Former dictator Juan Maria Bordaberry was sentenced this week to 30 years in prison for violating the constitution when he led a 1973 coup that ushered in 12 years of dictatorship.

The 81-year-old Bordaberry is the second former Uruguayan dictator sentenced to a long prison term in the past four months. In late October, ex-strongman Gregorio Alvarez was sentenced to 25 years.

The Latin American dictatorships that emerged in the 1970s were largely supported by the U.S. government, locked at that time in an ideological cold war – capitalism versus communism -- with the Soviet Union. The military regimes remained in power and - with the help of U.S. intelligence – killed and tortured thousands of “leftist” sympathizers throughout the region.  

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