wfn.org | Crimes against Humanity: Argentine Ecumenical Body Seeks

["Frank Imhoff" <FRANKI@elca.org>]

Argentine Ecumenical Body Seeks Recognition as Plaintiff in
Prosecution of Crimes against Humanity
"We Want to Know What Happened in the Clandestine Detention
Centers" 

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina/GENEVA, 3 October (LWI/ALC) - An
ecumenical human rights body is among organizations in Argentina
that are asking for recognition as plaintiffs in processes to
prosecute those responsible for crimes against humanity in the
country. 

The Ecumenical Human Rights Movement (MEDH) and six other similar
organizations filed their suit after Argentina's Parliament
annulled the so-called Final Point and Due Obedience law that
granted amnesty to military officers considered responsible for
crimes against humanity in the mid-seventies and early eighties.
MEDH brings together several Christian churches in Argentina
including the two Lutheran World Federation (LWF) member churches
there - the Evangelical Church of the River Plate and United
Evangelical Lutheran Church.

The request was brought before Judge Rodolfo Canicoba Corral who
is investigating crimes against humanity committed between 1976
and 1983 under the First Army Corps in the Naval School of
Mechanics (ESMA), which became a center where people were
detained, tortured and disappeared during the military
dictatorship.  

"We presented a 54-page writ in which we asked that they create a
file for each clandestine center that depended on the First Army
Corps, as to include everything in the same file is impossible,"
explained Marma Gonzalez Rivero, lawyer for those filing the
suit.

According to investigations carried out in Argentina, there were
more than 340 clandestine detention centers during the seven-year
military rule, and ESMA was one of the main ones. 

Those filing the suit include an association of ex-detainees and
previously disappeared, whose president Adriana Calvo filed the
same suit personally as a survivor, the national human rights
league and a juridical action committee. 

Established in February 1976, the MEDH also includes the Roman
Catholic dioceses of Quilmes, Neuquin, Viedma and Iguazz,
Disciples of Christ, Methodist, Reformed, and Waldensian
churches, and the national Christian youth association. Methodist
Pastor Jose N. de Luca is the coordinator of the movement, which
receives support through the LWF Department for Mission and
Development.

"We want to know the truth about what happened in the clandestine
detention centers, who gave the orders and who carried them out,
so that this never happens again in Argentine or in the rest of
the world," said De Luca. 

On September 4, the attorneys assigned to the case from the First
Army Corps, ordered the detention of 38 military and police
officers and civilians accused of kidnapping and being implicated
in the disappearance of hundreds of victims of the "dirty war."
In the case of ESMA, 13 suspects are still in jail. 

The lawsuit argues that "a system of clandestine repression was
established in the country" between 1976 and 1983 and that, based
on a 1985 judicial ruling, "it can be affirmed that the
commanders' secretary established a criminal mode to battle
terrorism. Inferior armed forces' ranks were given great
discretion to deprive those who appeared to be linked to
subversion of their freedom, based on intelligence information." 

The lawsuit also states that suspected individuals were to be
interrogated under torture and submitted to inhuman regimes while
they were held in captivity. Finally, there was great liberty to
determine the final destiny of each victim: entry into the legal
system, freedom or simply physical elimination. 

According to the suit, ESMA operated as a secret detention,
torture and extermination center before
 24 March 1976 up until
the end of the dictatorship. It came under the First Army Corps
and was the responsibility of the chain of command, including
successive commander-in-chiefs who also made up the military
juntas. 

The petition names those in charge of ESMA as the authors or
co-authors of the forced disappearance of more than 5,000 people,
who were submitted to systematic torture, inhumane and degrading
treatment, reduced to slavery and so on, in the detention center
from 24 March 1976 to the end of 1983. 

It specifies crimes committed by 47 of those responsible and
points to another 31 people who carried out functions within the
center's operation sector and presumably are also responsible.
Those named, according to the lawsuit, are the authors,
co-authors, accomplices and or participants in the crimes of
forced disappearance, torture, illegal arrest, robbery,
usurpation of identity and homicide. (703 words)

(The LWF is a global communion of Christian churches in the
Lutheran tradition. Founded in 1947 in Lund (Sweden), the LWF now
has 136 member churches in 76 countries representing over 61.7
million of the 65.4 million Lutherans worldwide. The LWF acts on
behalf of its member churches in areas of common interest such as
ecumenical and interfaith relations, theology, humanitarian
assistance, human rights, communication, and the various aspects
of mission and development work. Its secretariat is located in
Geneva, Switzerland.)

[Lutheran World Information (LWI) is LWF' information service.
Unless specifically noted, material presented does not represent
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