Brazil gives amnesty for dictatorship-era uprising

[struggle4progress]

By Fernando Exman

SAO DOMINGOS DO ARAGUAIA, June 18 (Reuters) - Seeking to redress one of the darkest chapters of its dictatorship era, Brazil on Thursday amnestied dozens of peasants who were jailed or tortured on charges they were linked to a 1970s Communist uprising.

The move is among Brazil's few efforts to address the crimes of the 1964-1985 military rule that even President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva -- himself jailed by the junta for union organizing efforts -- has cautiously avoided.

The justice ministry led an emotional ceremony in this isolated Amazon region that gave amnesty to 44 people who had been persecuted in the brutal suppression of a rebel movement known as Araguaia Guerrillas.

"Today we are making a formal request for forgiveness of the Brazilian state," said Justice Minister Tarso Genro. "This is the affirmation of the dignity and respect with which the state must treat its citizens" ...

http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSN18305459

[Judi Lynn]

1. Wonderful that this has happened under Lula. His own brother was also tortured.

Basicallyportant it is to know most of South America has risen above this primitive stage of filthy abuse, torture, murder of the suspected leftists, speakers for the poor, and only Peru and Colombia wallow in that kind of evil now, since the other countries have shaken off their oppressors and are moving together to build a new, and unified South America, free of outside interference, free of dirty coups and puppets.

Brazil was the first base of operations of US torturer, former State Department employee (and former police chief of Richmond, Indiana). He was a real professional:

Daniel Mitrione was born in Italy on 4th August, 1920. The family emigrated to the United States and in 1945 Mitrione became a police officer in Richmond, Indiana.

Mitrione joined the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in 1959. The following year he was assigned to the State Department's International Cooperation Administration. He was then sent to South America to teach "advanced counterinsurgency techniques." His specialty was in teaching the police how to torture political prisoners without killing them.

According to A.J. Langguth of the New York Times, Mitrione was working for the CIA via the International Development's Office of Public Safety (OPS). We know he was in several foreign countries but between 1960 and 1967 he spent a lot of time in Brazil and was involved in trying to undermine the left-wing president João Goulart, who had taken power after President Juscelino Kubitschek resigned from office in 1961.

João Goulart was a wealthy landowner who was opposed to communism. However, he was in favor of the redistribution of wealth in Brazil. As minister of labour he had increased the minimum wage by 100%. Colonel Vernon Walters, the US military attaché in Brazil, described Goulart as “basically a good man with a guilty conscience for being rich.”

The CIA began to make plans for overthrowing Goulart. A psychological warfare program approved by Henry Kissinger, at the request of telecom giant ITT during his chair of the 40 Committee, sent U.S. PSYOPS disinformation teams to spread fabricated rumors concerning Goulart. John McCloy was asked to set up a channel of communication between the CIA and Jack W. Burford, one of the senior executives of the Hanna Mining Company. In February, 1964, McCloy went to Brazil to hold secret negotiations with Goulart. However, Goulart rejected the deal offered by Hanna Mining.

The following month Lyndon B. Johnson gave the go-ahead for the overthrow of João Goulart (Operation Brother Sam). Colonel Vernon Walters arranged for General Castello Branco to lead the coup. A US naval-carrier task force was ordered to station itself off the Brazilian coast. As it happens, the Brazilian generals did not need the help of the task force. Goulart’s forces were unwilling to defend the democratically elected government and he was forced to go into exile. This action ended democracy in Brazil for more than twenty years. According to David Kaiser (American Tragedy) this event marks the change in the foreign policy developed by John F. Kennedy. Once again, Johnson showed that his policy was to support non-democratic but anti-communist, military dictatorships, and that he had fully abandoned Kennedy’s neutralization policy.

Mitrione remained in Brazil to help the new government deal with the supporters of João Goulart. According to Franco Solinas, Mitrione was also in the Dominican Republic after the 1965 US intervention.

More:http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKmitrione.htm