http://www.guardian.co.uk/chile/story/0,13755,1570335,00.html

As much as I share your frustration, I think the blame lies really at the feet of the legislators/politcians. I would go one further to suggest the word "derogation" in this sense is offensive doublespeak. Blaming the plod is irrelevant- they are just lackies obeying orders.

I think Human Rights should be untouchable and the law should be there to protect them from ANY "loopholes" or getarounds. I don't have any smart-arsed solutions to this problem except to keep plugging away at raising awareness to situation and thereby increasing pressure on the political/legal system.

I personally suspect the first step along this road would be to intially make it law that all parties should publish lists of the sponsors and the associated "donations" and start building towards a situation that no party is allowed to accept "donations" whatsoever (all funds fixed and from the public purse to enable a level playing field).

Sadly, all indicators show the wind is not blowing in our direction at the moment... things can change.

I am so fuckin pissed off with this country…with this world, its fundamentally psychotic. What is going on with people today? Bucnch of fuckin corporate sheep, how do people just switch their self off from the suffering of humanity!
I am just soooooo confused! Whatever happened to POWER TO THE PEOPLE!!!!
When will “they” realise that they cannot carry on living in ignorance, blinded by their own greed? Selfish mother f*****s I Right now can only take comfort in the fact that one day they will suffer too, its called Karma u bunch of murdering wankers!

Revealed: BAE's secret £1m to Pinochet

US banking records show links between arms firm and ex-dictator continued until last year

David Leigh and Rob Evans
Thursday September 15, 2005
The Guardian


Britain's biggest arms firm, BAE Systems, has been identified on US banking records as secretly paying more than £1m to General Augusto Pinochet, the former Chilean dictator. A Guardian investigation has revealed some of the money was listed as being paid through a front company in the British Virgin Islands, which BAE has used to channel commission on arms deals.
Covert payments to Pinochet-linked groups are listed on documents compiled by the Chilean authorities and obtained by the Guardian. They record large payments from BAE as recently as last year.
Asked last night why it had paid the general, who is the target of numerous allegations of murder and torture from the time he seized power in Chile, BAE issued a statement saying: "We at BAE Systems have clear and rigorous policies which govern the conduct of our relationships with third parties. We require all our employees to adhere to these policies and comply with the law."
The company, a prime exhibitor at today's international arms fair in London, has been the target of bribery allegations. It is under investigation by the Serious Fraud Office on suspicion of money laundering and false accounting, after allegations of a £60m Saudi 'slush fund'.

A Chilean judge, Sergio Muñoz, is pursuing Gen Pinochet on allegations of tax evasion. Last month he made successful court applications in the US to obtain banking records. They disclosed huge sums of cash flowing into banks including the then Miami branch of Coutts. Coutts operated accounts, which Chilean prosecutors say are linked to Pinochet, from 1993 to 2004, although the bank has now sold out to a Spanish bank, Santander. Coutts said : "We have no reason to believe our Miami affiliate did anything inappropriate by reference to the banking requirements at the time."

According to the Chilean documents, BAE made payments into Coutts accounts under its own name, and under that of Red Diamond Trading, an offshore entity which does not appear on BAE's published accounts. Documents obtained by the Guardian show it has been used since 1998 to funnel covert commission payments for aerospace deals to Argentina.

The BAE payments went to offshore firms - also registered in the British Virgin Islands - controlled, the Chilean authorities say, by Gen Pinochet's financial adviser, Oscar Aitkin, described in a US senate committee investigation this year as a conduit for payments to Gen Pinochet.

BAE sought to conclude a deal in the 1990s to sell Chile a rocket system and are now trying to sell it naval electronics. Chile is described as a "key market" by the Ministry of Defence.

· Story put together with help from the Chilean daily newspaper La Tercera

I have to agree - It's depressing - too many fat people, bloated overpaid workers
( unfortuanately now including the charity, union, public sector etc as well as i the usual banking, paper shuffling services ) , I'm all right jack property speculators, careerists and leeches of every shape and description ( just doing my job / you've got to get by i.e "so what if my job/lifestyle contributes heavily to causing climate chaos / mass murder / human rights abuses I've got a mortgage / kids, little time etc" and all the other pathetic non-excuses of the aspirant/comfortable COWARDS.

Stand up you miserable sons and daughters of babylon.

Still - It is good to see people turn up at all. Big respect to all of you ( except the filfth protecting the death dealers and those redneck scumbags from Ensign travel of Purfleet who deliberately tried to run people over so they could take other scumbags ( in suits ) to the Excel.

Don't expect to see anything in the mainstream media as they are shit getting shitter ( that includes the wnaky new look wow Grauniad )

Now I know you guys all hate the mainstream media for not exaggerating things as much as you'd like, but I think it needs pointing out here that as far as I am aware, there are no convicted "mass murdering scumbags" working at BAE Systems. People can use their products to kill. But the same applies to tobacco companies, I suppose you could go on to extend it to car manufacturers, any company that makes scissors and knives? How about moaning at the people who carry out the act rather than those who simply manufacture things.

I don't know if you've bothered to check out how the arms trade actually works, but all deals are from government to government, so take up issues there. BAE Systems and the rest technically act as subcontractors. And as a result, they aren't criminals as it is all facilitated through government. If you believe the government is the criminal here, again, moan at them. The real criminals are those who disrupt and intimidate people simply doing their legal jobs.

What about the products they make for things like detecting and removing land mines? And I suppose none of you fly anywhere on holidays or to travel, because if you've gone in an Airbus aircraft the wings were made by BAE Systems, and in a Boeing many components and systems are sourced from BAE.

They provide employment to thousands and thousands of people in this country, invest a fortune in research and development, and massively contribute to the economy so you guys can go through big school.

I fail to believe that anyone can be so naive that they believe if any defence contractor was to close down that either another wouldn't open to fill the gap or the others wouldn't increase capacity as a result. Would you prefer the country to be unarmed? Would that make you feel safer?

I'm 100% anti-war, but it really amazes me when I read things like this that have very little basis in truth, or above all, reason.

I work for BAE Systems as an engineer, and I was most consternated to read you are hateful towards us, and threw tomatos at our stalls when we take out our time to educate people and recruit people. I have gotten so much flack for working at BAE that I have even started getting a taxi home because I have been spat at, given rude comments a deven punched in the face whilst in uniform. BAE did nothing to deserve this - abuse like this is cruel and unkind, unnecessary, and above all, unacceptable. Would you like it if we did this? As for alligations of being "murderous", I have no idea what you are talking about