Amnesty International published today its annual report for 2013, in which it highlights the main issues affecting human rights globally and in Latin America. The 2013 report focused much of its attention on the plight of migrants and refugees, and in this context the organisation urged the US government to reconsider its immigration laws as hundreds of Latin American citizens risk their lives every year in illegal border crossings.

The group estimates that 200 people die every year through crossing the 3,169-km US-Mexico border, and stressed that the US government should be taking steps to ensure safer migrant passages.

Amnesty has said that many migrants seeking to escape their home countries fall victim to human trafficking and domestic violence by smugglers in charge of leading the border crossings. Border crossers, it said, continue to face abduction, murder and are forced into the recruitment of criminal gangs, with women and children being at particular risk.

Migrants most commonly die of exposure or dehydration in the deserts as they risk temperatures of more than 40 degrees to walk the 80 km route in which they hope to be picked up by smugglers further north of the crossing. Many also drown in the rivers as they seek to  avoid security checkpoints along the border.

According to Amnesty International, 85% of those that have died come from Mexico, and the remaining 15% were from Guatemala and El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica, and Brazil.

The group’s 2013 report also focused on South America’s development in terms of attaining justice for human rights violations committed by military dictatorships in the past, highlighting that key prosecutions in 2012 in countries including Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Guatemala, and Uruguay “marked further important advances in the quest for justice”.

However, the group believes that there is still a way to go before achieving any meaningful access to justice. ”In Haiti proceedings against former president Jean-Claude Duvalier remained stalled in the courts,” the report cited as an example.

The report also addressed issues of violence against women and reported that for millions of women in South America, their rights to make informed decisions regarding their sexual health are in some cases, non-existant still.

“In countries such as Chile, El Salvador, Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic, women and girls pregnant as a result of rape or for whom continued pregnancy posed a threat to health or life, continued to be denied access to safe, legal abortions. The impact of this denial of human rights was particularly acute for young girls and women from disadvantaged groups,” Amnesty International said.

The report also highlighted the difficult conditions under which journalists have to work in certain countries, pointing out that “some faced direct repression from the government, while in other countries they were targeted by armed gangs and criminal networks.”

In a landmark human rights trial that began on 19th March, former military dictator José Efraín Ríos Montt is facing charges of genocide and crimes against humanity in Guatemala. Ríos Montt is implicated for overseeing the majority of atrocities committed during the country’s 36-year civil war, during which he served as de facto president for a 17-month period after gaining power through a military coup in 1982.

The task of bringing Ríos Montt’s case to the justice system for mass crimes committed three decades ago has been hindered by countless setbacks -habitual suspensions due to constitutional and appellate court deliberations, death threats (and actual attacks) against those who uncovered evidence, an endless tug-of-war over the legitimacy and applicability of a void amnesty law from the 1980s, complications after evidence suggested links with the current Guatemalan president, and, as of late, defence complaints regarding evidence validity and representation rights.

However, as the bureaucratic hindrances fade away and real hearings begin, Ríos Montt’s trial marks the first time that a former head of state has ever been tried for genocide or crimes against humanity in a domestic court, a monumental move on the part of Guatemalan justice.

Background

Between 1960 and 1996 Guatemalan government troops clashed with guerrilla forces and targeted suspected sympathisers with the leftist-rebel cause: mainly indigenous groups of Mayan descent. After the war, national peace and reconciliation

commissions and the UN reported that about 200,000 people had died or disappeared throughout the conflict and thousands of others were systematically raped and tortured in governmental efforts to eradicate ‘subversion’.

A report from Guatemala’s Commission For Historical Clarification (CEH) indicates that nearly half of all human rights violations that occurred during the country’s civil war happened under Ríos Montt’s rule.

Ríos Montt’s plan to root out opposition, paralleled by other dictatorships of the era, was based on the idea that temporary dictatorial rule was the only way to reinstate order and control in a society that had been infiltrated by leftist ideologies and subsequently spiralled into chaos -whatever the initial costs may be. In this way, Ríos Montt developed his National Plan of Security and Development, a ‘scorched earth’ policy launched in 1982 that called for and justified persecution of suspected subversives to the point that they were not just pacified, but disappeared completely.

“There is no possible argument that recognises the ‘necessity’ of this horror,” says Latin American History professor Hugo Pomposo, of the University of Belgrano in Buenos Aires, who explains that this line of thought for justifying crimes and human rights abuses committed for historical ‘state interests’ is inexcusable, no matter how many years later.

