U.S. RELATIONS WITH CHILE FACE CHILLY FUTURE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP99-00498R000100130024-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 13, 2007
• Sequence Number: 24
• Publication Date: February 27, 1978
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Approved For Release 2007/06/14: CIA-RDP99-00498R000100130024-4
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&,v piGE r ---- 27 February 1978
STAT
Co-operation in Letelier BOrnbing roe oug .
? Wfth Chk il -Face : C"* h i"I I
-
futu. re"i
By Jeremiah O'Leary .
Armando Lopez Estrada, Alvin Ross Diaz and
Jose Dionisio Suarez. -
Ross and Suarez were cited for contempt for
refusing to.answer grand jury questions but only
Suarez was sent to jail last April in strategy by
Propper that is still not explained. Suarez is con-
sidered by those familiar with the case to be. less
Wa,bington star Stilt Writer"
The United States will adopt a policy of increas-
ing coolness toward Chile unless that, country
operates in the investigation of the bombing
murder here of exiled former Ambassador
Orlando Letelier, officials indicated today.
Such a response was indicated by several offi-
cials as all U.S. ambassadors to Latin America
gather here for a three-day meeting.
The government of President Augusto Pinochet
has been asked by. court officials here to have the
Chilean Supreme Court question under oath two
men who U.S. investigators believe possess knowl-
edge of the 1976 assassination of Letelier and his
associate Ronni Moffitt.
U.S. Ambassador to Chile George Landau prob-
ably left Santiago for Washington before the "let-
ters interrogatory" from U.S. Attorney Earl J.
Silbert arrived by diplomatic pouch in Santiago.
"WE ARE HOLDING their feet `to the fire and
they are .damned if they do or damned if they
don't," said one official close to the case. The
embarrassment for the Chilean government is the
the United States knows the two men were issued
Chilean diplomatic passports to the United States
just before Letelier s- murder in September 1976.
The men have been identified as Juan Williams
Rose and Alejandro Romeral Jara. Those names
are probable aliases.
"Everybody knows these were phony names,"
an official said. The implication is- that the two
men were agents of DINA, the former Chilean se-
cret police organization.."Either way Chile is in a
corner. They can't deny that two men were given
official passports under those names, undoubtedly
false.: They might brazen it out and insist that they
have no record of such people, and that would be
true if the names are false, but how can they ex-
plain asking us for passports for men who do not
exist?" The- passports were issued by. the. U.S.
Embassy in Santiago. , ; .zt; Assistant U.S. Attorney Eugene Propper; who
has handled the Letelier case, is believed to have
been in Chile once already. and in Venezuela twice
in search of evidence.
_.. Chief U.S. District Judge William ' B. Bryant's
covering letter asks that Propper be allowed to sit
in on the Chilean court's questioning of the.men.
t? ? .~. ? Y~.as.?.rKltAw.ba-:cw'.....s.-,Tt.r:.lc IT ISN'T KNOWN whether Propper decided to
go ahead with sending the "letters interrogatory''"
because his case is nearly complete. against the
bombers or whether he is attempting to gain addi-
tional information' Obviously,-, Propper has not
been able to call "Williams": and "Romeral"-be
fore the grand jury. The grand jury has, however,.
questioned Chilean consular officer Hector Duran, I
.anti-Castro.Cuban exile,leaders, Roberto Carballo,l
likely than Ross to cooperate with the prosecutors.
Unless Suarez breaks his silence by the time the
grand jury completes its term in March, U.S. offi-
cials probably will have to charge him or release
him. :. _ _ .
As reconstructed by some close to the case, the
scenario that led to the killings of Letelier and
Moffitt is probably something like this: One of the
two suspected DINA agents, whose real names are
not known but whose photos are. in possession of.
investigators, came to Miami in the spring of 1976
to confer with Duran. Some think they were acting
on orders of the DINA chief, Col. Manuel Con-
treras Sepulveda.
IT IS THOUGHT that Duran then arranged for
the DINA agent or agents to meet with Cuban exile
leaders-in. Miami and that they in turn subcon-
tracted the Letelier "hit" to other Cubans in Union.,
City, N.J. Officials believe there were two trips to
the United States from Chile by the DINA agents
before the plot was carried out Sept. 21, 1976. Le- 4,
h
'
l
e
e as
teller's car was blown up at Sheridan Circ
drove to work with Moffitt in the front seat and he '
husband, Michael, is the back seat. :: ' .'?. -,
officials doubt that two DINA agents
S
Other U
.
.
in their late 20s would carry out such a plot without-,
authorization from their chief.
' would say that the two men acted on their own and..
. . -?--,_.. L:urd
Mica...
no mention of the Letelier case-on the
There is
.
agenda for the meeting, of U.S. chiefs of mission-
.AA.ene insr.nr-
row. on the view from the field on human rights_
policies and goals of the Carter administration. J..
t
Secr
r
rn
_y -- -----
.
e
;
field Tu
en. Pau arbanes, D-Md.; Assistant Secretary of;
State. Terence Todman; Patt Derian, human rights
advisor to Vance; and Robert Pastor, the National
Security Council expert on Latin America.:
Approved For Release 2007/06/14: CIA-RDP99-00498R000100130024-4
STAT