Argentine rights leader finally testifies in stolen babies trial about her daughter’s demise

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press

Argentine rights leader finally testifies in stolen babies trial about her daughter’s demise
By Associated Press, Monday, April 11, 10:51 PM

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — A leader of Argentina’s human rights movement finally got the chance to testify in court about her daughter’s kidnapping and murder.

Former dictators Jorge Videla and Reynaldo Bignone are among eight people accused of organizing the theft of babies from pregnant detainees during the country’s dictatorship in the 1970s. Some 500 women gave birth in captivity before being killed.

Rights activist Estela de Carlotta pushed for this trial for decades. Testifying Monday, she described seeing the body of her daughter, who was slain after giving birth. She said the belly was destroyed by gunfire to hide evidence of the pregnancy.

De Carlotta says she’s never stopped searching for the grandson who would be 33 years old today.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/argentine-rights-leader-finally-testifies-in-stolen-babies-trial-about-her-daughters-demise/2011/04/11/AF1i4SND_story.html

[boppers]

1. I totally want to believe this is over-the-top propaganda.

Letting it "be real" is too horrifying.

[aquart]

2. Haven't been following the story, then?

The grandmothers protested for years. And I think one of the stolen children wrote a book. Nothing like finding out that Mom and Dad murdered Mom and Dad. And there was a movie, too, I think.

[rabs]

6. The Official Story

(from Wiki)

The Official Story (Spanish: La historia oficial) is a 1985 Argentine drama film directed by Luis Puenzo, and written by Puenzo and Aída Bortnik. It stars Norma Aleandro, Héctor Alterio, and Chunchuna Villafañe, among others. In the United Kingdom, it was released as The Official Version.<1><2>

The film is about an upper middle class couple in Buenos Aires with an adopted child. The mother comes to realize that her daughter may be the child of a desaparecido, a victim of the forced disappearances that occurred during Argentina's Dirty War in the 1970s.

Among several other international awards, it won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film at the 58th Academy Awards, being the first Latin American film to achieve it.

------------------

Powerful film.

[BlueMTexpat]

10. Not OTT at all.

It is, unfortunately, the unvarnished truth.

[EFerrari]

3. When Kissinger and d'Estaing kick off, I'm going to buy a red dress.

Hopefully, they won't die on the same day so I can buy two.

[Judi Lynn]

4. More information on this mother of a dictator-murdered young woman:

(AP got her last name wrong: it's de Carlotto, not de Carlotta.)

Wikipedia

http://upload.wikimedia.org.nyud.net:8090/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/43/Estela_de_Carlotto.jpg/240px-Estela_de_Carlotto.jpg

Estela Barnes de Carlotto at the inauguration
of the Mothers and Grandmothers of the
Plaza de Mayo Garden, in Paris.

Enriqueta Estela Barnes was born in Buenos Aires in 1930. Her family relocated to La Plata in 1940, and by 1950, she had become a primary school teacher. She taught in Brandsen, and later in La Plata, where she eventually beacme a school principal. She married Guido Carlotto, a paint store owner, and they had four children.<1>

The Dirty War being waged by the military dictatorship against both violent and non-violent dissidents first struck her family in September 1976, when her son-in-law's sister, María Claudia Falcone, was abducted during the notorious Night of the Pencils assault against left-wing La Plata high schoolers. Her daughter, Laura Estela Carlotto, was a History student at the University of La Plata, and belonged to the Peronist University Youth movement (JUP), as did her siblings, Claudia, and Miguel Guido. The JUP was tied to the Montoneros guerrilla organization, and its members were targeted by both the Argentine Anticommunist Alliance, and the dictatorship that took power in the March 1976 coup. Fearing for her safety, Laura Carlotto left the home she shared with her partner, Carlos, on August 1, 1977. Guido Carlotto was then kidnapped on August 5, and was released on August 25 only after payment of 40 million pesos (US$ 90,000), and after being severely tortured.<2>

