[News] Argentina Revisits Dictatorship: A Year of Human Rights Trials
Anti-Imperialist News
news at freedomarchives.org
Wed Apr 7 11:26:27 EDT 2010
Argentina Revisits Dictatorship: A Year of Human Rights Trials
By <http://www.zcommunications.org/zspace/marietrigona>Marie Trigona
Source: <http://towardfreedom.com/home/content/view/1906/1/>Toward Freedom
http://towardfreedom.com/home/content/view/1906/1/
Wednesday, April 07, 2010
"With regular jails overflowing, you (the
military) turned the principle garrisons in the
country into virtual concentration camps, where
no judge, lawyer, journalist or international
observer enters. The military keeping the
proceedings as secret, invoked as the need for
interrogation, has transformed most detentions
into kidnappings that allow you to torture
limitlessly and execute prisoners with no
trial." -- Rodolfo Walsh, political writer
disappeared after he penned the text, "Open
Letter to the Military Junta" published on March
24, 1977, the first anniversary of the coup.
Tens of thousands in Argentina recently marked
the 34th anniversary of the nations bloody
military dictatorship, flooding into the historic
Plaza de Mayo with cries of nunca más, or never
again. On March 24, 1976 the military ceased
power and instituted one of Latin Americas
darkest chapters of terror. During the 1976-1983
junta, the military disappeared more than 30,000 people.
Since the 30th anniversary of the coup, in 2006,
protests to repudiate the military coup have
grown in size and political importance; at this
years protest more than 25,000 people overflowed
the Plaza de Mayo while major human rights trials
are underway. The Mothers and Grandmothers of
Plaza de Mayo led the march carrying a banner
with photos of the disappeared. The black and
white portraits extended for blocks, with
thousands of photos of unionists, students,
artists, intellectuals, workers, lawyers,
mothers, fathers, sons, daughters and compañeros,
many of whom were only in their 20s when commando
groups kidnapped them to take them to clandestine
detention centers, torture and later disappear
this generation which dreamt of a better world.
This generation was reflected in the outpouring
on March 24, 2010, and in the collective screams
of "30,000 disappearedpresent! Now and Forever!"
Open door to justice
Nearly 27 years after Argentinas return to
democratic rule, the country is revisiting its
painful past with human rights trials. Many have
called 2010 the year of the human rights trials.
More than eight high-profile trials are underway,
prosecuting dozens of military, police and
civilians accused of torture, murder, kidnapping
and disappearances. The recent release of
classified military files may also lead to more
prosecutions and answers as to what happened to Argentinas 30,000 disappeared.
Until 2003, amnesty laws foreclosed any
successful prosecution of ex-military leaders for
human rights crimes by the courts. Even when
prosecution was impossible, human rights groups
continued to gather information as to the
whereabouts of the disappeared, collect evidence
and testimonies, and to demand justice and an end
to impunity. However, a 2003 Supreme Court order
overruled the Due Obedience and Full Stop laws
passed in the early 1990s which protected
officers from the possibility of facing charges.
The dimension of the crimes of those prosecuted
is unimaginable. And the number of prosecuted and
facing criminal proceedings falls short
considering the complex system of kidnapping,
torture, murder and disappearance that ensued
during the dark years of the dictatorship. The
most painful component for many is the
significance of disappearances, and the open
wounds left behind by not knowing exactly what
happened to the victims and their bodies.
Disappearances, a cornerstone in the lexicon of
terror devised by the military dictatorship,
persist as a social stigma and an uncomfortable void of the recent past.
ESMA trial
"March 24 not only compels us to reflect on the
past, but also to reflect on our future and
current challenges," says Victoria Donda, a
national deputy whose parents were disappeared at
the same detention center where her mother gave
birth. Donda was born at the ESMA Navy Mechanics
School while her mother was in captivity at the
clandestine detention center. She lived most of
her life with appropriators, who never told her
about her past. She recuperated her identity in
2003 at the age of 26. More than 500 children
were kidnapped by the dictatorship and raised
with false identities. The human rights group
Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo, has strived to
find all of the children, so far they have
recuperated the identity of 101 children, who are now in their 30s.
The ESMA trial, one of the largest human rights
trials in Latin Americas history opened in
December 2009. In total, 19 officers who worked
at the ESMA face charges of kidnapping, torture
and murder of 86 people. However, it is estimated
that nearly 5,000 were disappeared inside the
ESMA barracks, as the largest clandestine
detention center that operated during the
dictatorship. Donda will testify in the trial,
and says, "We are living in a country where the
people who participated in the crimes during the
dictatorship are being tried, [but] these are not
the type of trials that we want, nor are they as
fast as wed like, nor are all the people
involved in the abuses on trial; however, these
are the trials that we have and they are progressing."
Surviving testimonies
More than 300 clandestine detention centers
operated during the dictatorship, shedding light
on the magnitude of state terrorism carried out
from 1976-1983. Many of the victims in Buenos
Aires and surrounding neighborhoods were thrown
from planes into the sea after being drugged.
