'Dirty war' witness goes missing (Kissinger supported junta)

[Judi Lynn]

Source: AFP

'Dirty war' witness goes missing

AFP

1 May 2008

AUTHORITIES are "very concerned" over the disappearance of a second witness to abuses carried out by military dictators in Argentina's "dirty war," President Cristina Kirchner said today.

Juan Puthud, 50, a human rights activist who lost an eye after he was kidnapped and tortured at 18 years of age, was last seen yesterday as he was heading to work in Zarate, 90 kilometres north of Buenos Aires, his parents reported to police. He was a witness in ongoing trials against "dirty war" offenders. Another witness and torture victim Jorge Julio Lopez, 77, has been missing since September 18, 2007.

Then president Nestor Kirchner - husband of the current president - blamed Mr Lopez's disappearance last year on criminals "linked to state terrorism", a term used to describe the old military dictatorship that ruled from 1976 to 1983.

Referring to Mr Puthod's disappearance, Cristina Kirchner, in a speech in southern Santa Cruz, said her administration was "very concerned ... because a key witness in human rights trials has disappeared".

Buenos Aires Governor Daniel Scioli said an all out effort was underway to locate Mr Puthod, who was in "fragile health because of his heart and eyes, as a result of the tortures he suffered".

Read more: http://tools.ntnews.com.au/rss_article.php?news_id=2544115

[Judi Lynn]

1. Chronology of events surrounding the June 10, 1976 Kissinger-Guzzetti meeting

Chronology of events surrounding the June 10, 1976 Kissinger-Guzzetti meeting

NOTE: Links below refer to source documents


~snip~
5:27 am, June 10, 1976 - Early this morning, as the Secretary of State prepares to meet Guzzetti in Santiago, Chile, Deputy Secretary of State Charles Robinson sends a cable from Washington informing Secretary Kissinger that, "There is no evidence available suggesting the existence of a conspiracy among the governments of the Southern Cone to track down and prominent asylees resident in those countries."

Nevertheless, the cable continues, "gainst the backdrop of these political murders, the UNHCR representative in Buenos Aires has provided the embassy with disturbing reports about the inhospitable atmosphere for many foreign political exiles living in Argentina… Their total is estimated by UNHCR at 15,000, 10,000 of whom are Chilean and most of the balance Uruguayan. UNHCR estimates that about 1,000 of the Chilean exile and 300-400 of the others could be considered to be in danger from Argentine security forces or rightist extremists, either from Argentina or from their native countries… If the abuses continue or spread without a firm and unequivocal response from the junta, we can expect our efforts to maintain coherent relations with the new government in Argentina to become much more complicated, if not frustrated altogether. Robinson"

8:00 am, June 10, 1976 - Secretary of State Kissinger meets early in the day with the Argentine foreign minister, Admiral Guzzetti, for over one hour. The U.S. participants included Under Secretary for Economic Affairs William Rogers, Under Secretary for International and Security Affairs Carlyle E. Maw, and Luigi R. Einaudi as note taker. On the Argentine side, Guzzetti was accompanied by Ambassador Pereyra and Argentina's Ambassador to the OAS and renowned diplomat Julio Cesar Carasales.

{Note: the Memorandum of Conversation for this meeting was misdated June 6, 1976. The meeting took place during the morning of June 10, 1976, when Kissinger met with several foreign dignitaries attending the OAS General Assembly in Santiago. That afternoon he traveled to Mexico City. See Secretary Kissinger's travels at the State Department historian's web page and the Secretary's calendar of events for that day}

The encounter is cordial and the Secretary never raises the issues of torture and disappearances in Argentina, nor the Americans endangered there. The Memorandum of Conversation shows that after a series of pleasantries, Guzzetti opens the substantial part of the meeting by stating: "Our main problem in Argentina is terrorism. It is the first priority of the current government that took office on March 24."

In closing, Secretary Kissinger says, "If there are things that have to be done, you should do them quickly. But you must get back quickly to normal procedures."

