATOR STILL PROVOCATIVE
The Miami Herald
Dec. 12, 2006

SANTIAGO, Chile - The death Sunday of former Chilean dictator Gen. Augusto Pinochet has reawakened old, painful debates about his government in the streets of his capital.

In front of the military academy where his body lay Monday, thousands of Pinochet supporters waited for as long as four hours in the blazing sun to catch a quick glimpse of the general.

Homemade signs pro claimed Pinochet a hero, and the fired-up crowd chanted slogans in praise of the bloody 1973 coup he led against socialist President Salvador Allende.

''He took a country that was in collapse, with inflation of 1,000 percent, and he installed a new economic system, a liberal system, and that's why we're the success we are today,'' said auto mechanic Mario Moya González.

MARIO LLERENA, 93, DIES; CASTRO ALLY, THEN CRITIC
The New York Times
December 12, 2006

Mario Llerena, a Cuban intellectual who was an early representative of Fidel Castro in the United States but who broke with him before he took power because of Mr. Castro’s shift toward Communism, died Sunday in Miami. He was 93.

His daughter, Stella Portada, said yesterday that he had died of natural causes at an assisted living center in Miami after recovering from a bout of pneumonia.

Mr. Llerena met Mr. Castro in Mexico in the mid-1950s as Mr. Castro was preparing for an invasion of Cuba to overthrow the military dictator Fulgencio Batista. At Mr. Castro’s request, Mr. Llerena put into writing the democratic ideals that underpinned the Castro movement in the early days of the uprising. The document, “Nuestra Razón” (“Our Reason”), was published in Mexico.

It was in 1957, a few months after Mr. Castro was widely believed to have been killed in the invasion, that Mr. Llerena played a pivotal role in skirting General Batista’s attempt to censor any news about it.

After The New York Times published three articles by the correspondent Herbert L. Matthews revealing that Mr. Castro was alive and building a rebel force in the mountains of Cuba, Mr. Llerena, in New York, made photocopies and mailed them to more than 3,000 people listed in the Havana Social Registry.

IN DEATH, PINOCHET CONTINUES TO DIVIDE
The Washington Post
December 12, 2006

SANTIAGO, Chile, Dec. 11 -- When the Mass concluded with a benedictory prayer Monday afternoon, several hundred mourners mingled quietly for a moment around the glass-topped coffin of Gen. Augusto Pinochet, crossing themselves and stealing one final look at the pale visage of a man who ruled this country with an iron hand from 1973 to 1990.

Then someone began to sing the national anthem, loudly. The whole room joined in, swept up in a defiant brand of patriotism. They punched fists in the air and shouted Pinochet's name, invigorated by a sudden sense of purpose: to convince Chile that the memory of the former dictator, who they consider a valiant protector against communism, should be kept alive.

Others in Chile, however, are determined this week to remember Pinochet for a different reason: More than 3,000 people were murdered and about 29,000 tortured by his government in a ruthless campaign to eliminate dissidents.

Pinochet in death continued to be a point of division and ambiguity as Chileans prepared for his Tuesday morning funeral.

HISTORY WILL JUDGE PINOCHET HARSHLY
OUR OPINION: HE WILL BE REMEMBERED LARGELY FOR RUNNING BRUTAL REGIME
The Miami Herald
Dec. 12, 2006

Fittingly, former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet died on International Human Rights Day, bringing to an end the life of a man whose iron-fisted rule from 1973 to 1990 was characterized by utter disrespect for the rights of his countrymen. His passing will be not be mourned by those who cherish human dignity.

Torture and death

By the time of his death on Sunday at 91, the former general was politically irrelevant. Yet he remained a powerful symbol of a terrifying era when brute force prevailed over justice. To express dissent in any form during the Pinochet era was to court torture and death. His passing is a reminder of what can happen when a nation puts its fate in the hands of a ''savior'' who seizes power by force.

MOURNERS DEFEND PINOCHET AS ARDENT FOE OF COMMUNISM
The Washington Post
December 13, 2006

SANTIAGO, Chile, Dec. 12 -- Family and friends eulogized Gen. Augusto Pinochet on Tuesday as a hero of the Cold War who has been mislabeled as a murderous despot, and they appealed to history to judge kindly the man whose 17-year rule left behind a long trail of murder and abuse.

Loyal supporters waved banners during the funeral thanking Pinochet for toppling the Socialist government of Salvador Allende, the elected president who died during the 1973 coup that marked the beginning of the Pinochet era. In a separate ceremony held simultaneously in Santiago's main plaza, thousands held pictures of his government's victims and chanted, "The Tyrant Died! Allende Lives!"

