Closing line law
The Final Line Act (Spanish: Ley de Punto Final ) was a law enacted in 1986 by the Argentine National Congress in relation to the military dictatorship from 1976 to 1983 and repealed in 2003, which set a deadline for the opening of new criminal proceedings against former members of the junta .
background
The dictatorship was shaped by the " dirty war " of the armed forces against guerrilla groups and people they classified as "subversives". Massive violence, torture , kidnappings and liquidations by opponents of the government were systematically carried out without trial. At the beginning of the military takeover , General Luciano Benjamin Menéndez had announced: “We will have to kill 50,000 people. 25,000 subversives, 20,000 sympathizers and we will make 5,000 mistakes. ”In its approach, the government also cooperated with numerous criminal death squads , such as the Alianza Anticomunista Argentina .
legislation
After the end of the military dictatorship, Raúl Alfonsín began to come to terms with the crimes of the military junta . Alfonsín wanted to limit the prosecution in order to ensure the cooperation of the military in the renewed democratization of Argentina. After the highest management level had been called to account in the proceedings against the junta (Spanish: Juicio a las Juntas ), the Ley de Punto Final was passed on December 24, 1986 after only three weeks of deliberations , with a 60-day deadline for opening a new one Procedure provided. The project led to violent protests in Argentina. More than 50,000 people demonstrated in front of the convention building, CONADEP contradicted the law, and judges and party officials filed complaints. One of the country's highest judges, Guillermo Ledesma , who had also participated in the trial against the junta, resigned. Thanks to intensive work by human rights groups and liberal courts of law, thousands of complaints were filed within the deadline, and 450 officers were charged by the deadline. The military's dissatisfaction with these numerous charges, which affected many officers who were still active, sparked revolts on Easter weekends in 1987. Subsequently, Alfonsín presented the Law on Obedience , which, when passed in July 1987, exempted most of the accused from prosecution.
Repeal of the law and pardon the criminals involved
It was not until President Néstor Kirchner that the crimes were dealt with again seriously. The Conclusion Act and the Law on Obligation to Obedience were annulled by the Argentine Congress in 2003 and finally declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in June 2005. Pardons issued by President Carlos Menem were also revoked and new investigations and proceedings were initiated against a total of 580 people.
Web links
- Ley 23.492 , final line law in full, accessed on September 25, 2012 (Spanish)
Individual evidence
- ^ Paul H. Lewis: Guerrillas and generals: the "Dirty War" in Argentina . Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002, p. 147
- ↑ Alison Brysk: The politics of human rights in Argentina: protest, change, and democratization . Stanford University Press, 1994, p. 81
- ↑ Elin Skaar, Siri Gloppen, Astri Suhrke: Roads to reconciliation . Lexington Books, 2005, p. 163
- ^ Neil J. Kritz: Transitional justice: how emerging democracies reckon with former regimes . US Institute of Peace Press, 1995, p. 25
- ↑ Melanie Schwarzlose: Remembering after the dictatorship: The example of Argentina . GRIN, 2010, pp. 33-35