The Chilean dictatorship made the mistake of killing a political opponent in North American territory, with North American victims. Apart from the decision that the House of Lords will soon announce in London, the crimes of Pinochet should open the files and judicial processes of the United States. Approved by Jeane Kirkpatrick, condemned by Madeleine Albright, the US policy toward Chile brings to light sins and complicities that could gravely incriminate President Richard Nixon. Whatever may be the result of the actions of Judge Baltasar Garzon and the British tribunal, Augusto Pinochet has an account to settle with US justice. The individual case of Orlando Letelier does not only exemplify each and every one of the terrible fates that Pinochet imposed on his victims, but the reality that it will open, with renewed hope, relations between men, nations, and justice in the next century.
Human rights are universal.
And there is no statute of limitations for crimes against human rights. Carlos Fuentes is a Mexican writer.