More:
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB133/chron.htm

[L. Coyote]

2. George Bush Sr. May Face Charges: Conspiring to Kidnap and Murder Political Activists

FROM: George Bush Sr. May Face Charges: Conspiring to Kidnap and Murder Political Activists
Dec-12-07 - http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x2459135

Latin Americans are reacting to organized political murder of liberals and social activists.

==================
Plan Condor: Crimes Without Borders in Latin America
Marie Trigona - 12 Dec 2007 - http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/1042/1


Former military dictator Jorge Rafael Videla and 16 other military leaders in Argentina will be prosecuted on charges of conspiring to kidnap and kill political activists in a scheme known as Plan Condor, developed by Henry Kissinger and George Bush Sr., head of the CIA at the time. Dictators in Uruguay, Chile, Paraguay, Brazil, and Argentina killed opponents in the 1970s and 80s under the plan, also known as Operation Condor. The United States and Latin American military governments developed Operation Condor as a a transnational, state-sponsored terrorist coalition among the militaries of South America. In Argentina alone some 30,000 people were disappeared as result, leaving loved ones to seek justice decades later.

Coordinating Terror with U.S. support

Plan Condor began with the U.S. supported military coup against Chile's democratically elected socialist president, Salvador Allende. Allende's government was targeted as a threat to U.S. strategic policy in Latin America early on. White House tapes reveal that on Sept. 14, 1970, then-President Richard Nixon ordered measures to force the Chilean economy into bankruptcy. "The U.S. will not accept a Marxist government just because of the irresponsibility of the Chilean people," declared Henry Kissinger, Nixon´s secretary of State.

Declassified U.S. Department of State documents have provided evidence to Plan Condor's broad scope. The Operation was an ambitious and successful plan to coordinate repression internationally. FBI special agent intelligence liason to the Southern Cone countries Robert Scherrer (now deceased) sent the letter to the U.S. embassy in Argentina on September 28, 1976: "'Operation Condor' is the code name for the collection, exchange and storage of intelligence data concerning so-called 'leftists,' communists and Marxists, which was recently established between cooperating intelligence services in South America in order to eliminate Marxist terrorist activities in the area."

The memo also specified Argentina's enthusiasm over the plan. "Members of 'Operation Condor' showing the most enthusiasm to date have been Argentina, Uruguay and Chile. The latter three countries have engaged in joint operations, primarily in Argentina, against the terrorist target." Operation Condor has been difficult to investigate, due to the selectivity of victims and lack of official declassified documents from the CIA and Department of State. Many of the documents that have been released have been heavily censored. However, following an extensive investigation by Argentine courts beginning in 1999 and the decade long work of human rights groups to collect forensic evidence, 17 military leaders will be put on trial for their participation in the illegal persecution of social activists.

............

[saigon68]

5. George Bush Sr., head of the CIA at the time

The war criminal father of the retarded sock puppet Chimpanzee

[panAmerican]

3. What a shame. Isn't there some sort of witness protection for these people?

[laststeamtrain]

4. K & R n/t

[seafan]

6. Argentine President Reports Dirty War Atrocities Witness Is Missing

Source: AP

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina | A human rights activist who has testified about the treatment of political prisoners during Argentina’s military dictatorship has gone missing, President Cristina Fernandez said today.

“We are concerned,” Fernandez said on television, announcing an intense search for Juan Evaristo Puthod.
He was last seen Tuesday as he left a human rights office dedicated to the memory of thousands of dead and missing victims of the 1976-83 military junta.
The 49-year-old Puthod received anonymous death threats about a year and a half ago, his family said, and fellow activists worry that former police and military officials may want to silence him. He survived captivity in several clandestine detention centers during the military junta’s crackdown, and has become a key witness in several current cases.

.....

