Human Rights in Argentina: A year without Julio Lopez

by Marie Trigona

Human Rights groups in Argentina rallied September 18 to mark the one year disappearance of a key witness who helped convict a former police officer for life in 2006. Rights representatives have expressed immediate concerns over missing witness Julio Lopez; a new name that has been inscribed on the doleful roll call of Argentina's disappeared. From the final courtroom proceedings to the search for the disappeared witness, a look at the events of the past year.

“The Federal Criminal Court number 1 in La Plata, orders the following sentence. The court sentences Miguel Osvaldo Etchecolatz to life in prison.” As judge Carlos Rozanski read the sentence, Etchecolatz kissed a crucifix. Several spectators threw red paint on him as he was escorted out of the courtroom. Human rights activists and relatives of the disappeared celebrated the verdict while embracing each other inside and outside the court room in La Plata,

Julio Lopez, went missing exactly a year ago, on the eve of the land mark conviction of Miguel Etchecolatz, the first military officer to be sentenced to life in prison for crimes against humanity and genocide committed during the 1976-1983 military dictatorship. Lopez was last seen walking near his home in La Plata, about 40 miles from Buenos Aires.

Lopez's testimony of his detention as a political prisoner from 1976-1979 in clandestine detention centers was key in the conviction of Etchecolatz. Testifying before a court in La Plata, Lopez described the prolonged bouts of torture under Etchecolatz's direct supervision. “That day they electrocuted me with the electric prod using a lower voltage. The electric prod had a battery, so I couldn't feel it as much. ‘Now you're going to feel it,’ he said to me. He gave an order to the others: ‘Hook the electric prod up directly to the street line,’ he said. Etchecolatz said this. Mr. Etchecolatz.”

Since Lopez's disappearance, little headway has been made in the investigation of his whereabouts. Much of the evidence recently released has been tracked to the federal prison where Etchecolatz and another 100 military officers are imprisoned. Phone calls from the prison and note’s from Etchecolatz’s personal agenda lead to a clear trail that Lopez was under surveillance in the days leading up to his kidnapping.

At a press conference, Myriam Bergman, human rights lawyer handling the case of Lopez's disappearance, says she worries that much of the evidence has been filtered to protect the kidnappers. “A year has gone by since Julio was kidnapped and the disappearance of the comrade and there's still no one under investigation in the case. Human rights organizations have given the only serious tip offs being investigated. The investigators have waited months to investigate them. They allowed the suspects under investigation to know they were being investigated.”

Human rights groups are pointing to Etchecolatz and other military officers currently jailed in the V.I.P. Marcos Paz Federal prison while facing trial for human rights crimes. For Margarita Cruz, a torture survivor from the northern province of Tucuman, Julio Lopez's disappearance is a sign of the long standing impunity for military personnel who killed an estimated 30,000 people during the military junta's reign of terror. “A year since Julio was disappeared, it's certain that impunity in the country is alive and well. All of the work of human rights organizations on each of the anniversaries, each month since Julio's disappearance, is going to bring change. That's what we hope, we are calling for a massive march, to demand real answers to the whereabouts of Julio Lopez.”

In total, 256 former military personnel and members of the military government have been accused of human rights crimes and are now awaiting trial. But only three trials have been held since Argentina's Supreme Court struck down amnesty laws in 2005 protecting military personnel who served during the seven-year dictatorship. Human rights groups in Argentina report that the trials to convict former members of the military dictatorship for abuses have advanced at a snails pace, if advancing at all. Victims blame an inefficient court system filled with structural roadblocks and uncooperative judges.

To listen to this radio story visit, www.fsrn.org. For videos on human rights in Argentina visit, www.agoratv.org

http://mujereslibres.blogspot.com/ Marie Trigona

Renegade Eye Addendum: Mr. James Reiss wrote this very thoughtful review of a radio story produced for Free Speech Radio News on the one year anniversary of the disappearance of Julio Lopez.

Last week marked an important first anniversary. The Argentine human rights activist, Julio Lopez, disappeared on September 18, 2006, the very day that the Director of Investigations of the Buenos Aires Police, Miguel Etchecolatz, was imprisoned for human rights abuses, including the torture of Lopez.

