December 27, 2001
Narco News 2001
A Narco News Global Alert
Argentina
Seeks
Banzer's
Extradition
Judge Orders Bolivian
General:
Defend "Plan
Condor" Crimes
Court Seeks Testimony
by
Kissinger on U.S.
Complicity
Assassination
of Opposition Leaders,
Kidnapping
of Babies, the Charge
Bolivian General
Hugo Banzer Has
January 3rd Appointment
in DC Hospital
Translated by The Narco
News Bulletin
By Reuters News Agency
(original in Spanish)
December 27, 2001
Argentina
Judge Seeks Capture of
General
Banzer for "Plan Condor"
BUENOS AIRES, (Reuters)
An
Argentine federal judge, on Wednesday,
sought the capture with the goal of extraditing ex Bolivian president
Hugo Banzer, in a case that investigates the existence of a joint
plan by the military regimes of the Southern Cone in the 1970s
to eliminate opposition leaders.
"It's the right thing to do. We seek
it because of Plan Condor… The charge is racketeering, the
same charges that have been made against the ex repressor of
Argentina, Jorge Rafael Videla and for the ex Chilean dictator
Augusto Pinochet," Federal Judge Rodolfo Canicoba Corral
told Reuters.
Plan Condor, an alleged conspiracy between
the de facto regimes of Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Brasil and
Paraguay, supposedly coordinated the actions by military, police
and intelligence forces by their different countries inside the
national territories of their own to kidnap and eventually disappear
opposition leaders.
General Banzer, a military official who
governed as dictator between 1971 and 1978, and who returned
to power by democratic means in 1997, resigned on August 6th
from the Bolivian presidency due to advanced lung cancer. "I
think that the conditions exist," said the Judge, asked
about the real possibility that Banzer could be arrested and
extradited to the country. The last military dictatorship that
governed Argentina between 1976 and 1983 left between 15,000
and 30,000 people disappeared. But the military officials benefited
from the amnesty laws of 1986 and 1987 and were later pardoned
in 1990 by then-president Carlos Menem.
The only crime that is not covered by
the pardon law is that of the kidnapping of children of pregnant
women who were kidnapped and tortured in clandestine detention
centers, where they gave birth.
According to judicial sources, the amnesty
can not impede the advance of the case against Plan Condor, because
the pardon only applies to the dictators in their role as military
officials and the case by Judge Canicoba Corral investigates
the political responsibility of the officials in their positions
as presidents.
The ex Argentina dictator Videla, who
is facing charges for racketeering and as author of 72 disappearances
is under hous arrest because of Plan Condor and the theft of
babies during the military dictatorship.
Canicoba solicited the detention with
goals of extradition against Pinochet and retired Uruguay general
Julio Vadora on August 20th. He also sent a judicial order to
the United States to solicit the testimony of ex secretary of
state Henry Kissinger under the suspicion that the United States
government, between 1973 and 1977, knew of the existence of the
Plan.
Translated by The Narco
News Bulletin
From the ANF News Agency,
Bolivia
The
Government Has No Opinion
The
Bolivian Government will not respond
in any way to the international arrest warrant against Hugo Banzer
Suarez, by the Argentina Federal Justice Rodolfo Canicoba Corral,
until the request is formally made.
The Government Information Minister Mauro
Bertero said that he has only seen press reports, and awaits
the legal paperwork from Canicoba Corral through the Foreign
Ministry.
"The government doesn't express any
opinion about this issue until it can see the official request
of the judge who has the case," said Bertero.
However, on repeated occasions, President
Jorge Quiroga Ramirez said that there is a "profound"
respect to the former presidents for their bringing democracy
to the country, in spite of the charges filed by members of Congress.
In the case of the order against Banzer, Bertero said that hypothetical
statements should not be made and he awaits a reading of the
order…
From the EFE News Service,
Spain
Banzer
claims legal action
against
him is unfounded
Former
Bolivian President Hugo Banzer on Wednesday
dismissed as unfounded an Argentine judge's attempt to prosecute
him for the disappearance of opponents to his military regime.
Banzer, de facto president of Bolivia from 1971-1978, allegedly
repressed political opponents under the so-called Condor Plan
- the coordinated actions of the military governments of Argentina,
Brazil, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay to repress suspected leftists.
Argentine Judge Rodolfo Canicoba Corral has issued an arrest
warrant for the purpose of extraditing Banzer to help investigate
and clarify the Condor Plan. According to Nationalist Action
Party (ADN) Executive Secretary Guillermo Fortun, Banzer will
wait until he receives official notice of the charges through
the Bolivian foreign ministry before commenting further on the
allegations. Banzer, elected president in 1997 following his
de facto rule, resigned in August with lung and liver cancer
for which he is being treated at a Washington military hospital.
Fortun labeled the arrest warrant a "strange
move" by the Argentine judge, adding that the ruling will
not alter Banzer's plans to travel to Washington on Jan. 3 to
receive additional medical treatment.
The
Cancer Began Decades Ago