The trial of 31 former soldiers for human rights crimes started last week in the central province of Córdoba. In power during the dictatorship from 1976 to 1983, the officials face charges of homicide and torture.
Former dictator Jorge Videla and ex-chief of the Third Army, Luciano Menéndez, are among the accused. The public prosecutor alleged they are behind the execution by firing squad of 31 political prisoners in the San Martín penitentiary in Córdoba.
The accusations read by the prosecution maintain that a “repressive apparatus” had established “state terrorism since the coup d’etat on 24th March 1976” and that Videla was the most responsible but blame “extended to distinct levels of command”.
The national human rights secretary, Eduardo Duhalde, said, “all of those responsible must be tried, if they’re military, civilians, or police, those that were members and those that consented.”
He also called the trial “very important, as much for the crimes being tried as for the oppressors sitting on the dock.”
Videla was sentenced to prison in 1985 after being found guilty of the murder and disappearance of thousands of citizens, but was pardoned by President Carlos Menem in 1990.
In 1998 he was again detained and sentenced to a period of house arrest before being transferred to prison.
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