Free Speech Radio News reporter Marie Trigona has been tireless in exposing military and police brutality in Argentina, reminiscent of much worse abuses during the "dirty war" military government years from 1976 to 1983. Under the current civilian Nestor Kirchner administration, 256 "bad cops," former military personnel and members of the military government, have been accused. So far, however, only 3 have been tried.

The situation in Buenos Aires may not be as bad as in, say, Yangon, Myanmar (Burma), where an ultra-repressive military junta is now facing a standoff of thousands of protesting Buddhist monks. But Trigona's lone voice in the wilderness is a wakeup call for American listeners, distracted by huge headlines, who yawn at news stories relegated to the back pages of "The New York Times." Right now the kidnapped septuagenarian construction worker Julio Lopez may possibly be the equivalent of Myanmar's Nobel-Prize winning dissident, Aung San Suu Kyi -- if Lopez is alive. My guess is that he isn't. As to his whereabouts, the most we know is nada. The plot stagnates.

Back when he was on the scene, in his court testimony, Lopez's description of undergoing prolonged bouts of torture with electric prods in La Plata during 1976 makes for graphic radio. Otherwise, Trigona's matter-of-fact "Letter from Buenos Aires" passionately underscores her view that -- forget about Hamlet's Denmark -- something is rotten in Argentina.

(Reviewer) james reiss
Oxford, OH
September 24, 2007

Trial Against Accused Catholic Priest Torturer Begins in Argentina

A much awaited human rights abuse trial is underway in Argentina. The accused is a catholic priest charged with carrying out human rights abuses while working in several clandestine detention centers during the nation's 1976 to 1983 military dictatorship. The priest has been under arrest for 4 years ago while living under a false alias in Chile. This is the latest human rights trial of accused torturer since the landmark conviction of a former police officer for genocide in 2006.

Former Chaplin Christian Von Wernich wore a priest's collar and bullet proof vest as he sat behind reinforced glass in a federal court. The court clerk read charges accusing him of collaborating with state security agents and covering up crimes in seven deaths, 31 cases of torture and 42 cases of illegal imprisonment. He answered basic court questions but refused to testify in the case, “Following the advice of Dr. Jerollini who is my lawyer. I am not going to declare. And I am not going to accept questions.”

At least 120 witnesses are slated to testify against Von Wernich and the court has taken precautions to protect their safety, putting up police fences around the court house and installing metal detectors. In the front row of the court room's audience, representatives from the human rights organization Mothers of Plaza de Mayo sat with their white headscarves listening to the court's accusations.

According to Nora Cortinas, president of the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo – Linea Fundadora, the Catholic Church supported the crimes committed during the dictatorship.

“The heads of the Catholic Church participated in the dictatorship. Many priests were chaplains inside the barracks of the concentration camps. We want to point out that there is a sector from the church that didn't have anything to do with the dictatorship, on the contrary they supported us and reported the crimes committed at the time. But most of the representatives from the church participated in the celebration of death and torture.”

Journalist Horacio Verbisky recently published a book on the Catholic Church's involvement with the military dictatorship. Outside the courthouse, hundreds of human rights advocates rallied, demanding a severe sentence for the Catholic Priest. At one point, Von Wernich interrupted head judge Carlos Rozanski, saying he couldn't hear the accusations against him because protestors could be heard yelling 'Assassin' from outside the courtroom.

Christina Valdez's, whose husband was kidnapped and disappeared in La Plata in 1976, describes how she felt seeing Von Wernich on trial. “Looking at Von Wernich is looking at the face of a murderer. I suppose that all the relatives of the disappeared must feel a similar sensation: a certain impunity because one has to sit and swallow down everything that he or she feels in that moment. You can't yell at the murderer, you can't scream assassin.”

This is only the third human rights trial since Argentina's supreme court struck down amnesty laws in 2005 protecting military personnel who served during the 7-year dictatorship. Human rights organizations worry that judicial roadblocks and an atmosphere of fear may provide former members of the military dictatorship a window to escape conviction.

