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Dirty War (Argentina, 1976-83) (view source)
Revision as of 08:11, December 25, 2018
, 08:11, December 25, 2018no edit summary
Everyone was viewed with suspicion and tens of thousands were detained at one point: union leaders who agitated for wage increases and militancy in the US and European-owned car plants in Argentina, students who were members of the ''Unión de Estudiantes Secundarios'' (Union of High School Students or UES), journalists like [[Rodolfo Jorge Walsh]] that were not fearful of the dictatorship, human-rights lawyers who were part of suspect professions, young communists, socialists, nuns and priests that had ties with the [[Third World Priest Movement]]. And family members or friends of any of them; people that financially supported them or hid them from the military.
Everyone was viewed with suspicion and tens of thousands were detained at one point: union leaders who agitated for wage increases and militancy in the US and European-owned car plants in Argentina, students who were members of the ''Unión de Estudiantes Secundarios'' (Union of High School Students or UES), journalists like [[Rodolfo Jorge Walsh]] that were not fearful of the dictatorship, human-rights lawyers who were part of suspect professions, young communists, socialists, nuns and priests that had ties with the [[Third World Priest Movement]]. And family members or friends of any of them; people that financially supported them or hid them from the military.
==Children of the Disappeared==
===Children of the Disappeared===
With the return of democracy, human rights groups in Argentina started searching for the grandchildren stolen from detained female guerrillas and civilians and adopted in military circle. At the time, the ''Asociación Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo'' (Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo or ''Abuelas''), had records of 172 children who disappeared together with their parents or were born at the numerous detention camps and had not been returned to their families.
With the return of democracy, human rights groups in Argentina started searching for the grandchildren stolen from detained female guerrillas and civilians and adopted in military circle. At the time, the ''Asociación Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo'' (Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo or ''Abuelas''), had records of 172 children who disappeared together with their parents or were born at the numerous detention camps and had not been returned to their families.
The case of Maria Eugenia Sampallo (born some time in 1978) also received considerable attention. Sampallo sued the couple who adopted her illegally as a baby after her parents disappeared, both admittedly Montoneros. Her grandmother spent 24 years looking for her. The case was filed in 2001, after DNA tests indicated that Osvaldo Rivas and Maria Cristina Gomez were not her biological parents. They, along with Army Captain Enrique Berthier, who furnished the couple with the baby, were sentenced respectively to 8, 7 and 10 years in prison for kidnapping during the Kirchner government.
The case of Maria Eugenia Sampallo (born some time in 1978) also received considerable attention. Sampallo sued the couple who adopted her illegally as a baby after her parents disappeared, both admittedly Montoneros. Her grandmother spent 24 years looking for her. The case was filed in 2001, after DNA tests indicated that Osvaldo Rivas and Maria Cristina Gomez were not her biological parents. They, along with Army Captain Enrique Berthier, who furnished the couple with the baby, were sentenced respectively to 8, 7 and 10 years in prison for kidnapping during the Kirchner government.
==The PEN Disappeared held in detention camps==
===The PEN Disappeared held in detention camps===
By the time of the coup on March 24th 1976, the number of disappeared held under ''Poder Ejecutivo Nacional'' (PEN) stood at least 5,182. Some 18,000 disappeared in the form of PEN detainees were imprisoned in Argentina by the end of 1977 and it is estimated that some 3,000 deaths occurred in the Navy Engineering School (ESMA) alone. These disappeared were held incommunicado and reportedly tortured. Some, like senator Hipolito Solari Yrigoyen and socialist leader professor Alfredo Bravo, were ''detenidos-desaparecidos''. Alicia Partnoy, a poet and member of the Peronist Youth that had links with the ''Montoneros'', also counts as one of the victims who had disappeared but later "reappeared." On November 10th 1977, Colonel Ricardo Flouret and Captain Eduardo Andujar, representing the interior ministry, explained to [[Amnesty International]] that many of the disappeared were in fact guerrillas who had gone underground or fled the country.
By the time of the coup on March 24th 1976, the number of disappeared held under ''Poder Ejecutivo Nacional'' (PEN) stood at least 5,182. Some 18,000 disappeared in the form of PEN detainees were imprisoned in Argentina by the end of 1977 and it is estimated that some 3,000 deaths occurred in the Navy Engineering School (ESMA) alone. These disappeared were held incommunicado and reportedly tortured. Some, like senator Hipolito Solari Yrigoyen and socialist leader professor Alfredo Bravo, were ''detenidos-desaparecidos''. Alicia Partnoy, a poet and member of the Peronist Youth that had links with the ''Montoneros'', also counts as one of the victims who had disappeared but later "reappeared." On November 10th 1977, Colonel Ricardo Flouret and Captain Eduardo Andujar, representing the interior ministry, explained to [[Amnesty International]] that many of the disappeared were in fact guerrillas who had gone underground or fled the country.