Their daughter Laura was in turn abducted on November 16, 1977, with her partner, Carlos. She was three months pregnant at the time, and was taken to "La Cacha," a secret detention center in La Plata. The Carlottos were friends of Marta Bignone, whose brother, General Reynaldo Bignone, directed the Campo de Mayo training base (he would be selected President of Argentina by the dictatorship in 1982). Bignone refused to cooperate with the grieving family, however.<2>

Lauura Carlotto gave birth at the military hospital in Buenos Aires on June 26, 1978, and on August 25, subordinates of General Guillermo Suárez Mason (who as head of the Argentine Army First Section oversaw La Cacha) turned over her corpse to the Carlottos with her face and abdominal area mutilated. One of only a small number of missing dead returned to their families, she was buried on August 27 in La Plata.<1>

More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estela_Barnes_de_Carlotto

[Judi Lynn]

5. They would have had more witnesses during these Dirty War trials,but some of them have been murdered

The witness Estela de Carlotto is mentioned in the following article concening one of those witnesses who suddenly disappeared, like so many people the fascist dictatorship hated:

September 28, 2006

'Dirty War' torture witness goes missing

Pensioner who gave evidence against convicted Argentine police chief may have been killedBy Tom Hennigan A SEARCH is under way in Argentina for a pensioner who has disappeared after giving evidence that led to the conviction of one of the country’s feared police chiefs for human rights abuses carried out during the military dictatorship in the 1970s and 1980s.

Relatives of Jorge Julio López, 77, fear that he was seized from his home in La Plata by current or former police officers seeking to intimidate witnesses in future trials. Señor López was a key witness in the trial of Miguel Etchecolatz, a former police commissioner sentenced last Tuesday to life in prison for his role in human rights abuses carried out during military rule.

Señor López told the court that Etchecolatz tortured him in October 1976 and had executed a fellow prisoner. The trial was one of the first in Argentina since amnesty laws passed under pressure from the military in the 1980s were scrapped last year.

~snip~
Survivors of Argentina’s torture centres and human rights campaigners have long been subjected to threats. But Estela de Carlotto, the president of the Grandmother of the Plaza de Mayo, a group that works for the return of babies kidnapped and secretly adopted by the military, vowed that the disappearance of Señor López “will not paralyse the search for truth and justice”.

More:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article652322.ece

[mackerel]

7. Where has Boppers been all these years?

The amazing part is this woman was finally able to testify. Btw this was happening all over South America as the governments were so afraid of socialism. My parents fled Colombia to protect us from the fates that happened to so many of their friends in Peru, Chile and Argentina.

[EFerrari]

8. Operation Condor

Operation Condor (Spanish: Operación Cóndor, also known as Plan Cóndor, Portuguese: Operação Condor), was a campaign of political repression involving assassination and intelligence operations officially implemented in 1975 by the right-wing dictatorships of the Southern Cone of South America. The program aimed to eradicate alleged socialist and communist influence and ideas and to control active or potential opposition movements against the participating governments.<1> Due to its clandestine nature, the precise number of deaths directly attributable to Operation Condor is highly disputed. It is estimated that a minimum of 60,000 deaths can be attributed to Condor,<2> possibly more.<3><4><5> Condor's key members were the governments in Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia and Brazil. The United States participated in a supervisory capacity, with Ecuador and Peru joining later in more peripheral roles.<6>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Condor

[formercia]

9. "The United States participated in a supervisory capacity"

That about says it.

[EFerrari]

11. Yesterday someone accused me of being paranoid

about our government's intentions in South America.

When you really know the history, is that even possible?

When Daniel Ortega came out in support of Gaddafi, it looked so strange, siding with someone murdering his own people. Now, after watching Libya for a couple of weeks, I'm thinking Ortega saw a rerun unfolding.

[formercia]

12. AFRICOM

The command structure is already in place.

:hi:

Paranoid? :rofl: Not by a long shot.