Supporters of the genocide trial hope that with the initiation of case hearings those responsible for crimes committed in Guatemala in the name of ‘order and progress’ will be held accountable.

The Charges

Ríos Montt currently faces two separate genocide charges: the slaughter of 1,771 members of the Ixil population in Quiche between March 1982 and August 1983 and the displacement of nearly 30,000 others from the area, and an instance in Dos Erres in December 1982 in which 201 people were massacred. Both genocide charges also include allegations of ordered sexual violence and torture.

The ongoing trial solely regards the first set of charges, in which Ríos Montt is accused of approving and overseeing the completion of these acts and José Mauricio Rodriguez Sánchez, who served as chief of military intelligence under Ríos Montt, allegedly developed and implemented concrete military strategies to bring Ríos Montt’s vision to fruition -including hundreds of pages of documents that detailed secret killing missions.

High ranking military officers that served under Rodríguez Sánchez and Ríos Montt, like Oscar Mejia Victores and Héctor López Fuentes, are also implicated in the genocide cases, although charges have been suspended due to the health condition of the elderly defendants.

According to reports, the second genocide charge related to the Dos Erres is to be addressed in a later case.

The defence first aimed to block the genocide case from reaching the justice system altogether by using threats against those who brought about complaints, citing an outdated amnesty law, and taking advantage of Ríos Montt’s congressional immunity until last year.

After the case was finally brought to court, Ríos Montt’s lawyers have consistently asserted his innocence, as he never directly commanded soldiers to commit the crimes and never himself participated in the violence.

Case History

The Ríos Montt trial has a long and convoluted history outside of the hard to decipher crimes it seeks to confront.

A 1986 decree passed by Mejia Victores (who was president at the time and had served under Ríos Montt as defence minister, later overthrowing him in a coup) conveniently granted universal amnesty for those suspected of human rights violations and general war crimes between 1982 and 1986.

Congress later deemed this move void in the 1996 National Reconciliation Laws, lifting the amnesty for perpetrators of crimes considered to be international human rights abuses. One year later, Congressional Decree 133-97 repealed all amnesty laws before 1996 (ie., Mejia Victores’ 1986 decree).

This amnesty law has been the key defence argument protecting Ríos Montt and Sánchez (as was Ríos Montt’s recently terminated protection under congressional immunity) and Guatemala’s Constitutional Court is still reviewing its applicability in the current trials.

After a group of Guatemalans brought the case to a court in Spain with international jurisdiction and no real developments resulted, in 2001 the Justice and Reconciliation Association joined with other Guatemalan members of civil society to file an official complaint with state authorities for investigations into the most heinous crimes of the 1980s. With this step, historical records started opening up to the public and charges of genocide and crimes against humanity developed for domestic hearings. Six years later, in 2007, Guatemala and the UN established an international body to oversee investigations and move prosecutions forward.

In 2009, nearly 50 years after the start of Guatemala’s civil war, trials began. Those in question were essentially the people on the ground while the human rights abuses were being committed: police officers, government soldiers, and paramilitary troops. Convictions were made in these initial proceedings, although the highest-ranking official prosecuted was a former police chief.

In a strange turn of events in 2011, Mejia Victores brought himself forward for investigations. However, months later his case was called off due to his deteriorating health. Similarly, Sánchez was arrested in that year pending genocide charges but was moved to a military hospital to await hearings.

Finally, on 26th January last year, a federal judge formally accused Ríos Montt of genocide and crimes against humanity, as the ex-dictator ended his congressional term and procedural immunity along with it.

Current Proceedings

In recent months, the genocide case has only become more complicated. On 28th January presiding Judge Miguel Angel Galvez declared that enough evidence had been presented for the trial of Ríos Montt and Sánchez to begin. A three-judge panel was set up to hear the case and 19th March chosen as the date for hearings to commence.

In February, Judge Galvez called for testimonials and evidence related to the case to be brought forward. He also opened previously classified state documents for investigation. During this time an article was added to the Guatemalan Criminal Procedural Code that allows for pertinent new evidence to be considered, even if presented after the beginning of the hearings, and allows for temporary trial suspensions under such circumstances to review new evidence.

In the weeks leading up to the trial, the state’s Constitutional Court released a mixed decision concerning the 1986 amnesty law: it rejected the defendants’ claims that the law could call off the prosecution completely but continued considering a separate assertion that the law be taken into account in the current proceedings.

