omgwtf!

SANTIAGO, Chile: It had been 18 months since Gen. Augusto Pinochet reluctantly stepped down from the presidency and Chileans were just beginning to unearth brutal secrets of his 1973-90 dictatorship.

In a bleak corner of Santiago’s sprawling General Cemetery known as Patio 29, workers were digging up the unmarked graves of more than 100 people who had been secretly buried in the weeks following his 1973 coup.

Tearful relatives of the “disappeared” gathered to watch the digging, hoping to find evidence of their loved ones.

But the former dictator was unmoved. A powerful, feared figure in Chile for years after the return of democracy, Pinochet left his army headquarters surrounded by his usual squad of bodyguards and was asked by reporters what he thought of the discovery that some of the coffins held two bodies each.

“A good cemetery space-saving measure,” the general replied with a grin.

The quip caused an uproar. Reprimanded by his civilian successor, Patricio Alwyin, the general acknowledged that his words were “probably unfortunate.”

It was the closest to an apology that Pinochet’s victims would ever get.

There are actually people who mourn this man’s passing, and weep for his loss.

Pinochet: implacable toward his enemies and unrepentant to the end – Americas – International Herald Tribune