The Human Rights Blog

The wheels of justice in Argentina

Today is March 24th, 2008, the 32nd anniversary of the military coup in Argentina that resulted in the disappearance of 30,000 people and the extra-judicial executions of untold more. March 24th is now the national day of memory for truth and justice in Argentina. Throughout the country, there will be marches, demonstrations and cultural activities to mark the day, remember the disappeared and demand truth and justice.

Thirty two years after the coup, justice has never been closer in Argentina, and yet so far away. In recent years, the legal impunity that prevented Argentine courts from prosecuting human rights violators for most of their crimes was abolished. In 2003, the Supreme Court ruled that the Punto Final and Due Obedience laws, which provided blanket amnesties for the military and its accomplices, were unconstitutional. The court reasoned that the gross human rights violations committed in Argentina amounted to crimes against humanity, which do not prescribe and cannot be amnestied under international law, in addition the state has a positive obligation under human rights treaty and customary international law to seek the truth and bring justice to victims of gross human rights violations. Last year, the court used the same rationale in ruling that the pardons issued by a democratic president to the highest military and civilian authorities for their participation in such human rights violations, were also unconstitutional. There are now no legal impediments in Argentina to bringing human rights violators to justice.

There are, however, practical impediments. The wheels of justice move impossibly slowly in Argentina. Of the thousand criminal procedures that remain open, only a handful have reached the trial stage and some of these concerned figures relatively low on the totem pole of Argentine repression. Moreover, most of these trials have involved only one defendant at a time, which frustrates any expectation of celerity in the overall achievement of justice. Even worse, defendants have been tried only for the abduction, torture and murder of a very reduced number of victims, rather than the dozens or even hundreds or thousands for which they were responsible. There is an element of injustice when a human rights violator is not forced to account for all the violations he committed.

At this time, however, there is a movement to consolidate the open cases by clandestine detention centers, and try all those accused of committing human rights violations in a given center together. One such case concerns the clandestine detention center located in Infantry Regiment No. 9 of the province of Corrientes, and that trial seems to be proceeding without any serious problems. However, prosecutors and judges have warned that there is a bottleneck at the trial court stage and that this will slow down once again the wheels of justice. In particular, the ESMA case - based on the largest clandestine detention center in Argentina, through which an estimated 5,000 people passed before being killed - and the First Army Corps case, which concerns the task forces responsible for the detention and disappearance of people in the Buenos Aires and other provinces, may not reach the trial stage this year, as had been promised. One solution would be to reassign some of the cases to courts with a lighter workload. Another possible solution is to open another trial chamber. This has not yet been done.

It is said that justice delayed is justice denied. I am sure that many in Argentina would agree with that sentiment. There is a strong pressure by civil society on the Argentine government to take whatever measures are necessary to speed up the trials. Indeed, the recent announcement that judge Alfredo Bisordi was retiring from his post at the Cassation Court, after being accused of slowing down the repression cases, was greeted with cheers by both the government and the human rights organizations. But more pressure and more economic resources are doubtlessly needed if the victims - including the now elderly parents of many of the disappeared - are to find justice before they, or their victimizers, die.

Lack of speed is not the only problem that Argentine justice is facing, however. In September 2006, Julio López, one of the survivors and witnesses in the trial against Etchecolatz, the Police chief of the province of Buenos Aires during the dictatorship, was disappeared once again and his fate remains unknown. Other witnesses, lawyers and human rights defenders have also received threats. Meanwhile, a defendant linked to the ESMA and the theft of children, was found dead days before his sentence was read. It's still not clear whether his death was a murder or suicide. Other mysterious deaths of accused human rights violators have human rights organizations concerned.

On a more positive note, the arms of Argentine justice are now extending to the time prior to the dictatorship and to the Actions of the Triple A death squad, responsible for hundreds of murders under the government of Isabel Perón. Perón herself is being investigated, and her extradition from Spain has been requested. In a first for Argentine justice, the government of the province of Mendoza has filed a demand against the Triple A for the murder of its own citizens.