The divisions marked by the two gatherings intersected only sporadically Tuesday. Hecklers briefly tried to disrupt the funeral, and some attendees yanked the electrical cords of broadcast journalists -- an expression of anger at the unfavorable coverage given to Pinochet. The Chilean government, which granted Pinochet military honors but not a full state ceremony, sent Defense Minister Vivianne Blanlot as its lone representative. Some Pinochet supporters threw debris toward her near the end of the ceremony.

PINOCHET BACKERS SAY GOODBYE
The Miami Herald
Dec. 13, 2006

SANTIAGO, Chile - Some 5,000 Chileans bade farewell to former dictator Gen. Augusto Pinochet at his funeral Tuesday, championing him as an anti-communist who saved Chile from a civil war.

Pinochet's 17-year regime led to the deaths or disappearances of an estimated 3,197 people and the torture of thousands more. Today, the democratic country is divided between a minority of Pinochet loyalists and a majority that disapproves of his record.

President Michelle Bachelet, whom Pinochet's government jailed and tortured, didn't attend the funeral or refer to it during public appearances Tuesday. She had refused to let the ex-leader be honored as a former head of state. His funeral was outdoors on the terrace of the main military academy.

RELACIONES BILATERALES
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WHEN CASTRO DIES, THEY KNOW THE DRILL
The Miami Herald
Dec. 13, 2006

Picture this: Cuban leader Fidel Castro dies, Cuba's military battles protesters on the streets, and frantic Cubans take to the seas. In South Florida, exiles board boats and head for Cuba to pick up desperate relatives -- or to help start an armed insurrection against the 47-year-old dictatorship.

The Florida Straits get jammed with boat traffic on choppy seas. People drown. Chaos erupts.

The U.S. government believes this could happen. On Tuesday federal, state and local authorities accelerated preparations for Castro's death -- starting a two-day drill on how authorities plan to respond to a mass exodus to Florida.

As 400 emergency officials and others held the tabletop exercise at the Broward County Convention Center, Miami police sent an e-mail to reporters Tuesday afternoon warning of unsubstantiated rumors about Castro's ''possible death,'' and even Gov. Jeb Bush was alerted about the buzz in South Florida.

GAS SMUGGLERS DODGE THE LAW IN BRAZIL AND VENEZUELA
The New York Times
December 7, 2006

PACARAIMA, Brazil — At the last gas station on BR-174, the potholed two-lane highway that ends here at the border between Brazil and Venezuela, gasoline costs nearly $5 a gallon, the standard price throughout Brazil. But in the nearby Venezuelan town of Santa Elena de Uairén, the price at the pump is only 17 cents a gallon.

As might be expected, that whopping disparity has generated a booming contraband trade in gasoline in this remote and underpopulated corner of the Amazon. The governments of both countries have been moving to bring the problem under control, but the profit potential is so alluring that every measure they take simply spurs fuel traffickers to ever more ingenious efforts at evasion.

MEXICO CITY, Dec. 10 — A month ago, the death of Bradley Roland Will seemed cut and dried. Mr. Will, an independent New York City journalist was shot in the chest while videotaping a lopsided confrontation between gunmen who supported the beleaguered governor of Oaxaca and protesters demanding his ouster.

Pictures of some of the gunmen, with their names, had appeared on the front pages of all the major papers. The two fatal bullets had come from a 9-millimeter pistol like those issued to the police. The case seemed a prosecutor’s dream.

That is, until Dec. 1, when a judge freed two of the men photographed shooting at the protesters, citing a lack of evidence. The ruling provoked accusations from leftists of a cover-up. Indeed, the state’s investigation into the killing of Mr. Will, as well as the deaths of a dozen protesters in the conflict, has drawn so much criticism that federal police raided the state police headquarters on Friday and seized weapons to determine if any had been used in shootings during demonstrations.

Besides underscoring how infrequently killings of journalists and antigovernment protesters are solved in Mexico, the case has drawn widespread attention because it reveals the sad clash of left-wing idealism, personified in Mr. Will, a bearded 36-year-old originally from Illinois, with the murky realities of Mexican politics.

U.S. authorities added an unusual postscript to Oliver Stone's controversial documentary on Cuban leader Fidel Castro -- a $6,322 fine for violating the U.S. embargo on the island.

The Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control announced that producer IXTLAN Corp. agreed to pay the fine for violations during filming in 2002 and 2003.