On 19th March the trial began, and within the first several hours Ríos Montt’s attorney Francisco Garcí was expelled from the courtroom after the judicial panel interpreted his request for more time to study trial records as an unnecessary and strategic move to postpone the trial even further.  Ríos Montt went on to assert that in this way his rights to representation were denied from day one of the proceedings.

Two weeks later, the Constitutional Court altered the protocol related to the presentation of evidence, rejecting Judge Galvez’s habit of deeming defence evidence useless or excessive. On 17th April the Supreme Court called on the appellate court to clarify the 1986 amnesty law issue. The next day, Judge Carol Patricia Flores (who had initially charged Ríos Montt with genocide, was later removed via recusal and only recently reinstated) annulled the trial until a decision was made.

This decision to call off the trial, which was later reversed, is the most important recent development in the case and raised international outcry. According to news agency Democracy Now! the decision to suspend the trial was two-sided, as it apparently also coincided with political interests of the current government.

Investigative journalist Allan Narin was set to testify as a ‘qualified witness’ in front of the judicial panel in the coming days, with first-hand evidence he gathered during the civil war years that reportedly implicated the current Guatemalan president, General (Ret.) Otto Pérez Molina, when authorities froze the case. Pérez Molina served as a military officer under Ríos Montt and represented the armed forces in the peace negotiations of the 1990s.

During the critical days when the international community was unsure of whether the trial would carry on at all, Sebastián Elgueta, researcher on Guatemala at Amnesty International said: “The consequences of this decision may set back the clock in Guatemala to a time when impunity was the norm for those types of crimes.”

The trial court, however, met briefly following the Flores move and decided that she had no authority to annul the trial. It did, however, decide to freeze hearings pending Constitutional Court approval, which came on 22nd April.

On the last day in April the court convened after a recess and Ríos Montt appeared before the judges with new representation, although the case was again halted after only two days so Sánchez’s public defender (also new to the trials) could prepare.

In the last few days, Guatemala’s Constitutional Court responded to several defence appeals and is still considering the amnesty question. On 2nd and 3rd May it announced that case judges could not decide which kinds of evidence to recognise and rejected Ríos Montt’s claims that he was denied proper representation at the start of the hearings.

The court was originally set to reopen proceedings yesterday. However, the Court of Appeals suspended hearings in an announcement late Monday night after it reviewed Ríos Montt’s complaints over his allegedly compromised representation and reinstated defence attorney Fracisco García. After receiving the news of García’s reinstallation, the court was allotted 24 hours to make a decision on how to proceed with the case. It should announce a plan for future proceedings today.

For supporters of the trial, it is hoped that proceedings will restart with momentum and that the court will make some ground before more complications spring up.

Implications

Ríos Montt’s trial has various potential implications. It represents a monumental step in the search for justice for the people of Guatemala and introduces what could be a groundbreaking initiative for tackling perpetrators of mass crimes on a national level.

According to Pomposo, “the case is a very significant advance against the impunity for the military dictators in all of Latin America, and of course also for Guatemala, which has suffered one of the most brutal military dictatorships of the ’70s and ’80s.”

Assuming that the trial is properly carried out to completion, the verdicts will undoubtedly carry historical significance and could set a precedent for future genocide cases. Furthermore, contextualised in a region where other figures like Ríos Montt appeared during the years of Cold War terror -many like Ríos Montt allegedly backed by the CIA and the School of the Americas- the Guatemalan case could also have international implications.

Pomposo adds that “it is undoubtedly true” that the Guatemala case, particularly with the charge of a former head of state with genocide, could be held as precedent in other Latin American countries where there exist historical “violations of human rights instrumented by innumerable military interventions that have come about by coup d’états often brought about in cooperation with the US.”

Although individuals responsible for war crimes and genocide are nearly impossible to pinpoint, and undoubtedly involve several if not thousands of accomplices, the Guatemala case marks one step forward in bringing about justice for victims of these atrocious crimes committed decades ago. The coming hearings (and the obstacles they may face) will reveal whether or not trying Ríos Montt and Sánchez for genocide is the way justice will be served.

Update: Ríos Montt was found guilty of genocide on 10th May, whilst Rodríguez Sánchez was acquitted. More information here.

 

For information about the case documented through personal stories, check out the ‘Granito: How to Nail a Dictator’ videos: http://granitofilm.com/granito/antonio

The views expressed in this article belong to the authors and do not necessarily represent those of The Argentina Independent.