The wheels of justice have also began to turn in other Latin American countries. Chile, with its Prussian efficiency, has already sentenced over 190 human rights violators and has more than 100 open cases. It is now concentrating on prosecuting civilian accomplices. The Supreme Court, meanwhile, has rejected a proposed bill which would reduce the sentences of human rights violators and further accelerate the criminal procedures. Despite its 1986 amnesty law, there are several open cases being investigated and tried in Uruguay on charges of crimes against humanity, in particular those relating to the so-called "death flights," through which Uruguayans detained and disappeared in Argentina were flown back to Uruguay. One former president and other top generals were jailed on such charges. Uruguay, moreover, has criminalized forced disappearances per se. Guatemala, meanwhile, has started its first trial on charges of forced disappearance and the trial of former president Fujimori for the disappearance and death of 9 students and one professor at La Cantuta university, is advancing with only minor difficulties in Peru. Honduras has also announced that it will re-open the cases of forced disappearances in the 1980s. On the other hand, the quest for justice in Colombia has taken yet another wrong turn after 11 prosecutors - including some working on key human rights cases such as that of the attack on the Justice Palace in 1985 - resigned after allegations of leaking information. And in El Salvador, civil society is still fighting for the derogation of the amnesty law which has left those responsible for the commission of war crimes and crimes against humanity scot-free. Meanwhile impunity for human rights violations, including forced disappearances, is de rigeur in Mexico.

Mixed as the Argentine and Latin American experiences are, I think they have much to say to the world in terms of the importance of keeping the struggle for justice alive, of not giving up and working both in the political and judicial arenas, both national and international, to put an end to impunity.

Former Argentine President indicted of manslaughter

Argentina's former President, Fernando de la Rua, has been indicted on charges of involuntary manslaughter on the deaths of 5 people who were demonstrating against his regime in Plaza de Mayo (the plaza in front of the presidential palace). The police used strong means of repression and over 30 people altogether were killed. The judged considered that De la Rua could not not have known of what was going on - he would have heard it himself, seen it on TV or heard about it from his family/subordinates - and thus he was negligent in not stopping the repression.

This is the first time a former democratic President is charged with manslaughter, and I hope that not only he will be convicted, but that his prosecution will be an example to other judicial systems.

Spanish judges let Argentine repressors off the hook.

It's a good time to be an Argentinian human rights violator in Spain. Once upon a time Spain was in the spotlight for its progressive application of international human rights law. In 1998 Pinochet was arrested in London at the request of Spanish judicial authorities, in 2003 Argentine repressor Miguel Cavallo was extradited to Spain from Mexico and in 2005, Argentine captain Adolfo Scilingo was found guilty of committing crimes against humanity. That same year, the Spanish Constitutional Tribunal ruled that Spain had universal jurisdiction over human rights violations.

But the tide has turned, and a new class of conservative judges has taken over the National Audience, Spain's trial chambers. They are associated with fundamentalist currents within the Catholic Church and sometimes espouse Franquist ideologies; Judge Guevara Marcos, the President of the Chamber in charge of the Cavallo trial, for example, is a Catholic fundamentalist close to Opus Dei who was sanctioned by the General Council of the Judicial Power for racist attitudes. These judges are antagonistic to criminal procedures against human rights violators in general, and seem determined to rid Spain of these cases.

Miguel Cavallo was part of Task Force 3.3.2, an inter-force squad charged with kidnapping, torturing and killing suspected "subversives," among others. Later, Cavallo joined the Argentine Foreign Task Force that went to Central America to train others in counter-insurgence and torture techniques. In 2000, Cavallo was located in Mexico and in 2003 he was extradited to Spain. Finally, in February 2005 the instructional phase of the procedures against Cavallo concluded, and the case passed to the trial stage.

Since then, there have been a series of tactics put in place to delay his trial, which had not started by December 2006. In December 2006, moreover, the trial court suddenly decided it did not have jurisdiction over Cavallo, as he had also been indicted by courts in Argentina. This, despite clear language by the Spanish Constitutional Tribunal that Spain enjoyed concurrent jurisdiction to try crimes against humanity. The trial court gave Argentina 40 days to present documentation upon which to base an extradition. This was done in the height of Argentine summer, when courts are on vacation. The Argentine court scrambled to send the documentation on time, but this was not forwarded to the National Audience, and Cavallo was set free.

