SANTIAGO, Jan. 9 (Xinhuanet) -- Former Chilean military leader Augusto Pinochet was granted 10 million pesos (about 19,200 U.S. dollars) bail on Monday, but he remains under house arrest as another court ratifies the decision.

    Judge Victor Montiglio's motion will be referred to the Santiago Court of Appeal which is expected to declare a ruling this week.

    Pinochet, 90, has been under house arrest for six weeks in his Santiago mansion since Nov. 24 on charges related to the disappearance of six dissidents during his dictatorship from 1973 to 1990. In a separate case, Montiglio indicted him for a further three disappearances.

    The nine people were among 119 leftist anti-regime activists who disappeared from Chilean jails in 1975 in a case known as Operation Colombo. Their bodies were later found in Argentina and Brazil.

    The retired general had been charged in previous cases with tax evasion, the use of a fake passport to open bank accounts, perjury,and forging state documents, all in connection with an illicit fortune of 27 million U.S. dollars.

    However, Pinochet has been indicted for only a handful of the human rights suits and has never faced trial as the Supreme Court has accepted the defense argument that he is unfit to stand trial.

    In a recent turn-around, court-appointed experts ruled him mentally fit to stand trial for Operation Colombo. In September the supreme court lifted Pinochet's legal immunity from prosecution in the Colombo case. Enditem