During my first trip to the country in 2007, one interviewee wryly joked that justice in Uruguay had two speeds: “slow, and very slow.” Since then, however, things have changed; so much so, that in the first four months of 2013 the flurry of events and developments regarding prosecutions for the crimes of the dictatorship has, at times, been difficult to keep up with.

In our earlier pieces on the transfer of judge Mariana Mota and the sentence of the Supreme Court of Justice in February and March this year, we voiced several concerns including possible delays to the numerous human rights cases that Judge Mota was in charge of, as well as the Supreme Court’s blatant disregard for international human rights law provisions. A further fear was that the traditionally conservative Uruguayan judiciary would adhere to these signals from the Supreme Court and passively resign itself to closing down all investigations and prosecutions into past human rights violations. Indeed, during the 1980s and 1990s, only a handful of judges and prosecutors dared to defy the structure of impunity embodied in the Ley de Caducidad amnesty law. Those who did paid a high personal and professional price, as in the cases of Alberto Reyes and Alejando Recarey, who were consequently transferred to different jurisdictions in 1997 and 2003 respectively.

History Repeating Itself?

The beginning of 2013 had begun to feel like a serious bout of déjà vu. Out of the fifteen unconstitutionality appeals lodged with the Supreme Court’s regarding law 18.831, the tribunal has already deliberated on eight, judging in all but one in favour of the crimes being subjected to statutes of limitations and therefore being shelved invoking the principle of non-retroactivity of criminal law. Supreme Court Judge Jorge Ruibal Pino, furthermore, stated in early April that none of the cases of past human rights violations would prosper and that they would face “a wall” in the Supreme Court. In addition, criminal judge Roberto Timbal managed to archive a 1978 political murder by applying the Supreme Court’s jurisprudence, which deemed it not a crime against humanity but a common crime. Judge Fanny Canessa likewise shelved another case of past human rights violations a few days later siding with the Supreme Court’s stance. All these developments were met with pithy mocking by one lawyer who, playing with the country’s official name – Oriental Republic of Uruguay – called it la República Impune del Uruguay (the Unpunished Republic of Uruguay), highlighting once again the consolidation of impunity for past atrocities.

Recent developments in the country were unsurprisingly met by a wave of international condemnations, including by Amnesty International, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Center for Justice and International Law, and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. More recently, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights also unequivocally rejected the Supreme Court’s argument regarding the statute of limitations and went as far as saying that it constituted an obstacle to the full compliance with the 2011 verdict of the Inter-American Court in the Gelman vs. Uruguay case.

Domestic Challenges to Impunity

While international criticism of these developments is foreseeable, there are signs of apparent winds of change blowing from within the judiciary itself. In a significant twist in the fight against impunity in Uruguay, judges and prosecutors have begun to take a stand against the closure of investigations into the dictatorship’s crimes, throwing down the gauntlet the authority of the Supreme Court.

On the very same day the Supreme Court released its first sentence on the statutory limitations (February 22, 2013), the Appeals Court No. 1 unanimously argued that investigations into the crimes committed during the dictatorship should continue so that those crimes would not go unpunished; further, in a second sentence, the same tribunal contended that, the jurisprudence from the Supreme Court notwithstanding, Uruguay was obliged to prosecute and punish such atrocities in compliance with the Gelman verdict.

More recently, in the aftermath of Ruibal Pino’s combative statements, five criminal public prosecutors presented an appeal against four of the five Supreme Court judges calling for them to be put aside in future sentences relating to the crimes of the dictatorship. The prosecutors maintained that Ruibal Pino had “pre-judged” in the cases – violating the principle that bodies can review their decisions and listen to other arguments – and as such, he and the other three judges should no longer adjudicate on them. Such a direct challenge against the Supreme Court is an unprecedented step and it is unclear what will happen next; normally, judges from the Appeals Court are selected to temporarily substitute Supreme Court judges. However, this is the first time that four out of five judges are being called upon to recuse themselves from considering cases.

Over the past couple of days, two criminal court judges have also gone against the Supreme Court. Judge Beatriz Larrieu – who has taken over Mota’s tribunal – rejected the petition to close down the investigation into the death and torture of Norma Cedrés that occurred between 1975 and 1978. In her resolution, Larrieu had a two-fold argument. First, she claimed that those crimes amounted to crimes against humanity and were therefore not subject to statutes of limitations; second, the judge argued that the Ley de Caducidad had blocked all investigations into human rights crimes since 1986 and therefore the statutory limitation should only begin to be counted from 2009, when the law was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. Just a few days later, judge Juan Carlos Fernández Lecchini – without deeming it necessary to deliberate on the issue of crimes against humanity – considered that the 1977 assassination of Julio Castro by the dictatorship had not expired given that between 1985 and 2005 the state had been unable to prosecute the crimes of the dictatorship due to the application of the Ley de Caducidad.