Cavallo has now stated he will present himself for voluntary extradition. That would be to his advantage, as he then can negotiate the charges on which he will be extradited - and he will not have to face additional charges when he arrives in Argentina. These charges are likely to be limited to the murder of journalist Rodolfo Walsh, and perhaps a few other murders - but will most likely not be for crimes against humanity as such. This will mean he will not have to testify about his involvement in either task force described above. Moreover, Cavallo will be freed in June 2007, when his pre-trial detention ends. It can take several years before a trial in Argentina starts, if at all, so he would be de-facto a free man.

The same may happen with Juan Carlos Fotea, a former counter- intelligence agent and member of the Foreign Task Force that operated in Central America during the 1980s. Despite the fact that Fotea had been indicted numerous times by Garzon as early as 1997, Garzon has suddenly decided that Spain no longer has jurisdiction over Fotea, for similar reasons to those claimed in the Cavallo case. Fotea's case is being appealed. Meanwhile bail has been set and reduced for Fotea, and it's likely that at some point he'll be released on his own recognizance.

The legal strategy being pursued in Spain appears to be designed to minimize the number of the accused and the severity of the charges against them. Trials in Argentina will likely result in the accused being tried on common crimes rather than crimes against humanity (as Scilingo was in Spain). Being tried for a crime such as murder will require a greater level of evidence to convict the accused of a particular crime - rather than demonstrating a particular behavior and/or membership in a criminal organization which led to the commission of crimes - and minimizes the seriousness of the crimes and the potential punishment those accused have to face.

So if you are a Latin American human rights violator, you could do worse than visiting Spain.

Luis Gerez reappeared

A couple of days ago I wrote about the disappearance of Luis Gerez, a former disappeared who had testified against a former torturer who had been elected to Congress in Argentina. Gerez was abducted by three men on his way to the butcher last Wednesday. They three him on the floor, they put a plastic bag around his head and suffocated him. They put him in a car, and they took him to a shed where they had shackles ready for him. There they tortured him with cigarettes, they threatened him and they subjected him to mock executions. "They killed me a thousand times," he said. He was in obvious shock when he was found by two girls in a neighborhood close to where he disappeared.

The Buenos Aires and national police worked tirelessly to find him. Over 50 buildings were searched, and the residents in all the nearby homes were questioned. They believed they were close to finding him. Patti's mignons were particular object of interest, and the government is convinced that they were involved in the disappearance of Gerez. If so, they may have been inspired, rather than in collusion, with those responsible for Julio Lopez' disappearance.

Gerez was freed,just as President Kirchner was finishing his televised speech in which he blamed para-police and para-military groups for the kidnapping of Gerez, promised he would not relent on the struggle against impunity and called for faster judicial proceedings against those accused of crimes during the past military dictatorship. He also called for witnesses, judges, lawyers and human rights defenders to accept the police protection the government has offered. However, corruption within the Buenos Aires police force is endemic, thousands of police men have been fired in recent years for committing crimes and there are still 900 policemen under investigation. Witnesses are justified in wondering if the police would actually protect them.

The government has attributed the quick liberation of Luis Gerez to its swift actions and to the President's speech. Such actions were not present when Julio López was disappeared over three months ago. I hope that the government's new attitude will intimidate would-be-kidnappers and stop the influx of threats against those participating in criminal procedures against those involved in the repression.

A new disappearance in Argentina

Over three months ago, Jorge Julio López, a witness against Etchecolatz, a former police chief who was found guilty of crimes against humanity in Argentina, "disappeared." There have been no news of his whereabouts since then. This tuesday, Luis Gerez, a mason who was a key witness against Luis Abelardo Patti, also disappeared. Patti was elected to the Argentine Congress and Gerez testified in a Congressional hearing about whether Patti should be allowed to take his seat in Congress. Gerez testified that he had been the subject of a forced disappearance as a teenager and that he had recognized Patti as one of his torturers. Gerez, as well as other lawyers and witnesses, had received threats.

