1970-1979 | Arms exports | Backing dictatorships | Chile

Foreign Secretary cites copper as reason for arming Chile’s dictatorship

24 April 1974 On 24 April 1974, Foreign Secretary James Callaghan explained to the Labour Party’s National Executive Committee (NEC) why the Cabinet had decided to supply the Chilean dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet with two Leander class frigates and two Oberon submarines. They had been under construction on the Clyde when the military coup, which…

2000-2009 | Backing dictatorships | Chile

Chile’s murderous tyrant Pinochet allowed to return home

2 March 2000 On 2 March 2000, the aging dictator Augusto Pinochet was jubilant on discovering that he would be allowed to return to Chile, following the intervention of Britain’s Home Secretary Jack Straw, despite the House of Lords ruling that he should be extradited to Spain to answer charges of wholesale torture and murder….

1990-1999 | Backing dictatorships | Chile

28 OCTOBER

SHIP’S CREW SAVED BUT ‘NOT EVEN ANY OF OUR CLOTHES OR ONE SLAVE.’ [ 28 October 1763 ] The London registered Phoenix was carrying 332 slaves crammed into its hold from Africa towards Maryland on the United States’ mid-Atlantic coastline. BRITAIN’S HIGH COURT – CHILE’S TYRANT PINOCHET CAN’T BE PROSECUTED [ 28 October 1998 ]…