While it is still too early to say whether these attempts will be enough to guarantee that past crimes will not go unpunished, it is nonetheless important to recognise the significance of these developments, which suggest that things are changing in Uruguay. Following in the steps of judges Mota, Reyes, Recarey – as well as those of other individuals such as former prosecutor Mirtha Guianze and human rights lawyer Pablo Chargoñia who led landmark prosecutions such as that into the disappearance of Elena Quinteros in 2002 and 2003 – judges and prosecutors in Uruguay are no longer willing to silently tolerate impunity and are ready to fight for justice.

Dr Francesca Lessa is a specialist in issues of justice and human rights in Uruguay based at the Latin American Centre and St. Anne’s College, University of Oxford.

Pierre-Louis Le Goff is a research assistant at the Latin American Centre, University of Oxford, and a member of the committee for Crimes Against Humanity at the Permanent Assembly for Human Rights (APDH), Buenos Aires, Argentina.

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), an autonomous organ of the Organisation of American States (OAS), held a hearing on the “general situation of human rights in Paraguay” in Washington, US, on Friday and various Paraguayan organisations brought grievances to address.

Among the most important issues presented were the Curuguaty Massacre of last June and the so-called ‘parliamentary coup’ against Fernando Lugo last year. The organisations demanded that the commission urge Paraguayan state investigation into the allegations of torture in the Curuguaty incident.

They also asked for clarification regarding the procedure for the seizure of lands belonging to the Cuyabia indigenous community. The same request was made on the continuous felling of the Ayoreo Totobiegosode Natural and Cultural Heritage Site.

The organisations alerted the Commission to the recent murders of three farming leaders. They also asked them to help get the threats against human rights advocates in the country under control.

The Commission received the complaints of the Human Rights Coordination of Paraguay, the Latin American and Caribbean Committee for the Defence of Women’s Rights, the Peace and Justice Coordination of Paraguay, and Rural and Indigenous Women Workers of Paraguay, among others.

Story courtesy of Agencia Púlsar, the AMARC-ALC news agency.

The views expressed in this article belong to the authors and do not necessarily represent those of The Argentina Independent.

A couple of weeks ago, we argued in an earlier piece that by transferring Judge Mariana Mota, Uruguay’s Supreme Court of Justice (SCJ) had shown itself determined to derail efforts to deliver justice for the military’s crimes, despite the revocation of a 25-year-old amnesty law in October 2011.

On 22nd February a sentence by the same court regrettably proved our assertion correct. The ruling judged as unconstitutional articles two and three of Law 18,831 – a bill enacted by the Uruguayan Parliament which, for the first time since 1986, allowed the judiciary to freely investigate the widespread and systematic human rights abuses committed by the dictatorship between 1973 and 1985.

With the recent sentence, the SCJ has unmistakably aligned itself with the closing down of all investigations into the atrocities of the dictatorship and, coupled with Mota’s transfer to a civil tribunal, it once again sends a strong signal in favour of impunity.

The Court’s verdict centred on its qualification of the abuses of the dictatorship as constituting ‘common crimes’ as typified under domestic criminal law and not amounting to crimes against humanity, as stipulated by Law 18,831 and numerous provisions in international human rights treaties voluntarily ratified by Uruguay. Due to the labelling as common crimes, the atrocities committed between 1973 and 1985 are again susceptible to the application of statutes of limitations, establishing a cut-off point of 26 years and 8 months by which crimes
could be investigated and brought to trial, that is to say before 1st November 2011. The sentence also invoked the principle of non-retroactivity of criminal law, which guarantees that a person cannot be accused of a crime that was not considered as such when the event took place.

Undeniably, the decision constitutes a significant step back in the struggle for truth and justice, showing a blatant disregard for international legal jurisprudence concerning human rights violations and international treaties to which Uruguay is party.

But beyond this, it represents an unequivocal statement by the Court regarding how it judges the dictatorship’s crimes. At worst, one could argue that it condones such crimes; at best, it serves to downplay their seriousness.

