Enrique Diaz was pottering about at home in Shannon when a flick of the television button triggered a tumult of emotion.

"I saw a big picture of Augusto Pinochet. Then it said that he was arrested in London. I didn't know what to do. In a way I was shocked, then I was emotional, happy. I ran upstairs to tell my wife, Nancy. She was sleepy, but she came downstairs. She couldn't believe it, then she said: `Thank God, at last some justice for my brother and the people of Chile'."

After 24 years of living quietly in the west of Ireland, Enrique and Nancy Diaz struggled to comprehend that the man whose rule had shattered their lives on the other side of the world a quarter of a century ago might, after all, be brought to justice.

"I hope, from my heart, that this man is taken to court," said Mr Diaz (51).

His family's nightmare began soon after Gen Pinochet ousted the democratically-elected President Salvador Allende in a coup in 1973. At the time, Enrique was a civil servant and a trade union official. "Trade unions were banned. I had to go into hiding for seven months."

Nancy's 18-year-old brother was arrested and never came home. To this day the family do not know what happened to him.

Given the grim situation, the Diaz family were glad to escape and enter Ireland under a government refugee programme in April 1974. With 16 other Chilean families, they were taken to Shannon, then a new settlement which had been created to house workers at the nearby airport.

But it was tough. Mr Diaz had chosen Ireland partly because an Irish friend in Chile used to say that there was a lot in common between Irish and Chilean people, a liking for fun, for one. In reality, it was going to take a very long time for the family to feel settled in Ireland. They were thankful to be safe but still faced many uphill battles. The culture shock was immense. Few Irish people knew anything about Chile, though some would pretend they did, in kind, but unwittingly amusing, attempts to be friendly.

"Sometimes people would say something like `Oh, Chile. Yes, I was in Africa once', while another man asked me what language I spoke, and I said Spanish. He said `Oh yes, I knew Chile was in Spain'."

Without English, the Diaz family couldn't even speak to neighbours at first. The man who had once worked on social policy and education issues, and who had managed to take his family halfway round the world to get out of danger, was sliding into silence.

"We had to communicate using our hands. I was like a child again, except that I was a child with a family to support."

While Pinochet consolidated his grip on Chile, exiles like the Diaz family struggled to survive. With little English, middle-class people had to reinvent themselves as skilled manual workers.

Like his neighbour, a former general administrator of Chile's biggest sugar factory, Enrique Diaz learnt to work with his hands. He worked a 76-hour week for a year as a tool-maker in his first factory job while simultaneously trying to learn English. When he discovered that he was being paid five times less than his Irish co-workers, he asked for a rise.

"I was told I was lucky to have a job and the door was open if I didn't like it."

For a short "terrible time" the family had to survive on no income. However, Nancy got work as a sewing machinist and then Enrique got another job that quickly led to a promotion.

Sixteen years later, he is still working happily with the same Shannon firm.

Over the years, the hope that Pinochet might be brought to justice, and that they might be able to return home, slowly faded. Now Mr Diaz feels almost at home in Clare. Ireland is home to his daughters, two of whom were born here.

His eldest girl, who was born in Chile, is studying at University College Galway and plans to work as a counsellor. Another daughter is preparing to go to art college, while the youngest is preparing for her Leaving Certificate.

After all this time, the idea that Pinochet, the man responsible for so painfully altering Mr Diaz's life, is now himself facing hardship, and punishment has brought a certain amount of satisfaction to Mr and Mrs Diaz. They have been closely following events since last Saturday, and Irish and Chilean friends have phoned them to express their solidarity.

"Everyone is delighted. He was responsible for so many thousands tortured and imprisoned and disappeared. It has been a dream for 24 years that he and his colleagues would be brought to justice and to trial.

"Even, perhaps, in these days when he is under arrest, Pinochet is going through a psychological situation and he might be realising something of what it was like for the thousands who were in a worse situation under him. For a man who was so powerful to find himself with nothing, he must be feeling not so well."