Argentine pilots charged over 'death flights'

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Reuters

Friday June 3, 2011
Argentine pilots charged over 'death flights'
By Claudia Gaillard

BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - Three Argentine pilots were charged on Thursday over dictatorship-era "death flights," when drugged political prisoners were thrown from military planes into the River Plate, court sources said.

The indictment was ordered as part of an investigation into crimes committed at the infamous ESMA Naval Mechanics School during the 1976-1983 "Dirty War," during which as many as 30,000 people were kidnapped and killed.

"In the ESMA, they gave them a weak tranquilizer and then when they got into the plane, they took off their clothes, took off the handcuffs, and then gave them the final injection. They threw them out sleeping and alive," prosecution lawyer Horacio Mendez Carreras told Reuters Television.

About 5,000 suspected leftist dissidents were held at the clandestine detention center. Many died during the secret death flights and few bodies were recovered.

Read more: http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2011/6/3/worldupdates/2011-06-03T031445Z_01_NOOTR_RTRMDNC_0_-574650-1&sec=Worldupdates

[sabrina 1]

1. Horrible! I cannot understand how people can commit these

horrific acts against other human beings. I wonder what kind of people they are.

I am so glad that the victims families and the country are finally getting some justice. It took a long, long time.

Maybe one day it will happen here too.

[Kolesar]

2. Nuns

Was that the same Argentine government that "took" the Falkland Islands from Britain?

[dipsydoodle]

3. Falklands War was 1982

http://www.falklands.info/history/82timeline.html

[Kolesar]

4. ...Crimes committed at the infamous ESMA Naval Mechanics School during the 1976-1983 "Dirty War,"

So we have a match.

I doubt if my coworkers arrive at the office with creepy stories like this on their minds.

[dipsydoodle]

5. Its a horrible thought - being dropped live from a 'coptor.

Was part of Operation Condor and other countries may have done the same too.

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

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

[Stella_Artois]

8. Yes

Yet some people on DU are utterly indignant that the Falkland Islanders objected to their "liberation"

[SoapBox]

6. Makes me sick.

What the hell is wrong with humanity...so full of hate and anger...and they just can't wait to kill, kill, kill.

[alp227]

7. meanwhile American companies get away with secret flights to Gitmo n/t