Former military leader Jorge Rafael Videla has been charged with an additional 49 cases of torture, kidnapping and murder. The 84-year-old is already serving a life sentence for human rights abuses committed during the Dirty War, the last period of military rule in Argentina, which lasted from 1976-83 and during which time an estimated 30,000 people were disappeared.

Videla, who headed the junta from 1976-81, is already set to face trial in September for stealing 33 babies of political opponents.

The case against him was widened after new forensic evidence came to light, but a trial date for the new charges yet to be set.

It is not the first time Videla has been tried – he was sentenced to life in prison in 1985 of the murders of 66 people and the torture of 93 others. But in 1990 then-president Carlos Menem pardoned him, along with other military leaders from the Dirty War, citing the need to get over past conflicts and move on.

In 1998 Videla was arrested again, and after a brief period in prison, he was transferred to house arrest due to health issues. Menem’s pardon was declared unconstitutional in 2006, and the charges were restored. He was transferred to the Campo de Mayo military prison in 2008, and is one of 100 people facing charges for human rights abuses committed during the Dirty War.

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Navanethem Pillay urged Honduran authorities yesterday to carry out a thorough investigation into abuses that have taken place in the country following last year’s military coup.

Pillay presented a report to the UN’s Council for Human Rights in Geneva yesterday, in which she urged Honduran authorities to investigate cases of “violations of the right to life, torture, abuse, detention without trial and rape”, which took place after the military coup in June 2009. Pillay’s report also called on the Honduran government to begin legal proceedings against those responsible.

The report criticised the Honduran military for failing to act in compliance with the law and said: “the suspension of rights was incompatible with Honduras’ international obligations.” Moreover it condemned the fact that the majority of those who were responsible “still go unpunished.”

“Considering that only a few cases of violence on the part of [anti-coup] demonstrators were reported, the potential danger does not appear to have been grave enough to justify a state of impunity.” Pillay wrote. The high commissioner also called for freedom of speech in Honduras to be restored, and laws against “sedition” and “illicit demonstration” to be repealed.

The non-governmental organisation Human Rights Watch made similar demands in a letter to the Honduran authorities on 3rd March. The letter cited multiple cases of “killings, rape, torture, kidnapping, and assault” as well as evidence that these abuses were politically motivated.

Despite accusations of human rights abuses and continuing violence in Honduras, the United States and the International Monetary Fund resumed aid to the Central American country on 6th March. Moreover, Honduras’ president Porfirio Lobo, who was elected in polls presided over by an interim government installed by the military, recently received the support of the leaders of Guatemala and El Salvador.

Spain’s high court has ordered the extradition of a pilot to Argentina for his role in the country’s Dirty War. Dutch-Argentine pilot, Julio Alberto Poch, will face charges of throwing political prisoners out of aircraft into the sea under the military dictatorship 30 years ago.

Poch, 57, was arrested in Spain last year after his colleagues told an Argentine judge who had travelled to Europe that he had boasted about hurling drugged prisoners into the River Plate or the Atlantic Ocean.

A retired Argentine navy lieutenant, Poch also holds Dutch nationality, which protected him from extradition until he landed in Spain on a stopover en route to the Netherlands on 22nd September. He works for Holland’s Transavia, an airline owned by Air France-KLM.

Poch denies allegations of his involvement in the “death flights” of the 1976-1983 dictatorship, in which some 30,000 people disappeared or died. He is said to have been a military pilot at Argentina’s notorious Naval Mechanics School – one of the biggest torture and detention centres of the Argentine military regime.

“I have been treated like a criminal and locked up with common criminals. The only chance I have to defend myself will be in Argentina,” Poch said in the eastern Spanish city of Valencia. The court said in its ruling there were sufficient guarantees to ensure that Poch would have a fair trial in Argentina.

In 2005, Argentina’s Supreme Court struck down amnesty laws which had shielded alleged human rights abusers from prosecution.

Relations between Venezuela and Colombia are at a historic low as both nations increase the concentration of military at the border between the two, in preparation for a potential conflict. This comes after an unmanned spy plane, launched from Colombia, entered Venezuelan airspace last week. The Venezuelan army has been ordered to shoot down any further incursions.

Venezuelan president, Hugo Chávez, has not said who is suspected of launching the plane, though he called it “technology of the empire”, referring to the United States. President Chávez has criticised a pact announced last month allowing US troops to use several bases in Colombia. In the past months he has accused the US of planning to invade Venezuela with the help of Colombia, a charge the United States denies.

Colombia has accused Chávez´ government of aiding the country´s leftist guerilla groups. For decades, Colombia has struggled to subdue Marxist rebels profiting from the cocaine trade within the country. Colombian Defense Minister, Gabriel Silva, told El Tiempo newspaper: “In Colombia, we have concentrated on the internal threat. Unfortunately now (…) there is a risk of a foreign aggression”. Without specifically accusing Venezuela, Mr Silva was quoted on Sunday saying his country was preparing to ward off any attack.

Mr Silva has announced the construction of a new military base in La Guajira, near Colombia´s border with Venezuela. He said the base would have up to 1,000 soldiers. The Colombian army has also activated six new airborne battalions. Meanwhile, Venezuela has moved 15,000 more troops up to the border.

Tensions between the two nations have been high for months over accusations by both sides of attempts to destabalise each other. As these tensions continue to escalate, Hugo Chávez took to the airwaves on Sunday, when he called Colombia´s government a declared enemy of Venezuela, on his television show. “Believe me, bourgeoisie of Colombia, if you hurt Venezuela you’ll regret it. We are not unarmed. We do not have our arms crossed,” Chávez said.