Reply #25: Moon and the "Archives of terror" in Paraguay [View All]

[Cell Whitman]

thanks again octafish for your good work. here's a little something to add to your files...


http://ipsnews.net/africa/print.asp?idnews=30309

SOUTH AMERICA:
'Archives of Terror' Yield New Horrors

Darío Montero

The so-called "archives of terror" discovered by a human rights lawyer in Paraguay over a decade ago continue to yield new information on the cooperation between the de facto regimes that ruled much of South America in the 1970s and 1980s.

MONTEVIDEO, Sep 16 (IPS) - Paraguayan activist and lawyer Martín Almada visited Uruguay this week to hand over documents recently found in the archives of terror, which indicate that the number of Uruguayans who were detained in Paraguay during the dictatorial regimes was much greater than human rights groups had previously realised.

In December 1992, Almada, who was held as a political prisoner and tortured in his country in the 1970s, came across a room full of official records in a police station near the Paraguayan capital.

The hundreds of thousands of documents that he basically discovered by accident pertain to the torture and forced disappearances carried out by the dictatorship of Gen. Alfredo Stroessner (1954-1989) in Paraguay.

But the archives of terror are especially important because they contain secret documents shedding light on Operation Condor, a coordinated plan among the military governments that ruled Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay in the 1970s and 1980s, aimed at tracking down, capturing and eliminating left-wing opponents. ...

Although there is abundant information on flights carrying political prisoners between Argentina and Uruguay, until now activists did not have official records showing that such flights existed between Uruguay and Paraguay.

"I also gave the Uruguayan Congress a copy of the document that records the birth of Operation Condor (in late 1975 in Chile) and outlines the mechanisms by which it functioned, as well as a list of Uruguayan officers who belonged to the so-called Anti-Communist League in 1977, which formed the basis of that repressive plan," said Almada.

"These documents also indicate that Korean Reverend Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church had links" to Operation Condor as well, he added.

Almada said that in September 1977, after Jimmy Carter became president of the United States, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) withdrew its support from Operation Condor.

Documents declassified in recent years in Washington, D.C. clearly demonstrate that Operation Condor was backed by the United States since its creation at the initiative of the Chilean dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990).

After September 1977, "ties began to appear between Moon's sect and the local and Latin American Anti-Communist League. A finance company, Urundel, was even set up in Paraguay to serve as a bank for the repressive operations in that country," said Almada.

He added that Operation Condor, which basically kept its "administrative headquarters" in Paraguay, was conceived of and led by the armed forces in the region, which often made use of the police to help with the "dirty work". Industrialists were also accomplices in the case of Paraguay, he noted.

this ones link is dead but here is what it said...

Paraguay overshadowed still by clouds of dictatorship
Museum in South American country to display records of torture, terror

Taiwan News, Staff Reporter
2006-05-18 Page 6
By Dennis Engbarth

...
However, in the wake of the adoption of a human rights policy by U.S. President Jimmy Carter during his term from 1976 to 1980, support for Operation Condor was cut off by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency in 1977.

Almada claimed that Stroessner then relied primarily for guidance and assistance in Operation Condor activities on the Unification Church of the South Korean Sun Myung Moon sect under the cover of the World Anti-Communist League and the Pacific Anti-Communist League, both of which were backed by the KMT regime and headquartered in Taipei.

Moonies try to claim Moon stopped support of the torturing dictators in the 70s, another deception fort he pile.

quoting: page 254-5 "Inside the League" – Scott Anderson and Jon Lee Anderson 1986

General Alfredo Stroessner, the dictator of Paraguay, sent a telegram thanking the League for 'DEFENDING THE WOLRD FROM THE Marxist tyranny," then went on to boast breathlessly of his own contributions to the cause. …

The crowning endorsement, however, had to be that of President Roald Reagan.

It is an honor to send warm greetings to al l those gathered for the 17th Annual Conference of the World Anti-Communist League in San Diego.

The World Anti-Communist League has long played a leadership role in drawing attention to the gallant struggle now being waged by the true freedom fighters of our day. Nancy and I send our best wishes for every future success. …

Another element objectionable to some mainstream conservatives, the Unification Church, had not been purged in San Diego. In fact, its presence had grown. Many of the American observers to the conference were involved with Reverend Sun Myung Moon through any one of his myriad front groups. Among these were Ray Cline, Director of the United States Global Security Council, and Roger Fontaine, a former National Security Council official and currently a reporter for the Moon-owned Washington Times. The Reverend Moon may have called the League a "fascist" organization in 1975, but he still wanted to be part of it in 1984. ("Inside the League" – Scott Anderson and Jon Lee Anderson 1986)