Document: Pinochet 'Stonewalled' Probe

Chile's President Augusto Pinochet, right, shakes hands with Deputy Sec. of State Warren Christopher at Andrews Air Force Base, Md. in this 1977 file photo. Pinochet, who terrorized his opponents for 17 years after taking power in a bloody coup, died Sunday, Dec. 10, 2006, putting an end to a decade of intensifying efforts to bring him to trial for human rights abuses blamed on his regime. He was 91. (AP Photo) (AP)

WASHINGTON -- Chilean President Augusto Pinochet took steps to protect himself from potentially damaging legal measures by U.S. and Chilean authorities investigating the assassination of a political opponent, a declassified CIA document shows.

The document said that in June 1978, part of Pinochet's strategy for dealing with the killing two years earlier was to "stonewall" any further requests from the U.S. government that "would serve to build a case" against the head of Chile's secret police, Manuel Contreras, and other Chileans.

Pinochet also was determined to protect Contreras from domestic prosecution because the president's "political survival is dependent upon Contreras's fate," the document said.

It was among documents posted on the Internet Tuesday by the National Security Archive, a research group affiliated with George Washington University. Many of the documents were declassified years ago. The archive posted them Tuesday in connection with Pinochet's death at 91 in Santiago on Sunday.

Orlando Letelier had served the previous government of Marxist President Salvador Allende as foreign minister and as ambassador to Washington. He was killed in September 1976 along with an associate, Ronni Karpin Moffitt, when a bomb under his car exploded while the two were riding to work in Washington. Letelier had been working to undermine Pinochet's government.

Allende was ousted by a Pinochet-led military coup in September 1973.

The document, stamped "secret," was earmarked for the FBI and the State Department.

It said Pinochet lobbied the Chilean Supreme Court to ensure that U.S. requests for the extradition of Chilean citizens are rejected.

Another goal was to "exploit Chilean nationalism with a covert action campaign to portray the Letelier investigation as politically motivated _ another pretext for destabilizing the Pinochet regime."

The document also said that Pinochet was intent on placating negative foreign opinion about his government by permitting the U.N. Human Rights Commission to visit Chile.

Pinochet was able to stay in power until 1990, stepping down after losing a referendum on his rule. Contreras, meanwhile, spent seven years in prison for his role in the assassination. He claimed he had acted at Pinochet's direction.

Peter Kornbluh, director of the National Security Archive's Chile Documentation Project, said the Justice Department, which investigated the Letelier assassination, retains classified files on the case. He called on Justice officials to "release all documents on Pinochet's role in this atrocity."