Michelle Bachelet Jeria (September 29 1952-) is a Chilean socialist politician and the first woman to become Chile Defense Minister. She is currently a pre-candidate for Chile's presidential election of 2005, representing a faction of the ruling coalition Concertación.

Bachelet is a surgeon, pediatrician and epidemiologist educated at the University of Chile. She is the daughter of former air general Alberto Bachelet, who was killed as a result of torture in 1974 during the military regime of Augusto Pinochet.

In 1974 Bachelet and her mother were detained at Villa Grimaldi and Cuatro Álamos , two notorious torture centers in Santiago. Upon release, they were forced to leave the country and moved to Australia, and then settled in East Germany. In the early 1980s she returned to Chile and graduated from medical school in 1983.

Between 1994-97, Bachelet worked in the Ministry of Health. In 1996, she began to study the topic of defense, first in Chile and then in the United States, under a presidential scholarship. In 1998-99, she worked for the Defense Ministry.

Bachelet was named Minister of Health by president Ricardo Lagos in 2000, and then Defense Minister in 2002, becoming the first woman to hold this post in the history of Chile .

Bachelet resigned her government post in late September 2004 in order to start her presidential run. Current opinion polls indicate she is the frontrunner for the next presidential election, giving her an ample advantage over her closest rival, former mayor of Santiago and 1999 presidential candidate, Joaquín Lavín.

External link

• Bachelet for President (Official site, in Spanish)