The announcement said, ``IXTLAN and four individuals negotiated services in which the Cuban government or a Cuban citizen had a particular interest in favoring the making of the film.''

Although the individuals fined were not identified, people familiar with the case told El Nuevo Herald that they included IXTLAN, Stone and team members that filmed Looking for Fidel, shown on HBO in 2004.

REGIONAL
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THE RIGHT SIDE OF LATIN AMERICA'S LEFT
Opinion
The Christian Science Monitor
December 12, 2006
By Jeffrey W. Rubin

BOSTON – With his landslide reelection victory this month, Hugo Chávez maintains his role as lightning rod for US anxieties about Latin America's resurgent left.

President Bush has commended the leftist presidents of Brazil and Chile for embracing free-market orthodoxy and governing with moderation. But administration officials and members of Congress have repeatedly denounced Mr. Chávez - and more recently Bolivia's Evo Morales - for zealously criticizing the US and putting oil and gas resources to nationalist use. With the election of each new leftist president in Latin America, US commentators distinguish "good" leftist leaders who don't rock the boat from "bad" ones who do.

This US perspective is shortsighted. The resurgence of the left in Latin America is part of an ongoing process - which began with the 1910 Mexican Revolution and the rise of leftist parties in the 1920s and 1930s - of extending democratic reform, broadening markets, and increasing the involvement of the middle class in politics. Latin American leftists have not always championed these goals, and other parties have taken them up. But without the presence and pressures of the left, these changes, which support democracy and markets in the long run, would never have taken place.

Hasta la semana pasada, representantes de la Organización de Estados Americanos habían observado ocho elecciones presidenciales en los últimos 12 meses sin dificultad alguna. Aunque varias contiendas fueron debatidas con vehemencia, el rol de la OEA no se puso en duda al cumplir con su misión de contribuir a que los ciudadanos del Hemisferio Occidental puedan votar libre y justamente.

Pero fue entonces cuando les llegó el turno a las elecciones de Ecuador y Venezuela, las últimas contiendas del año electoral más activo en la historia del hemisferio. De repente la credibilidad de la OEA como garante independiente de elecciones democráticas quedó en entredicho.

En Ecuador, el candidato presidencial de izquierda Rafael Correa acusó a la misión de observación electoral de la OEA y a su líder, el ex canciller argentino Rafael Bielsa, de parcialidad. En una carta al Secretario General de la OEA José Miguel Insulza a mediados de octubre, el partido político de Correa acusó a Bielsa de haber calificado abiertamente al candidato y a su plataforma como la opción errada para Ecuador y una fuente de ¿inestabilidad¿ para la democracia ecuatoriana.

As 2006 comes to a close, the conventional wisdom among Latin America watchers is that the region has shifted further to the left. But, as often happens, the conventional wisdom may be deceiving.

Granted, there were nine presidential elections in the region this year -- in Chile, Costa Rica, Peru, Colombia, Mexico, Brazil, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Venezuela -- and the left won most of them. Self-proclaimed leftist candidates won in Chile, Peru, Brazil, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Venezuela, which has led Venezuela's populist president Hugo Chávez to assert that a ''leftist wave'' is spreading through the region.

But there are several reasons to take Chávez's assertions with a grain of salt. Right-of-center candidates won key elections in Mexico and Colombia, and centrist or center-leftist candidates who have little in common with Chávez won in Chile, Peru, Costa Rica and Brazil.

SANTIAGO, CHILE – The death Sunday of one of South America's most notorious dictators, Gen. Augusto Pinochet, frustrated the efforts of those who had hoped to see him condemned for the human rights abuses committed during his 17-year rule.

Yet Gen. Pinochet, who overthrew Chile's democratically elected Marxist government in a 1973 coup, leaves behind a disputed legacy that is also lauded for impressive economic successes.

The date of his death - Dec. 10, the UN's International Human Rights Day - could not have been more symbolic. The international effort to bring Pinochet to justice epitomized the global struggle to end impunity for human rights abusers in Latin America.

WASHINGTON - Humberto Palamara was a civilian employee of the Chilean navy when he wrote a book on naval ethics and intelligence services, not knowing that he was about to begin a harrowing judicial ordeal that would cost him his career and his marriage.

The navy banned the book in 1993, alleging it revealed state secrets. After Palamara complained in public, he was fired, tried and convicted under Chile's tough disrespect and military justice laws. He spent 10 days in jail as one tribunal after another rejected his appeals, and his wife moved to Spain with their two children.