In order to put the decision into perspective, it is useful to reflect on exactly what the SCJ considers ‘common crimes’. First, it does not view as a crime against humanity prolonged torture, which during the dictatorship often involved the electrocution of various parts of the body (including testicles) as well as
sexual violence often in the presence of spouses or partners. Second, it does not consider a crime against humanity the forced disappearance of its own citizens, whose remains – in an unsuccessful attempt to deny not only the victims’ deaths but also their lives – were purposely hidden in unmarked graves or incinerated, never to be found by their families. Nor does the SCJ regard as a crime against humanity prolonged imprisonment, often in solitary confinement for years on end without charge or trial.

Uruguay’s highest legal body does not judge such abuses, committed in a systematic plan to destroy the country’s social fabric, as crimes that will have a profound and lasting effect on the whole of society. Rather, like other ‘common crimes,’ they should be swept under the carpet after a certain amount of time has
elapsed, to be officially forgotten.

The trouble is, as has been evidenced throughout Latin America’s recent history, such crimes are not easily forgotten. Just as the Court’s sentence minimises the abhorrent brutality of the dictatorship’s crimes, it simultaneously negates the legitimacy of victims’ demands for truth and justice. The Court makes no mention of well-recognised guarantees enshrined in international law, such as family members’ right to information about the fate and whereabouts of their loved ones; the right to legal redress and access to justice; and the right to reparations for their suffering.

It is extremely regrettable that the SCJ has delivered such a verdict just months after the infamous Ley de Caducidad was finally repealed. Worse still is the Court’s complete disregard for international human rights provisions since Nuremberg and in particular the condemnation Uruguay received just two years ago from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights regarding the regime’s crimes.

The SCJ is sending a strong message as to its view of the country’s past, its present, and the country’s future. If it continues down this path, Uruguay will find itself on the wrong side of history.

Pierre-Louis Le Goff is a research assistant at the Latin American Centre, University of Oxford, and a member of the committee for Crimes Against Humanity at the Permanent Assembly for Human Rights (APDH), Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Dr Francesca Lessa is a specialist in issues of justice and human rights in Uruguay based at the Latin American Centre and St. Anne’s College, University of Oxford.

Representatives from 18 countries across Central and South America met at the American Convention on Human Rights in Guayaquil, Ecuador yesterday in a meeting that was described as “historic”.

Eight reforms were agreed upon by the country representatives to improve the functioning of the Inter-American System for Human Rights, which incorporates the Inter-American Commission and Court for Human Rights (CIDH and IACHR).

The CIDH will be entrusted to strengthen the promotion of human rights through national systems. As part of this, member states will be asked to contribute financially to the estimated US$15m annual payment required to implement the reforms.

Talking about these changes Ecuador’s president, Rafael Correa said that “it is imperative to transform it.” “Rest assured that we will strive to genuinely protect the rights of the people in the Americas, without succumbing to interests or pressures of any kind. It has been a meeting of great importance for the future and strengthening of the Inter-American human rights system,” he added.

The meeting was attended by representatives from Argentina, Barbados, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Dominican Republic, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay and Venezuela.

Uruguay has won international plaudits of late and gained the image as a bastion of progressivism in the Americas. Last year abortion was legalised, making it only the second country to do so; proposed legislation to legalise marijuana places it at the vanguard of the so-called war on drugs; and then there is President José ‘Pepe’ Mujica, whose folksy, down-to-earth form of leadership and position as the ‘world’s poorest president’ places him as a refreshing contrast to the vast majority of the globe’s leaders. As such, Uruguay is becoming again ‘the Switzerland of Latin America’ as it was once known.

This positive image took a significant step backwards on Wednesday 13th February 2013, however, when, without explanation, the country’s Supreme Court of Justice decided to transfer Judge Mariana Mota from her criminal jurisdiction (tribunal 7 in Montevideo) to a new position as judge of civil tribunal 1 in Montevideo. For the past several years, Mota has been at the forefront of investigations into the vast human rights violations, including executions, torture, disappearances, and prolonged imprisonment, committed by the military dictatorship which ruled from 1973 to 1985.  Until a few days ago, she had been in charge of more than 50 cases of the dictatorship’s crimes. In February 2010 it was Mota who, in a historic verdict in Latin America, sentenced former dictator Juan María Bordaberry to 30 years in prison for his part in leading the 1973 coup d’état.