Aside from the ESMA, other clandestine torture
centers operated in the nations capital. Inside
the Atlético, Banco and Olimpo, three separate
secret detention sites, thousands were tortured
and disappeared. Ramiro Poces father was
disappeared from the Garage Olimpo, one of the
clandestine detention centers in a trial of the
Buenos Aires circuit of clandestine detention
centers. "The Due Obedience and Full Stop laws
prohibited the proceedings against military.
Thanks to the reversal of those laws we are able
to slowly begin the trials," says Poce. He will
testify in the trial, to give testimony of his
fathers kidnapping by a commando group. Some 17
military and police are being prosecuted in this
trial. For many, the trials mark a new chapter in
Argentinas history. "Each time the trials began,
it is a step towards building a true democracy
and prosecuting those who staged a coup against
the nation and the entire population."
Military officers have begun to testify in their
defense, failing to provide information or
confess; on the contrary some defend their
actions as following military orders to "fight a
war against subversion." For the first time,
Rafael Videla appeared in court in March; however
hundreds of police protected the former dictator from news cameras.
Slow justice
During this years massive march for the
commemoration of Argentinas 30,000 disappeared,
protestors and human rights groups expressed
immediate concerns about delays in legal
proceedings and resistant judges contributing to
delays in the human rights trials. "Only a few
who formed part of this genocide are being tried
in the justice system. There are still a lot left
to be charged," said Estela Carlotta, president
of Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo, reading from a
document written by human rights groups on March
24. Organizers from this years march demanded,
"the political decision to give more resources to
the Justice system, in larger court rooms and
truly public trials. Society has already
condemned the murders and we wont allow for
forgiveness, amnesty or reconciliation for those responsible."
The government official Victoria Donda admits
that the judicial system has been slow to reform
and is filled with accomplices from the
dictatorship who still have not been prosecuted
for their actions. A recent article in the
national daily Pagina/12 revealed that several
judges are being investigated in the province of
Mendoza for human rights abuses committed during
the dictatorship. Other irregularities have
surfaced such as the same judge overseeing trial
proceedings in two different provinces, which has
delayed another major human rights trial of the
Massacre of Margarita Belen for over a year and a
half. The higher courts have also agreed to
change judges, following the defendants request,
all with the purpose of tying up proceedings. "In
the provinces of Salta and Jujuy they do not have
an adequate space to hold the trials. And they
purposefully held the ESMA trial in a court room
so small [that] space for observers, media and
activists from attending all the court sessions has been limited," says Donda.
Breaking the wall of impunity
This years massive march reflects the passionate
cries for the trials to continue, and that all
military and accomplices involved in the brutal
terror be brought to justice. But protestors came
out not to close the dark chapter of history, but
to turn the pages in the construction of a new
future that values democracy and human rights.
March 24 is now considered a national holiday, "a
national day of memory for justice and truth," a
day on which schools and public offices are
closed. President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner
has supported the trials, but has also polarized
the human rights movement. The president turned
the official commemorations into a rally for the
President, while creating tensions between human
rights groups critical of the governments
economic policies and failure to provide the
judicial system with enough resources to carry
out the trial. While the president released an
important document with the names of 4,300 people
who worked in the armed force battalion 601, one
of the largest intelligence agencies of the Armed
Forces, more documents remain to be disclosed.
The agency was used to collect information on
activists which led to their disappearances,
among the ranks of the thousands of names of
people now in their 50s and 60s are not only
military but civilians, professionals who have
yet to be tried for their participation in the
dictatorship. Human rights groups report that
intelligence officers continue to infiltrate
social movements and political organizations.
Among those demanding justice are the Mothers and
Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo, which for over 30
years have used pacifist tactics to demand
justice and truth about what happened. For Latin
America, these groups have exemplified the
regional struggle for democracy and sovereignty,
in a hemisphere plagued by dictatorships in the
1970s and 1980s which disappeared over 90,000
people according to The Latin American Federation
of Associations for Relatives of the
Detained-Disappeared (FEDEFAM). Argentina, thanks
to the endless work of human rights groups, is
paving the way for other countries to revisit
their painful past. Without justice for crimes
committed in the past, the military and
repressive forces in the region will have the
power to act with impunity as we are seeing with
an active coup in Honduras, military in the
streets of Chile and U.S. military bases in
Colombia. Militarization remains a risk for the
region, and with long-standing impunity for
military crimes Latin America could lose another
generation. However, a new generation of human
rights advocates in Argentina is trying to break
this wall of impunity through the legal system for long-standing justice.
Marie Trigona is a writer, radio producer and
translator based in Argentina. She can be reached
through her blog
<http://www.mujereslibres.blogspot.com/>www.mujereslibres.blogspot.com
All photos by Marie Trigona
Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110
415 863-9977
www.Freedomarchives.org
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://freedomarchives.org/pipermail/news_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20100407/06247bf7/attachment.htm>
More information about the News
mailing list