Scioli also said that a simple criminal motive hasn’t been ruled out. But Puthod isn’t the first witness to disappear since Argentina renewed its effort to prosecute Dirty War crimes. Construction worker Jorge Julio Lopez hasn’t been seen since September 2006, shortly after his testimony helped convict a former Buenos Aires provincial police chief of dirty war crimes.

Retired army officer Paul Alberto Navone died in an apparent suicide in February after he was called to testify about the fate of twins born to a political prisoner. And in December, former Coast Guard officer Hector Febres was found dead of cyanide poisoning in his military cell, just before a court was to rule on charges he kidnapped and tortured dissidents.

Nearly 13,000 people are officially listed as dead or missing from the seven-year crackdown.

Read more: http://www.theledger.com/article/20080430/BREAKING/862899473

[AlphaCentauri]

7. Oh! boy what a way to rewrite history, killing the witness... sad

[Judi Lynn]

8. Human rights activist is released by captors in Argentina

Human rights activist is released by captors in Argentina

By OSCAR SERRAT, Associated Press Writer
56 minutes ago

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina - A human rights activist whose disappearance prompted an intense government manhunt was released by his captors after being tied up and beaten, he said Thursday.

"They hit me. It was a punch without warning," said Juan Evaristo Puthod, a survivor of clandestine prisons where thousands of political dissidents were tortured and killed during Argentina's 1976-83 military dictatorship.

"It brought back all my memory, of a moment that was very difficult for me, for the whole world. My only fear was that they would kill me," Puthod told Radio 10 as he went from a hospital to a government office to file a police report about being seized.

Puthod, who lost vision in one eye while being tortured years ago, has been an important witness in several human rights cases as Argentina's current government tries to hold former police and military figures accountable for their roles in the "Dirty War."

More:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080501/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/argentina_dirty_war_witness

[Judi Lynn]

11. Argentina: Human Rights Witness Goes Missing And Is Released

Argentina: Human Rights Witness Goes Missing And Is Released
May 10, 2008 By Marie Trigona
Source: Upside Down World

Juan Puthod, a human rights activist was kidnapped in Argentina; his disappearance prompted an intense manhunt and concern from rights groups. This is the third case in as many years of a human rights witness going missing since Argentina opened up Dirty War trials investigating rights violations.

Just hours after his disappearance, the government launched a massive manhunt and human rights groups started a media campaign for information on the whereabouts of the human rights activist. Puthod, who survived the terror inside several clandestine detention centers during the dictatorship was kidnapped and later released. During his 28-hour disappearance his captors blindfolded him, beat him and threatened him to stop participating in the trials against former military officers for crimes they committed.

His kidnapping sent a chilling reminder of the crimes committed during the 1976-1983 military dictatorship. At a press conference last week, Puthod gave details of his kidnapping. "One of the things my kidnappers told me was clear. They said, ‘buddy, you don't understand that we still have your life in our hands. Even after 32 years, your life still belongs to us. We decide when you live and die. You haven't understood the messages we've sent to you."

President Cristina Kirchner and Buenos Aires Governor Daniel Scioli expressed immediate concern over Puthod's disappearance. In a televised speech Kirchner said that the government was "very worried" over Puthod's disappearance. Hundreds of police flooded the Buenos Aires province looking for traces of the victim. Puthod was found just blocks from offices dedicated to investigating crimes committed during the nation's bloody military dictatorship.

Juan Puthod was set to testify in several high profile trials involving military personnel who served during Argentina's so called dirty war. Just days after the March 24, 1976 military coup, Puthod was kidnapped by a commando group. During his detention, he was taken to seven clandestine detention centers. He was tortured so severely, he lost his left eye.

More:
http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/17596

[lonestarnot]

9. Milton Friedman thanks you from his grave for disappearing him.

Are the Chicago cops still running around with assault rifles?

[eppur_se_muova]

10. criminals "linked to state terrorism" -- remember that phrase, it'll come in handy.

Expect to hear it a lot in the coming years, as Bu**sh** goons are brought to justice.