MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Argentine papers detail “Dirty War”

The United States on Tuesday turned over recently declassified documents to Argentine authorities that might shed light on human rights violations committed during the 1976-1983 military dictatorship

More than 4,600 documents dating from 1975 to 1984 will be made available to human rights organizations and the general public and are expected to provide evidence or leads for courts investigating crimes committed by the Military Junta.

"The U.S. Embassy in Buenos Aires has notified us that they will post the documents on the Internet in the next 48 hours so that any Argentine citizen might view them," Foreign Minister Carlos Ruckauf said.

The Argentine government and human rights organizations asked the U.S. State Department to declassify the documents two years ago, the foreign minister told a news conference.

"We don't have any details, the boxes are still sealed. But we thought it important not to keep this solely in the government's hands, and that's why we're going to make the documents available to anyone who wants to see them as of tomorrow," Ruckauf said. The documents pertain to the period of time when the Argentine Anti-Communist Alliance - a right-wing terrorist group known as the Triple A - operated, shortly before the last military regime took power.

The Alliance has been blamed for numerous bombings and attacks on leftist groups. The documents will also shed light on Plan Condor, the coordinated repression of suspected leftists by South American military regimes in the 1970s, as well as Argentina's unsuccessful war against Great Britain over the Falkland Islands in 1982, the minister said.

During Argentina's so-called "dirty war," some 9,000 people disappeared, although human rights groups contend the figure is closer to 30,000.

"The material will clearly be very useful in a number of ongoing court cases," Justice, Security and Human Rights Minister Juan Jose Alvarez said.

The prosecution of human rights violators was virtually blocked by two amnesty laws enacted in 1985 and 1987 and ex-President Carlos Menem's 1990 pardon for all military commanders who had been convicted on such charges.

However, several federal judges who consider the laws unconstitutional continued to investigate a number of cases that led to the arrest of several retired and active-duty military officers.

In addition, several senior-level members of the former military regime and others who acted to repress dissidents are presently under arrest for masterminding and carrying out a systematic plan to abduct, change the identity of and put up for illegal adoption the children of disappeared political dissidents.

Horacio Verbitsky, head of the Center for Legal and Social Studies, a human rights organization that had requested the documents' declassification, said the release of information will give a boost to investigations and "provide evidence for court cases." Specifically, Verbitsky said he hopes the documents will shed light on the murder and disappearance of some 20 Montoneros leftists in 1979.

Last month, Judge Claudio Bonadio indicted and arrested more than 40 ex-members of the military and former intelligence officers for their role in the massacre.