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4. Universalism in Action II: Pinochet in London
On September 11, 1973, Augusto Pinochet launched a military coup against the
Chile’s elected President Salvador Allende. He subsequently ordered the torture, killing, and
disappearance of thousands of his junta’s political opponents. In 1978, the junta passed a self-
amnesty, which was barely questioned during the pacted transition to democracy 1988-1990.
On October 16, 1998, Pinochet was arrested in London by Scotland Yard at the request of a
Spanish judge. On March 24, 1999, the Law Lords, acting as the highest judicial authority in
the United Kingdom, decided that Augusto Pinochet Ugarte was extraditable to Spain for
crimes against humanity. On March 2, 2000, the British Home Secretary Jack Straw pulled
the last available brake for Britain: he stopped the impending trial by allowing Pinochet to go
free for health reasons.
These were the key events in the most prominent recent international criminal law
saga. The proceedings against Pinochet were in many ways different than Israel’s trial of
Eichmann. While Israel was accused of speaking in the name of the victims rather than in
the name of humanity, Spain and the UK were accused of meddling in Chile’s internal
affairs, going after the international left’s favorite bad guy, and recklessly promoting “the
tyranny of judges.”
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While Israel was deemed too close to the victims to do justice, Spain
and the UK were thought too distanced from Chile to act responsibly. The suspicion that
Spain and the UK did not have a link to the crime except through common membership in
humanity—which is precisely what universal jurisdiction allows for—created misgivings. The
complaint was, like in the Eichmann trial, that the trial was chosen for particular
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Henry Kissinger, “The Pitfalls of Universal Jurisdiction,” Foreign Affairs, July/August 2001, 86. Kissinger’s
vigorous critique of universal jurisdiction, though in keeping with his foreign policy thinking, is not
disinterested: judges in France, Chile, and Argentina all want to question Kissinger about his support of
Pinochet’s coup, among other things. See Doug Cassel, “The World Reaches Out for Justice,” Chicago Tribune,
August 12, 2001.
Convention