Throughout Uruguay, Mota is well respected, and considered to be well trained, competent, qualified, professional, and responsible. In the aftermath of her transfer, several political leaders expressed their indignation and surprise. Uruguay’s Foreign Minister Luis Almagro for instance labelled Mota an “extraordinary judge” and declared that Uruguay is likely to lose its international standing as a result of this event. Deputy Felipe Michelini expressed his surprise and indignation for the lack of explanations behind the Court’s decision as well as his preoccupation for the stance of the Supreme Court in terms of fighting impunity for the dictatorship’s crimes. Lastly deputy Luis Puig asserted that the judge’s transfer amounted to “a real triumph of impunity.”

By removing Mota, the Uruguayan judiciary has shown itself determined to derail efforts to deliver justice for the military’s crimes, despite the revocation of a 25-year-old amnesty law in October 2011.

In the 1970s and 1980s, Uruguay became known as ‘the torture chamber of Latin America,’ reflecting the repressive techniques used by the military dictatorship.  Between 1973 and 1977, the dictatorship boasted the highest percentage of political prisoners per capita in the world, who were subjected to prolonged imprisonment, and physical and psychological torture.  Over 200 civilians were forcibly disappeared during the 12-year rule while thousands were brutally tortured and illegally detained.

Following the return to democracy in 1985, the administration of Julio María Sanguinetti established the Ley de Caducidad de la Prevención Punitiva del Estado (Law on the Expiry of the Punitive Claims of the State, or Expiry Law), an amnesty law which granted complete impunity to military and security personnel for the crimes they committed during the dictatorship.

The new democratic government took a position of ‘no truth, no justice’ to calls for accountability and information about the whereabouts of the disappeared. As such, silence and oblivion because institutionalised, and the Expiry Law became the cornerstone of a culture of impunity.

There have been sustained challenges to institutionalised impunity since the adoption of the Expiry Law, always spearheaded by civil society organisations. Two referenda triggered by human rights groups failed to overturn the law in 1989 and 2009. Some high-profile prosecutions were achieved after 2005 with efforts by lawyers to circumvent the parameters of the law; nevertheless, the preservation of the amnesty meant that all attempts to investigate abuses had to be approved by the Executive.

A decision by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR) in the case of Gelman vs. Uruguay in February 2011, finally led to the revocation of the law by Parliament in October 2011.

Overturning the Expiry Law means that Uruguay’s Judiciary is free to investigate and hold to account those responsible for abuses carried out a generation ago.  However, Wednesday’s decision suggests that the culture of impunity that existed for over 20 years still exerts its influence and is much harder to eradicate than initially expected. As many, including lawyer Pablo Chargoñia and activist Raúl Olivera, have previously stated, impunity in Uruguay goes well beyond specific laws such as the Expiry Law and has transformed itself into “factual impunity”.

Mota’s involvement in high-profile cases had previously generated attempts to oust her from her position. In 2011, she was forced to explain to the Supreme Court allegations in a news article that she had attended a March of Silence, a yearly demonstration organised by the human rights community to demand information about those disappeared by the dictatorship. Last year, she incited the wrath of many individuals, including former president Jorge Batlle and current president Mujica following an interview with an Argentine newspaper in which she criticised the Uruguayan government’s efforts to shed light on the crimes of the past.  Once again, Mota was forced to explain her actions to the Supreme Court.

Given previous efforts to undermine her position, it appears unlikely to be a mere coincidence that the Supreme Court should decide to remove her from her post.  Although the Court is permitted to do so according to Uruguayan laws, its failure to provide an adequate explanation points to something more calculated.  As Mota explained in an interview with La Diaria newspaper, ‘it is strange for a judge to be transferred without having made a request, nor having demonstrated malpractice.’

What is worrying is that the Court should decide to remove a judge who has proved herself as competent, efficient, and well trained in the cases in which she is involved.  Even worse is that such a development should arise only months after the Expiry Law was finally overturned. With Mota’s removal, it is highly likely that the 55 cases of abuse by the dictatorship she was investigating will cease to develop and be subject to lengthy delays.  With the advanced age of many of the defendants, such delays can dramatically reduce the likelihood of them standing trial and produce further impunity.

If Uruguay is to retain its continued regaining its image as the Switzerland of Latin America, it is fundamental that the independence of judges such as Mota, as well as the rule of law, is respected. Judges like Mota should be supported and accompanied in the fight for justice, not ousted and removed from their jobs. Without this, the dark years of the dictatorship will continue to cast a long shadow.

 

Pierre-Louis Le Goff is a research assistant at the Latin American Centre, University of Oxford. Dr Francesca Lessa is a specialist in issues of justice and human rights in Uruguay

The trial against Guatemalan ex-dictator Jose Efrain Rios Montt and former general of the Army Jose Mauricio Rodriguez for crimes against humanity has been postponed.

