As millions mourned the fact that General Pinochet had died yesterday, without having experienced the warm feeling of burning cigarettes to his testicles and napalm to his eyeballs, suspicions arose that his passing may be connected with forthcoming legal action against him for torture, murder, embezzlement, cocaine-smuggling, corruption and obesity.

“It’s not the first time he’s had a nasty bout of death before an arrest or court appearance,” said a Chilean government spokesman. “But we still aim to have him imprisoned by the year 2200”.

The General, who spent three years at the Berlusconi School of Convenient Heart Attacks and Self-Proclaimed Immunity, is now widely believed to be living in Dulwich, and partaking of afternoon tea with his number one fan, Margaret Thatcher, whom he plans to marry next spring, or whenever his current wife’s strychnine tablets take effect.

However, the wedding, a human rights violation under Clause 6 of the European Convention, is more likely to be held next autumn, thus allowing son Mark sufficient time to make the overland journey from South Africa, and get lost in the forests of Siberia for several months.

Rumours of a secret Pinochet-Thatcher love-child, (a 1978 Daily Star headline, which inexplicably undermined its credibility as a newspaper), received some credence today, when a 28 year-old Hitler look-alike made enquires at Grantham Parish Church, and drowned the vicar in the font.