The Argentine security forces used forced disappearances during the 1970's as a weapon of generalized terror. It was very effective, so it's no surprise that with the threat of finally having to face justice for their crimes against humanity, they would return to their old practices. The system behind the disappearances was never completely dismantled, in particular in the intelligence sector, and many of the responsible were not identified, much less punished for their deeds.

The disappearances and threats are meant to stop the prosecutions of members of the security forces, by intimidating those responsible and sending a clear message of what will happen to witnesses. It is incumbent on the Argentine democratic government to use all the resources of the state to identify those responsible for this terror apparatus and make them face justice, as well as to dismiss from public and military posts all those who took part in the repression.

Pardons ruled unconstitutional in Argentina

An Argentine court ruled today that the Presidential pardons that the Menem government has conferred on former Minister of Economy Jose Alfredo Martinez de Hoz and former Minister of Interior Alvaro Harguindeguy were unconstitutional because the crimes they are accused of constitute crimes against humanity. Martinez de Hoz and Harguindeguy are being investigated for their role in the kidnapping of two businessmen, whom they tried to extort into accepting a business deal beneficial for the military government.

This is the first time that the pardons, granted by the Menem government on all the top military, police and civilian leadership accused and/or convicted of murder, torture and kidnapping during the dirty war, were overturned. Last year, the so-called "amnesty laws" were also overturned on the ground of unconstitutionality, as they also concerned crimes against humanity.

I think these rulings are of immense importance beyond Argentina's borders, given their foundation on international law. What they say is that both general amnesties and individual pardons for acts that constitute crimes against humanity are illegal. This was previously clear vis a vis self-amnesties but not against those granted by civilian governments. It may take 30 years of work and struggle as it did in Argentina, it may even take longer - but justice can be served.

Indigenous people hunger strike

Twelve indigenous people leaders in the Argentine province of Chaco are in a hunger strike at the Government house in that province. The strikers are being kept in a dark room, under extreme security measures. The indigenous people are asking that the government investigate the sale of the land where they lived to large companies. After fifteen days in a hunger strike, many of the strikers are in precarious health conditions. Meanwhile a large group of indigenous people have camped out at the May 25th plaza in solidarity with the demands.

The Press has been kept at bay from the strikers.

You can write to the Gobernor of Chaco asking that the strikers be treated humanely, that they be given access to their family members and that the issue of the sale of their lands be investigated at:

Dr. Dn. Roy Abelardo Nikisch
Governor
Marcelo T. Alvear 151 - 1er Piso - Edificio “A”
(3500) Resistencia - Chaco -
Tel. (03722) 432786 - 448002 Fax (03722) 434202
E-mail: gobernador.chaco@ecomchaco.com.ar
www.chaco.gov.ar

A 30 year struggle

On this day, March 24th, 30 years ago, a military coup led to Argentina's last and bloodiest dictatorship. Tens of thousands of people were to be killed or "disappeared" at the hands of the dictatorship. Today, in Argentina, is a holiday. "The National Day of Memory for Truth and Justice". There will be marches, vigils, memorials, tree plantings, street renamings all culminating a week of cultural activities in memory of the victims of the repression, all to the cries of "Truth and Justice" and "Trial and Punishment for the Responsible".

Today, 30 years after that terrible day, we are probably closest to achieve the latter than we have been for decades. You will remember how after democracy returned to Argentina in 1983, many members of the security forces responsible for human rights violations were tried and in many cases convicted on charges of kidnaping and murder. The turmoil that these cases caused led to military rebellions and eventually two general amnesty laws followed by pardons for the highest military leaders. For years, it seemed that impunity would reign in Argentina.