US President Jimmy Carter offered to accept 3,000 PEN detainees, as long as they had no terrorist background.<ref>Iain Guest, Behind the Disappearances: Argentina's Dirty War Against Human Rights & The United Nations, p. 498, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1990</ref>Some 8,600 PEN disappeared were eventually released under international pressure. Of these 4,029 were held in illegal detention centres for less than a year, 2,296 for one to three years, 1,172 for three to five years, 668 for five to seven years, and 431 for seven to nine years.<ref>Sonia Cardenas, Conflict and Compliance: State Responses to International Human Rights Pressure, p. 52,University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007</ref>Of these ''detenidos-desaparecidos'' 157 were killed after being released from detention.
US President Jimmy Carter offered to accept 3,000 PEN detainees, as long as they had no terrorist background.<ref>Iain Guest, Behind the Disappearances: Argentina's Dirty War Against Human Rights & The United Nations, p. 498, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1990</ref>Some 8,600 PEN disappeared were eventually released under international pressure. Of these 4,029 were held in illegal detention centres for less than a year, 2,296 for one to three years, 1,172 for three to five years, 668 for five to seven years, and 431 for seven to nine years.<ref>Sonia Cardenas, Conflict and Compliance: State Responses to International Human Rights Pressure, p. 52,University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007</ref>Of these ''detenidos-desaparecidos'' 157 were killed after being released from detention.
===Casualty estimates===
The New York Times reporter David Vidal wrote on January 5th 1979 that the number of disappeared in Latin America as a whole now numbered 30,000. The Christian Science Monitor and The Boston Globe soon followed suit with similar stories, claiming 30,000 people had disappeared under military dictatorships in Latin America and not just Argentina. The Los Angeles Times repeated the claims of 30,000 Latin Americans and not just Argentinians, disappeared in a new article published in October 1979 and November of that year. The Nunca Más report issued by the National Commission on the Disappearance of Persons (CONADEP) in 1984, identified 8,961 persons "disappeared" between 1976 and 1983, in a case by case verification, and another list of 1,300 victims seen alive in clandestine detention centres.
In 1977, General Albano Harguindeguy, Interior Minister, admitted that 5,618 people disappeared in the form of PEN detenidos-desaparecidos were being held in detention camps throughout Argentina. According to a secret cable from DINA (Chilean secret police) in Buenos Aires, an estimate by the Argentine 601st Intelligence Battalion in mid-July 1978, which started counting victims in 1975, gave the figure of 22,000 persons – this document was first published by John Dinges in 2004.
The total number of disappeared in the form of PEN prisoners was 8,625 and of these disappeared 157 were killed after being released from detention. Human Rights Groups in Argentina often cite a figure of 30,000 disappeared, Amnesty International estimates 20,000 while other observers think 12,000 is a more accurate figure. In 1988, the Asamblea por los Derechos Humanos (APDH or Assembly for Human Rights) published its findings on the disappearances and stated that 12,261 people were killed or disappeared during the Dirty War. The Montoneros admitted losing 5,000 guerrillas killed, and the ERP admitted 5,000 of their own guerrillas had been killed. By comparison, Argentine security forces cite 523 deaths of their own between 1969 and 1975 and 205 deaths between 1976 and 1978.
There is no agreement on the number of detenidos-desaparecidos. In a 2009 interview with the Buenos Aires daily newspaper Clarín, Graciela Fernández Meijide, who formed part of the 1984 truth commission, claimed that the documented number of Argentinian killed or disappeared was closer to 9,000. Between 1969 and 1979, left-wing guerrillas accounted for 3,249 kidnappings and murders and 5,215 bombings. CONADEP also recorded 458 assassinations (attributed to the Argentinian Anti-Communist Alliance) and about 600 forced disappearances during the period of democratic rule between 1973 and 1976.
In a final report televised on April 28th 1983 as the military prepared their departure, the ruling junta officially declared that the disappeared were all dead but said the military junta had saved the nation by their actions. Human Rights Group, such as the Argentinian League for Human Rights, condemned the junta's final report and claimed at the time, that between 6,000 and 15,000 people had disappeared in Argentina between 1975 and 1979. Some 11,000 Argentines have applied for and received up to US$200,000 each as monetary compensation for the loss of loved ones during the military dictatorship. In more recent times, journalist Alfonso Daniels put forward the claim in an article he wrote for the Daily Telegraph that over 30,000 Argentines disappeared.
==Military downfall==
==Military downfall==