The Supreme Court threw out a 1989 presidential pardon that absolved a former army general of alleged human rights abuses during Argentina's dictatorship.
Friday's ruling that the pardon of General Santiago Omar Riveros was unconstitutional opens the door for lower courts to reconsider dozens of other pardons granted after the end of the 1976 to 1983 military regime.
The court's seven members voted 4 to 2, with one abstention, that Riveros can be tried for illegal abductions, torture and killings of dissidents during a crackdown known as the Dirty War.
missing
Nearly 13,000 people are officially reported as missing from the junta era, though human rights groups say the toll is closer to 30,000 victims.
President Nestor Kirchner has made settling dictatorship-era human rights cases a priority. Since 2005, when the Supreme Court struck down 1980s laws granting blanket amnesty to people involved in official repression, dozens of former military and police officers have been called before the courts.
Last year, former police investigator Miguel Etchecolatz was convicted of genocide and sentenced to life imprisonment. That trial was marred by the disappearance of the chief prosecution witness, torture survivor Jorge Julio Lopez, who remains missing.
junta
A high-ranking commander during the junta, Riveros was known for his harsh direction of one of the army's torture centers, Campo de Mayo.
He was accused in connection with 14 killings and 20 cases of torture at army institutes under his command, before being pardoned by then-President Carlos Menem.
Riveros has been under house arrest since 2000 as part of a trial of military officials who allegedly arranged the illegal adoption of more than 200 children born in detention centers. Charges of child kidnapping never went to court and were not covered by the presidential pardon.
Menem issued a statement on Friday defending his pardons and accusing Kirchner of a "vendetta" against former members of the military while not lifting pardons granted to leftist "terrorist organizations" they sought to crush.
election
Menem is making a long-shot bid to regain the Argentine presidency in October's election. The race's front-runner is Kirchner's wife, Senator Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner.
Argentine constitutional scholar Gregorio Badeni noted that during the 1990s, the Supreme Court -- dominated by Menem appointees -- had ruled that the Riveros pardon was valid.
"I don't really understand the court's argument for going against its earlier ruling," he said.
The Supreme Court said in a statement that the alleged crimes violated not only Argentina's constitution but also international law and treaties still in effect.
PARLIAMENT CHAOS: Police forcibly removed Brazilian Deputy Glauber Braga after he called the legislation part of a ‘coup offensive’ and occupied the speaker’s chair Brazil’s lower house of Congress early yesterday approved a bill that could slash former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro’s prison sentence for plotting a coup, after efforts by a lawmaker to disrupt the proceedings sparked chaos in parliament. Bolsonaro has been serving a 27-year term since last month after his conviction for a scheme to stop Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva from taking office after the 2022 election. Lawmakers had been discussing a bill that would significantly reduce sentences for several crimes, including attempting a coup d’etat — opening up the prospect that Bolsonaro, 70, could have his sentence cut to
China yesterday held a low-key memorial ceremony for the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) not attending, despite a diplomatic crisis between Beijing and Tokyo over Taiwan. Beijing has raged at Tokyo since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi last month said that a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan could trigger a military response from Japan. China and Japan have long sparred over their painful history. China consistently reminds its people of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, in which it says Japanese troops killed 300,000 people in what was then its capital. A post-World War II Allied tribunal put the death toll
‘UNWAVERING ALLIANCE’: The US Department of State said that China’s actions during military drills with Russia were not conducive to regional peace and stability The US on Tuesday criticized China over alleged radar deployments against Japanese military aircraft during a training exercise last week, while Tokyo and Seoul yesterday scrambled jets after Chinese and Russian military aircraft conducted joint patrols near the two countries. The incidents came after Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi triggered a dispute with Beijing last month with her remarks on how Tokyo might react to a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan. “China’s actions are not conducive to regional peace and stability,” a US Department of State spokesperson said late on Tuesday, referring to the radar incident. “The US-Japan alliance is stronger and more
FALLEN: The nine soldiers who were killed while carrying out combat and engineering tasks in Russia were given the title of Hero of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea North Korean leader Kim Jong-un attended a welcoming ceremony for an army engineering unit that had returned home after carrying out duties in Russia, North Korean state media KCNA reported on Saturday. In a speech carried by KCNA, Kim praised officers and soldiers of the 528th Regiment of Engineers of the Korean People’s Army (KPA) for “heroic” conduct and “mass heroism” in fulfilling orders issued by the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea during a 120-day overseas deployment. Video footage released by North Korea showed uniformed soldiers disembarking from an aircraft, Kim hugging a soldier seated in a wheelchair, and soldiers and officials
RSS