Instead, the struggle was taken abroad. Astiz, Navy Captain was convicted in absentia in France for the murder of two French nuns; Suarez Mason and Rivero, two top Army leaders, were sentenced to life in prison in Italy after a criminal procedure that took over a decade. Both of these cases were based on the legal concept of passive personality and on charges of "regular" crimes, murder and abductions, but they served as a precedent for a far more important criminal procedure that would take place in Spain, where Navy Captain Adolfo Scilingo was recently convicted of committing crimes against humanity.

The possibilities of justice abroad jump-started the quest for justice in Argentina. In addition to murdering and disappearing people, Argentinian security forces had taken the babies of disappeared women and given them to families close to them to raise as their own. This crime had not been covered by the amnesty laws, so criminal procedures re-started. Top security forces leaders - including former presidents - were arrested, released, to be re-arrested and re-released in a justice merry-go-round. Two of them, however, were convicted and are currently serving sentences.

"Trials for truth", judicial procedures aiming to investigate what happened to the disappeared were started in several cities around the country. They have been going on for years now, and their records offer a wealth of information as to how the repression took place. They also provide a better, albeit slower, alternative to truth commissions.

These procedures helped build the necessary momentum to do away with the amnesty laws. A few years ago, Congress passed a law abolishing them. The act had no legal consequences, but it was a start. They later followed by nullifying them. But it took a progressive president and Supreme Court to actually declare the amnesty laws unconstitutional and to stop that last legal impediment to justice.

Today, there are over 1,000 criminal procedures open against over 500 members of the security forces for their participation on "dirty war" crimes. Over 200 people have been arrested. Still, other than those tried for appropriation of minors, none have yet been tried.

Still, the wheels of justice are moving and I hope this will give pause to human rights violators in other countries, including the US. It may take a long time to get them, they may be tired and gray when we finally put them behinds bar (and in the US, unlike in Argentina, there is no law mandating home imprisonment for those over 70 years old), but eventually we will, we must. Because without justice there is no rule of law to cement the democratic institutions that we so cherish.

Good News: A grandchild found

Not all news in the human rights world are negative. Today the Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo announced that they found another of their lost grandchildren. Sebastián is the son of Gaspar Onofre Casado and Adriana Leonor Tasca who were disappeared in 1977 when Adriana was 5 months pregnant.

Sebastián was born while Adriana was at a concentration camp and was handed by a military officer to a couple he knew and who registered the baby as their own. Sebastian had question about his true identity, however, and he contacted the Grandmothers. DNA tests have just confirmed his true identity.

82 children have been reunited with their birth families since the Grandmothers started their struggle. Many more continue disappeared.

I congratulate Sebastian's grandmother, Ángela Barili de Tasca and the whole Casado-Tasca family

On St. Valentine's Day - A letter

A few days ago I received a copy of this letter to include in the page of Berta Perassi, a woman who was "disappeared" in Argentina almost 30 years ago. It's a love letter, and I thought very fitting for this Valentine's Day. Here is my free translation:

For a while I've felt a great need to write to you and tell you about everything I've lived without you through the years.

It was 1973 in the city of Río Cuarto, the university was very young and the winds of revolution surrounded us, captivated us. Both of us studied and started our political activism. When I met you, I liked you right away, not only as a fellow activist but also as a woman. I still remember your blond hair and your whitewashed jeans that made you look like a rebel. Our relationship didn't last very long but it was very intense, as intense as that time in history.

You were always more decisive than I, you wanted there to be no more injustices, you wanted the world to be better... quickly you started working in the barrios on the outskirts of the city, teaching the workers to read and write, those workers who’d sign the labor contracts with their thumb print and didn’t know what it said above, you taught them to respect themselves, to be freer, to fight for their rights.

It was there in the El Acordeón barrio that a para-police squad came to burn you with cigarette butts and threaten your life. You were already a ‘subversive’. There another life began for you, faced with the threat to your life there was no more room for you in Río Cuarto.

At that time I felt impotence and the desire to protect you; I walked with you to your mother’s house in Moldes and I stayed with you two days thinking about what to do, how to continue, how to live with the nightmare of the constant threat.

Finally you decided to go to Córdoba, it was in the middle of ‘74, the right had already started its work of killing activists.

