Generals in exile

Haiti's Duvalier is in France, reportedly broke. Ethiopia's Mengistu Haile Mariam, under tighter security since an assassination attempt,...

Haiti8217;s Duvalier is in France, reportedly broke. Ethiopia8217;s Mengistu Haile Mariam, under tighter security since an assassination attempt, now mostly just stays home. Even before the October 16 arrest in London of former Chilean dictator General Augusto Pinochet on a Spanish extradition warrant, life has been uneasy for some fallen dictators.

Pinochet, at least until he showed up in London had it made compared with his fellow former rulers wanted for mass murder, torture and kidnapping. He was in his native land, immune from prosecution.

For the rest, whether they live in luxury or poverty, it8217;s been one long battle to fade into foreign obscurity. They have their bodyguards, their money, their memories and their hopes that the midnight knock on the door, the assassin8217;s bullet or the extradition warrant never comes.

Along with Duvalier and Mengistu, there8217;s Haiti8217;s Raoul Cedras, dwelling quietly in a high-rent district of Panama City, Paraguay8217;s General Alfredo Stroessner, given sanctuary in Brazil sincethe 1989 coup that ended his 34-year-dictatorship and Uganda8217;s Idi Amin, living with several wives and at least 30 children in all-expenses-paid luxury in Saudi Arabia.

Human rights investigators say some 300,000 people were killed during Amin8217;s eight years of blood-soaked rule after he seized power in a 1979 coup in the East African nation. Now in his early 70s, Amin lives in the Red Sea port city of Jiddah, where he has been spotted on evening walks along the coast or attending Friday prayers in a nearby mosque.

Jean-Claude Baby Doc8217; Duvalier, whose family8217;s 1957-86 dynasty saw tens of thousands massacred and tortured to death in Haiti, is less fortunate. Duvalier, who was 19 when he succeeded his father, Francois, a doctor known as Papa Doc8217;, as President in 1971, is a virtually forgotten figure. The man who once had a private militia of thousands, wreaking havoc and living off extortion, is now never seen in public. He is divorced from his wife and reportedly lives on handouts fromfriends.

Mengistu, a marxist accused of mass murder and crimes against humanity during his 17-year rule, has perhaps more cause to worry than most. Zimbabweans, mostly poor, were unenthusiastic about his 1991 arrival in Harare, particularly after the government picked up an unpaid phone account for 15,000. His protector, Zimbabwe8217;s President Robert Mugabe, is now increasingly unpopular. And since the 1995 assassination attempt, life has become more restrictive.

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In Brazil, Paraguay8217;s Stroessner keeps quiet and avoids photographers, and there are no reports of him ever being seen outside the mansion where in lives in the posh Lago Sul district in Brasilia. In Panama City, Cedras looks secure: Panama rejected an extradition request from Haiti earlier this year. Human rights activists, however, contend that after Pinochet8217;s London experience, no dictator can ever feel safe again.

Mario Vargas Llosa, among Latin America8217;s most widely translated writers, could think of no better warning for aspiringdictators worldwide. 8220;To know that the international community does not guarantee immunity for their crimes and they will always live on the fly, like cornered rats, will be a powerful vaccination against the Third World plague of military pronouncements, barracks insurrections and coups d8217;etat,8221; Llosa wrote in the Spanish daily El Pais.