The American Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, says the United States committed terrible mistakes in Latin America during the Cold War era.

Speaking in Atlanta, Mrs Albright said the planned release of documents relating to General Augusto Pinochet's rule in Chile was an attempt to deal with this.

She was answering a question about the US Army's School of the Americas, which has been accused of training Latin American officers who later violated human rights.

However, the US still opposes the prosecution of General Pinochet outside Chile for human rights abuses committed under his rule -- a stand condemned yesterday by the New York-based organisation, Human Rights Watch.