Court officials announced Thursday that the start of the criminal trials against the former dictator and former general for genocide war crimes has been postponed indefinitely.

One of Rios Montt’s lawyers, Franciso Palomo, told the media, “we are preparing an appeal against the ruling on Monday by Judge Miguel Ángel Gálvez, which ordered the start of the trial against former military”.

Palomo said the legal action will be presented to the Supreme Court of Justice and aims to stop the beginning of the public trial which accuses Rios Montt and Rodriguez for the massacre of thousands of indigenous people between March 1982 and August 1983.

“We insist that he (Rios Montt) did not order any slaughter,” Palomo said. “So we believe that there is not much to debate”.

The judge ordered the parties to appear before court on Friday to present exculpatory evidence. The Association for Justice and Reconciliation (AJR) and the Center for Legal Action in Human Rights (CALDH) issued a statement in which they explained that “for the first time in our country there could be open proceedings for genocide and crimes against humanity”.

This would be the first case in which a former head of state is charged with thousands of murders committed by the Guatemalan army during the civil war that lasted 36 years.

There have been convictions of low-ranking military and police for human rights violations that occurred during the armed conflict.

Under the regime of General Rios Montt, who came into power after leading a coup in 1982, the Army implemented the so-called policy of “scorched earth” on indigenous populations to those accused of collaborating with guerrillas during the Cold War.

Over 500 social organisations and movements from Latin America and the Caribbean will participate in the Peoples’ Summit, that will kick off this Friday in Santiago.

The representatives of these organisations will discuss how to push forward their agenda of social justice across the continent. These talks will be held in parallel of the meeting between the Community of Latin-American and Caribbean States (CELAC) and the European Union (EU), also held in Santiago this week. This official meeting will discuss investments and economic ties between Europe and Latin America.

“We want to see what type of investments [will be discussed], and what Latin-American states want on the one hand and what the people want on the other, often these investments have disastrous consequences for us,” Martín Pascual, spokesman for the Peoples’ Summit told AFP.

The Peoples’ Summit will kick off with a march from the Universidad de Chile to the Plaza de Armas in central Santiago where cultural activities will be held. The organisations will draft a common document they will present to the leaders present at the international gathering.

The CELAC-EU meeting will gather over 40 heads of state, including Mariano Rajoy from Spain and Angela Merkel from Germany, as well as the President of the European Commission Herman Van Rompuy.

“It is an important opportunity to question the different dimensions of the crisis and the governments’ attempts to use European capital investments in Latin America a way out of the crisis, at the same time that our peoples are rebelling against the extractive, inequitable and depredating model,” read a statement published by Acción, the Chilean association of non-governmental organisations.

These events will take place in a moment of tension between indigenous communities in Chile, with violent attacks occurring in recent weeks. Two Mapuche leaders have been on a hunger strike for more than 70 days in the prison of Angol and Concepción (550km South of Santiago) claiming their innocence.

A delegation of the Peoples’ Summit will be sent to meet them and extend their support.

Chilean Interior Minister Andrés Chadwick has come out denying his own government’s declarations that the Mapuche involved in recent attacks had links with the Colombian FARC guerillas.

A week ago, Cristian Larroulet, minister of the presidency, had accused the Mapuche allegedly behind a number of attacks of having connection with groups from outside Chile.

“We are in the presence of an organised terrorist group, with terrorist methods, with international connections, and training and contacts with the FARC,” he had assured.

Mapuche groups responded to the government by accusing them of “adding fuel” to the conflict. The interior minister tried to tone down the dialogue between Mapuches and government at a press conference yesterday.

“We don’t have any evidence, nor have we ever said we do have evidence [regarding links between Mapuche and foreign guerrilla groups],” he said contradicting Larroulet’s words.

“There could be the possibility some kind of different armament, in which case the government would worry and, within the investigations of the Public Ministry, determine if there are support channels, financing that could come from inside the country or external sectors,” he explained.

The press conference also focused on the mobilisation of a large number of police to the Araucania region, where the conflict has been most violent. These reinforcements were sent to “guarantee security and protection in the territory” according to Chadwick.

The Mapuche conflict has erupted into violence over the past few weeks in Araucanía, with a fire killing two landowners on 4th January leading to violent retaliation against Mapuche communities. Aruacanía is the region with the largest Mapuche population in Chile, and it is also its poorest region.