Aug
Historical Memory, Politics
Salvadoran Military Officials Facing Possible Extradition for Murder of Jesuits
Diario Digital Contrapunto Reports: Military Leaders of the Civil War in Jail
August 8th, 2011
By Hugo Sanchez / Gerardo Arbaiza
SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador woke this morning shocked after learning that the military leaders who led the army for much of the civil war (1980-1992), are imprisoned in a military facility which before and during the armed conflict sew terror against opponents of the dictatorship.
Locked in a cell behind bars and sleeping in bunk beds, the nine soldiers accused of the slaughter of 6 Jesuit priests, their employee and her daughter in 1989, are part of criminal proceedings for which they could be extradited to Spain to receive a punishment that never imagined.
Since it became known that Judge Eloy Velasco, the Audiencia Nacional of Spain, emitted an international arrest warrant for the military officers accused of perpetrating the slaughter at the University of Central America, El Salvador has experienced legal and political speculation about whether or not the accused will be extradited.
For many years the military has managed to evade justice for war crimes or crimes against humanity committed during the armed conflagration, shielded by the controversial amnesty law decreed by the Salvadoran congress in 1993, which pardoned all the serious crimes committed between 1980 and 1992, both by soldiers and guerrillas.
SEE: https://abcnews.go.com/Archives/video/nov-16-1989-jesuits-killed-el-salvador-12108649
ARPAS Community Radio Association: A Desperate Attempt to Evade Justice
by the Association of Participatory Radios and Programs of El Salvador (ARPAS)
The former soldiers involved in the slaughter of the Jesuit priests of the University of Central America try to avoid being captured by the National Civilian Police, poised to enforce an order from the International Police (INTERPOL).
Yesterday, the former military chiefs, led by Juan Orlando Zepeda, Rafael Humberto Larios, Helena Francisco Fuentes and Juan Rafael Bustillo, tried to get military protection in a barracks.
However, the Ministry of Defense decided this morning to deliver the military officials to a court to continue the process which may end in their extradition to Spain where Judge Eloy Velasco awaits their arrival.
This historic event could mark the beginning of the end of the impunity around the serious human rights violations committed before and during the civil war, which include in addition to the murder of the Jesuits, the assassination of Monsignor Oscar Arnulfo Romero, massacres like El Mozote and the Sumpul, and a great number of other murders, disappearances, torture, etc.
As this editorial is being written, a meeting between President Mauricio Funes and his security cabinet continues at the Presidential Palace in which the topic of discussion is the possible extradition of former military chiefs accused of murder by the National Court of Spain.
To support the decision of the Ministry of Defense to allow justice to apply to the former military officials, the Executive should ask the Twelfth Court of Peace to continue the process and ask the Supreme Court to authorise without delay the extradition of former military chiefs to Spain.
The imminent capture of former military members of the military group called “Tandona” occurs just as the Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL) is suing the Salvadoran State through the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, for the slaughter committed by the army at the El Mozote massacre in December of 1981.
Looks like the time has come for justice to be applied and for victims to be revindicated. Let’s hope that time has finally come.