Nora Cortinas says that Argentines do not wish to live with a justice system of impunity. “What we want is for the trials to speed up a little bit and not be tried on a case by case basis. And that the government takes responsibility to help end the threats against witnesses, judges, and lawyers. So that we can really say that there's justice in this country.”

Von Wernich's trial is expected to go on for two months. Human rights groups are preparing events to demand the safe return Julio Lopez, a key witness who helped convict a former officer for life, but who disappeared nearly a year ago.

Listen to interview on Uprising Radio: Clergyman on trial for human rights crimes

Marie Trigona
http://mujereslibres.blogspot.com/

RENEGADE EYE

News from Argentina

This past month in Argentina has been anything but dull. Here’s a run through of recent events and personal reflections on where things are going. Check out videos on these news events at www.agoratv.org Also, feel free to visit my blog for further updates: http://mujereslibres.blogspot.com/

Train Riot breaks out

Enraged train commuters rioted in a major rail station in Buenos Aires on May 16. Delays in railway services sparked violent riots in Buenos Aires, when commuters set fire to parts of a train station during rush hour.

Angry passengers lobbed rocks at ticket booths, and set fire to automated ticket dispensers and police offices inside the Constitucion train station, the largest station in Buenos Aires with more than 300,000 users daily. About an hour after the violence erupted, riot police clashed with protesting passengers; shooting tear gas, rubber bullets and arresting 16 people.

Overcrowding has plagued the railway, leading from Constitucion station in downtown Buenos Aires to the capital's poor southern suburbs, since services were privatized in the 1990's.

Mothers of Plaza de Mayo Commemorate 30^th Anniversary

The Mothers of Plaza de Mayo commemorated the 30th anniversary of their movement on April 30 in Argentina with a celebration of art and music. Thousands joined the mothers in the Plaza in the heart of Buenos Aires to thank them for their three decade long struggle for human rights and justice. After thirty years of fighting, they continue to face legal roadblocks preventing courts from putting ex-military behind bars for their human rights crimes while a key witness in these trials was disappeared in 2006.

In 1977, out of desperation and love for their children, a group of mothers began a protest to demand information about the whereabouts of their children. These youth were among the 30,000 people who were forcefully disappeared during the so-called dirty war carried out by Argentina’s military dictatorship between 1976 and 1983.

Juana Pargament, now 92-years-old, said that the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo have always gathered the strength to fight from their children. “30 years of struggle! Of course we are older now, we started out when we were younger. When they took our children away, it was painful, we suffered. But we had a strength that I can't put into words. It was also a difficult lesson, because we mothers had to learn to defend our children.”

Impunity and escrache popular

Following the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo’s example the group H.I.J.O.S. (Children for Identity Justice and Against Forget and Silence) formed in 1996 using the escrache as a tool for popular justice for their parents and against impunity.

H.I.J.O.S. (Children for Identity Justice and Against Forget and Silence) held an “escrache” protest outside the home of Alfredo Bisordi, the Magistrate Council president who is accused of deliberately obstructing the cases to convict ex-military leaders for state supported terrorism. Alvaro Piedra, a son of a disappeared, human rights lawyer and member of HIJOS says that after 30 years victims still await justice. “The escrache is a method to send a message and bring light to the situation that Bisordi supports impunity, throughout his career as a magistrate he has supported the military.”

Bisordi first incorporated into the judicial system during the military dictatorship and was the secretary for Judge Norberto Giletta, who became infamous for rejecting the missing persons reports that the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo and other parents presented to the courts. Bisordi has openly supported the dictatorship and has even gone so far as to pardon skin heads accused of racist physical attacks and call torture survivors “subversive terrorists.”

Human rights groups want Bisordi and the other three council members to be removed from their positions and for the trials to make progress. Piedras said that if the trials are delayed military may escape prosecution. “We’re trying the criminals 30 years after their crimes were committed, so the presentation of evidence is more difficult.”

