MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

After the Falklands war, Brazil helped repatriate Argentine repressor jailed in the UK

“Death angel” Captain Astiz provided the Task Force with its first victory in South Georgia

The Brazilian dictatorship mediated before London in 1982 to have Navy Captain and notorious repressor Alfredo Astiz, repatriated to Argentina from Britain, where he had been flown after he surrendered the South Georgia garrison to the British Task Force.

Then Brazilian ambassador in London Roberto Campos interceded directly to avoid Captain Astiz also known as the “death angel”, from being extradited to France or Sweden where he was wanted for the disappearance in the late seventies of the nuns Leonie Duquet and Alice Domon and for the disappearance of the Swedish Argentine born teenager Dalma Hagelin.

Among the 110 cables on the South Atlantic conflict released by the Brazilian Foreign Affairs ministry (Palacio de Itamaraty) and published in the leading newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo in an open site (www.transparencia.folha.com.br) the role played by then Brazilian president General Joao Batista Figueredo and Brazilian diplomacy clearly stands out.

To ensure that the Argentine navy officer really made it back to Buenos Aires, President Figueiredo ordered that a delegation of Brazilian military officers and diplomats escort him to Rio do Janerio and from there on to Buenos Aires.

Ambassador Campos who died in 2001 had been Planning minister for the de facto military government headed by General Humberto Castelo Branco, which emerged in 1964 with the ousting of elected president Joao Goulart.

Brazil remained neutral during the 1982 conflict and some documents of the time referred to the Malvinas as the “Falklands”, but finally Brasilia sided with the Argentine military following its own interests. Argentina’s president General Leopoldo Galtieri requested from his peer General Figueiredo that Brazil look after Argentine interests in London following the breaking of relations between Buenos Aires and London.

The request from Galtieri to Figueiredo was to ensure the repatriation of Astiz and neutralizing the extradition claim France was about to present in London for the officer allegedly responsible for the disappearance of the two French nuns.

Paris made the formal extradition request for the ‘death angel’ but the UK hesitated and Buenos Aires was desperate to avoid Astiz ending in an open trial in France or Sweden. Finally Astiz was repatriated in late June 1982.

The Brazilian government of President Figueiredo had taken the first steps for a friendly reconciliation with Argentina following on several years of mistrust because of the Itaipú hydroelectric dam, still the world’s largest operational complex which assured Brazilian industrial development with cheap accessible power.

At the time Argentina and Brazil were still disputing the leadership of South America but under the military governments, from 1964 to 1985, Brazil managed a formidable infrastructure leap that helped with the foundations of current development.

Finally in 1979 Figueiredo managed that Argentina and Brazil together with Paraguay (which shares Itaipú), signed an agreement that cleared the diplomatic path for the Itaipú complex in the Paraná River shared with Argentina and Paraguay.

This warming up of bilateral relations further materialized when President Figueiredo visited Argentina in 1980 and met with his peer General Videla, who would soon step down and be replaced by General Viola and finally General Galtieri. No wonder then that the Brazilians were willing to intercede for Argentina in the case of former captain Astiz and to represent Argentine interests in London.

Currently Astiz is facing several trials for crimes against humanity and will most probably spend the rest of his life in prison. Evidence has emerged that the two French nuns most probably were tied and gagged, and later dropped into the sea from a helicopter, which was a common method of the Argentine military to get rid of the ‘disappeared’.