Argentina

Photo: Getty Images

Dictator Jailed in Final Judgment on Argentinian Junta's Dirty War
By David Usborne
The Independent, December 24, 2010
"The former military dictator of Argentina, Jorge Videla, who was the principal architect of the so-called 'dirty war' during which as many as 30,000 civilians were 'disappeared' to secret prisons, never to be seen again, has been found guilty of crimes against humanity and sentenced to 25 years in prison. More than 20 other former military and police officials were also convicted and given harsh sentences alongside Videla, who, at 85 years old, will in all probability now die behind bars. They included his former army chief, retired General Luciano Benjamin Menendez. The convictions triggered jubilation among victims' relatives, including members of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, the human rights group which over decades relentlessly demanded that leaders of the military junta that ruled Argentina from 1976 to 1983 be brought to justice. ... The three-judge panel sitting in a Cordoba court found Videla guilty of aggravated homicide, aggravated torture and torment followed by death. It also ruled that Videla must serve his sentence in a common prison. Videla spoke defiantly before his sentence about his role in combating what he saw as a leftist insurgency encouraged by the former Soviet Union. ... The door to new prosecutions was reopened in part because it has taken this long for Argentina to purge its judicial system of judges and prosecutors who retained ties to the dictatorship era. The new trials were also strongly encouraged by the current government of President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner.
Exactly how many people in Argentina were tortured and murdered by the junta -- a majority of them students -- has never been firmly established. By government reckonings the toll was about 13,000 but human rights groups put it closer to 30,000. The case brought against Videla and his co-defendants specifically related to 31 victims of the 'dirty war' who were rounded up and taken to a secret prison in Cordoba where they were tortured, including with water-boarding and electrocution, and left naked in cold and damp cells. The court heard that they were told that their families would be killed if they did not confess to a leftist conspiracy against the state. The court found Videla 'criminally responsible' for the deaths of the 31 men. One of the judges described Videla as 'a manifestation of state terrorism.' Given the opportunity to speak before sentencing, the former coup leader showed scant remorse, however, saying he had been wrongly convicted. 'Much of what took place in the 1970s has been distorted, and perverse facts about the war have been concealed,' he argued. [...]"