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Human rights
Slaking a thirst for justice. Apr 12th 2007 | BUENOS AIRES AND SANTIAGO. From The Economist print edition.
A generation later, in both Argentina and Chile, the courts are dealing with the perpetrators of past atrocities. For the past 31 years, Viviana Díaz, a small, gentle woman now in her 50s, has devoted her life to finding out what happened to her father, Victor Díaz López, a former leader of Chile's Communist Party. Following the bloody coup against Salvador Allende's left-wing government in 1973, he became one of the military regime's most wanted men. After nearly three years in hiding, he was finally picked up by the DINA, the secret police of Chile's dictator, General Augusto Pinochet. His family never saw him again.
He was one of the many thousands who perished under the dictatorships that ruled many parts of Latin America in the final phase of the cold war in the 1970s and 1980s. A quarter of a century after the last successful military coup in Latin America, the region has moved on, with democracy for the most part firmly established. But in many countries, the past still poses some searching questions. Peace or justice? Retribution or reconciliation? Find the truth, however painful, or prefer the ease of forgetting?
In most countries in the region where abuses occurred under authoritarian rule—Guatemala (where 200,000 died in a civil war between military dictatorships and left-wing guerrillas), Brazil, Mexico and Uruguay—the process of dealing with the crimes of the past has barely begun. To a lesser extent, that applies to El Salvador too (see article).
Take Mr Díaz's case. His family learnt of his arrest through an anonymous phone call. Then silence. After four months of searching, Ms Díaz and her mother, a washerwoman, met a woman recently released from Villa Grimaldi, a secret detention centre. She had a message for them from Marta Ugarte, another of the many communist leaders interned there. Ugarte's wrists had broken after she was strung up from the ceiling and her breasts were burned with a blow-lamp. She wanted them to know that neither she nor Mr Díaz would ever get out alive.
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According to Chile's Interior Ministry, 148 people, including nearly 50 military officers, have already been convicted for human-rights violations during the 17-year dictatorship. Over 400 more, nearly all from the armed forces, have been indicted or are under investigation. Pinochet was himself facing trial on several charges, including murder, torture and tax evasion, when he died in December at the age of 91.
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Trials and tribulations in Argentina ú
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Pinochet's London arrest emboldened judges in Argentina too. Soon afterwards, General Jorge Videla, the junta president of 1976-81, was put on trial on charges of appropriating babies. For this, General Videla was sentenced to eight years imprisonment. He had already received a life sentence in 1985. His subsequent pardon was quashed by a judge last September on the ground that he was guilty of crimes against humanity and could never be pardoned. Because he is aged over 70, General Videla is now under house arrest.
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Viviana Díaz finally found truthThese prosecutions are backed both by the current Peronist president, Néstor Kirchner, whose government includes several former followers of the Montonero guerrillas, and by public opinion. Unlike armies in many other Latin American countries, the army in Argentina is no longer much respected. In opinion polls 70% of respondents approved of the court's annulment of the amnesty laws. No new prosecutions are being brought against former guerrillas. The government argues, with questionable logic, that they were not guilty of crimes against humanity and are thus subject to the statute of limitations.
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As the experiences of Chile and Argentina show, each country has to find its own way of dealing with past atrocities in accordance with its own particular circumstances and history. Sometimes, it may take a whole generation for society to be ready to learn the truth, as in Germany after the second world war. At other times, an amnesty, which may later be unpicked or annulled, may help to secure peace.
The rise of international human-rights law has helped those who argue that in cases involving the worst crimes justice must never be sacrificed to peace. Where conflict continues that principle may be hard to apply. Its proponents say justice is essential not just as an end in itself but to deter future tyrants. Until recently, most could expect to get off scot-free. Increasingly, other countries may follow the road pioneered by Chile and Argentina.