Marie Trigona
http://mujereslibres.blogspot.com/
RENEGADE EYE

Argentina: Thirty-One Years After Coup, Disappearances and Terror Back on the Streets

Toward Freedom Written by Marie Trigona

Thursday, 29 March 2007

Argentina marked the 31st anniversary of the nation's 1976 military coup on March 24 with a series of marches to commemorate 30,000 disappeared during the so-called dirty war. As the perpetrators face trial 31 years on, key witnesses are disappearing and terror is back on the streets. In the face of threats and attacks, demonstrators demanded an end to impunity for military personnel who served in the 1976-1983 dictatorship. Rights representatives have expressed immediate concerns over Julio Lopez; a new name that has been inscribed on the doleful roll call of Argentina's disappeared. Human rights groups in Argentina report that the trials to convict former members of the military dictatorship for human rights abuses have been put on hold and that the wave of threats against witnesses continues. Legacy of fighting for human rights The Mothers of Plaza de Mayo held their weekly Thursday vigil in the plaza where they have met for 30 years to demand information on the whereabouts of their children who were kidnapped and later murdered, but whose bodies have never been found. Mercedes Meroño, whose daughter was disappeared in 1978 said that the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo have gathered the strength to fight from their children. "After 30 years of struggle in the plaza and 31 after the dictatorship, we defeated the dictators with a struggle that we never abandoned, because we support the revolutionary struggle of our children. We continue to say that we were born out of our children’s fight, because before we didn’t know anything about this. For love we went out into the streets." During the Mothers’ 29 years of struggle they have endured physical attacks and endless threats. Three of the founding members were disappeared and murdered following the infiltration by Adolfo Astiz, a military officer, in 1977. Astiz, like many other former military leaders have been charged with human rights abuses, but has never been sentenced for his crimes. Astiz is facing trial for the 1977 disappearances of French nuns Alice Domon and Léonie Duque and a dozen other people, including Azucena Villaflor, the founder of Mothers of Plaza de Mayo. Meroño, now 82 years old, says that the Mothers will continue to fight until ex-military leaders are convicted and put behind bars for human rights crimes "At 31 years since Argentina's worst military coup, what we want is peace, love and solidarity. And those of us who fight for those words are triumphant. The evil people, the murderers, those who threw young people alive into the sea, tortured and raped: all of them are hidden in their homes like cowards. We want for them to be put in jail just like any other murderer and to be placed in common jails." Today’s terror and impunity Right across from the Plaza de Mayo on March 22, a delegation from the group called Space for Memory, Truth and Justice presented a report of over 200 cases of recent attacks and threats against human rights activists. Police barricades blocked the delegation two blocks from the Interior Ministry. Carlos Leiva is an activist from an unemployed workers organization Frente Dario Santillan. Speaking at the Interior Ministry, Leiva describes his kidnapping that occurred earlier this month. "On Friday, March 2, I was on my way to a movement meeting. A car stopped in front of me and two people who came from behind forced me into the car. They took me to an abandoned warehouse. I was held there for 6 or 7 hours while they threatened me a lot and asked personal questions and questions about our movement. The moment came when they had orders from a superior and they simulated shooting me." Leiva has identified his perpetrators as civil police who harassed him at a previous protest and says that authorities haven’t carried out an investigation since his kidnapping. "Every year the point is to go out and say we don't forget. During the dictatorship they disappeared an entire generation that thought, that could speak out. Today we are trying to fight for a better future in our organizations and the police are trying to fill organizations with fear. The clearest case is they disappeared Julio Lopez and he hasn’t turned up." Human rights trials paralyzed Argentina’s federal courts have virtually paralyzed upcoming human rights trials six months after the disappearance of Julio Lopez — a key witness who helped convict a former police officer for life. Lopez went missing September 18, the eve of the landmark conviction of Miguel Etchecolatz, the first military officer to be tried for crimes against humanity and genocide. In his testimony, Lopez said that Etchecolatz tortured him during his detention from 1976-1979. Testifying before a court in La Plata, Lopez described the prolonged bouts of interrogation under Etchecolatz’s supervision. "I even thought that one day I find Etchecolatz, I am going to kill him. And then I thought, well, if I kill him I’ll just be killing a piece of garbage, a serial killer who didn’t have compassion." He said that the police chief would personally kick detainees until they were unconscious and oversee torture sessions. Etchecolatz's sentence for crimes against humanity, genocide, and the murder and torture of