In Córdoba you started once again to discuss, to reflect, to think what to do. The political alternative didn’t convince you; what you wanted to do was continue fighting against the exploitation of workers, against the lack of social rights. You found work in a cookie factory, you wanted to live with the workers, be part of their struggle. That’s where you met members of the Worker’s Revolutionary Party and a few months before the coup d’état you joined their union.

They were difficult times, every day there was more repression.

In 1975, one could no longer breathe in Río Cuarto, they had ransacked my house, the death threats against activists continued. I also went to Córdoba, in part because I wanted to be closer to you... young love. We saw each other, went out for a couple of months, but afterwards we went apart, everything in your life was so intense, your activism a full-time job, seeing each other too much was dangerous.

With time I found out you had another boyfriend, I was very sad, bitter, but finally I accepted it. I’d see you once in a great while, I liked seeing you, you had a lot of strength and it was hard for you to accept that I was no longer an activist, you were always more decisive.

The coup came and the repression worsened, the disappearances of fellow activists were every day more numerous. On May 27th, 1976 they kidnaped me, they took me to the Intelligence Division of the province of Córdoba and tortured me. They didn’t know anything about me so it wasn’t difficult to resist torture, deny that I knew any activists in Córdoba.

That, Berta, is when I started to “forget” you, to erase you from my life, you know? To know you was dangerous for you and for me, it was best for both of us that I erase you from my life.

They took me to Río Cuarto, they continued to torture me and they left me alone in a cell for 71 days. Much later I learned that while I was in that cell isolated from the world an Army squad kidnaped you. It was on July 1st 1976; we still don’t know how they took you. But we do know that they took you to “La Perla,” a monstrous secret detention facility where they savagely tortured you, that they used the picana on you, that one of your torturers was Luis Manzanelli who left your eyes black and blue from all the punches he gave you. A coward, a horrible man who is still free somewhere. What we do know is that you resisted, that you didn’t give anyone’s name, that the torturers of the Third Army Corps declared you “unredeemable” and that twenty days later they “transferred” you. They probably shot you, as they did with so many others, cowardly, hooded and with your hands tied, for the “mistake” of having fought with the people, for being a union activist, for wanting to make a revolution to finish with the exploitation of workers, for wanting a more just society. You were 23 years old, filled with life and hope.

I was luckier than you; I was imprisoned for 3 years and 2 months. It was very hard but I was able to withstand the policies of destruction applied by the people who had killed you. On the way I lost many other friends, 32 of them were killed in the Cordoba jail, Alberto Pinto who worked with us in Río Cuarto was savagely beaten to death in the La Plata jail.

I was telling you that I had erased you from my life, two years into my jail term they took me out again to torture you, again the “fish” until I’d swallow so much water that it seemed like I was dying. In one of those sessions the torturer talked about you, he said you were my girlfriend, and I forgot you again. I denied that you’d been my girlfriend, forgive me, it was an action of self-defense, I know you will understand, in reality I’ve never forgotten you and I will never forgive you. But I didn’t want to admit I knew you to that savage. You know, that has haunted me my whole life. In reality I did the same thing you did, you also “forgot me” when they kidnaped you, when they tortured you savagely. Now I know that if you’d spoken about me I would not be able to write to you, they’d taken me out of the cell and taken me to La Perla. Do you know that you saved my life?

Finally I was freed in July 1979, still with fear as the military were still kidnaping activists. Did you learn that there were 30,000 “disappeared” as you? Those killers destroyed a whole generation, ours, the one that fought for a better world, the best of us like you are no longer here. It’s been horrible, Berta, you can’t imagine the disaster they created. Did you know that if you’d been pregnant they’d have kept you alive to steal your baby? Do you know that they stole 500 children and killed 500 mothers? And all of this, Berta, they did it with the support of the United States and the great international monopolies, the managers of those companies gave lists of union activists like you.

In all these years many times I dreamt awake that I would find you, that I’d see you in the street in the picture of some girl and even though those sons of bitches killed you, I always remember your image, your smile, your pretty eyes, your joy...

Now I say to you simply, “always towards victory, Berta!”

David