political dissidents during the dictatorship represents the first time in the nation's history that the courts have sentenced a military officer to life for crimes against humanity. This is only the second conviction of a former military officer charged with human rights abuses since 2005 when Argentina's Supreme Court struck down immunity laws for former officers of the military dictatorship as unconstitutional. Etchecolatz was arrested and sentenced to 23 years in 1986, but was later freed when the "full stop" and "due obedience" laws implemented in the early '90s made successful prosecution of ex-military leaders for human rights abuses virtually impossible. In total, 256 former military personnel and members of the military government have been accused of human rights crimes and are now awaiting trial. However, this adds up to less than one ex-military officer for each of the country’s 375 clandestine detention centers that were used to torture and forcefully disappear 30,000 people. Aside from numbers, human rights representatives report that the trials are advancing at a snails pace, if advancing at all. Victims blame an inefficient court system filled with structural bureaucratic roadblocks and uncooperative judges. Some trials have been delayed more than three years. President Nestor Kirchner, under pressure from human rights groups, addressed the issue publicly at the government’s official rally to commemorate March 24. He pleaded with the judicial system to speed up the trials but did not sanction any order or take any other action. Recently, 61 plaintiffs (mostly torture survivors) publicly accused four Magistrate Council members for deliberately obstructing the cases to try ex-military leaders for state supported terrorism. The council president, Alfredo Bisordi, has been investigated by the Magistrates Association for openly supporting the dictatorship and amnesty for human rights abusers. Human rights groups want Bisordi and the other three council members to be removed from their positions. Groups worry that judicial roadblocks and an atmosphere of fear may provide former members of the military dictatorship a window to escape conviction. Patricia Isasa, a former political prisoner and torture survivor is leading a case against 9 of her perpetrators in the province of Santa Fe. Currently, she is in a witness protection program after receiving threatening phone calls. She says that many of the witnesses have dropped out of the trials since the wave of threats began: "The cases are clearly paralyzed. Before the kidnapping of Lopez I had a set date for the trial. The trial has been moved forward to no less than a year from now." Several judges have been threatened and are in police protection programs. In other cases, victims have reported that judges have ties to the military dictatorship. Isasa has made public complaints that her court case is being held up by a court with ties to one of her perpetrators, Victor Brusa, an interrogator in the concentration camps that later became a federal judge. Brusa served as a judge until he was put under house arrest thanks to Isasa’s efforts. For Isasa, survivors deserve a quota of justice after 31 years of injustice and impunity. "The court delay means a year of impunity, a year of shame, a year of being a witness whose life is in danger. When can I have a sense of peace? When these people have a firm sentence in jail and deactivated as much as possible. Now, please don't put them in the same place!" In recent months Human rights organizations have faced unrelenting threats in phone calls and emails defending crimes committed during the dictatorship. HIJOS, - an organization of children of the disappeared is one of those groups. Ramiro Gonzalez, son of a woman who was disappeared and member of HIJOS, was forced into an unmarked car by four men on October 4, who beat him while showing him pictures of activists and asking for their names. According to Gonzalez, many of the phone calls have been tracked to the federal prison where Etchecolatz and another 100 military officers are imprisoned. "We are continuing to receive phone calls from the federal penitentiary," says Gonzalez. "Everything is on hold, now that there are trials being held nationwide. Many of the witnesses don't want to take part in the prosecution out of fear, because the threats continue." He adds that although HIJOS is on alert, they are continuing to fight for justice for their parent’s deaths during the military dictatorship. "We at HIJOS are particularly worried because we feel that we are an easy target. Many of our comrades are getting psychological help for the threats and some of us are truly afraid. But we are clear that we aren't going to abandon the struggle!" With Julio Lopez missing for more than six months, it is almost certain that he is dead. His capturers are using his body as a negotiating tool to protect military personnel from any further criminal charges or trials. The political implications of Lopez’s disappearance has led to a virtual paralysis in the upcoming trials that human rights groups were promised when the Supreme Court overturned the amnesty laws that protected former military officers who served during the dictatorship. Marie Trigona is a journalist and radio producer based in Buenos Aires. She can be reached at mtrigona@msn.com Visit http://mujereslibres.blogspot.com/ for more information on the human rights trials.