An elderly man has disappeared after testifying that he had been tortured by a former police commissioner during the country’s military dictatorship, and concerns are growing for his safety.
Nine days after the disappearance of Jorge Julio Lopez, 77, human rights groups marched Tuesday urging authorities to step up their efforts to locate him. The provincial government in La Plata, where he lived, has offered 200,000 pesos ($67,000) in award money and set up a hotline asking for leads.
Lopez, who testified that he was tortured by former police commissioner Miguel Etchecolatz, has not been seen since the day before Etchecolatz was convicted and sentenced to life in prison for crimes against humanity last week.
Gone into hiding?
Lopez was reported missing last Monday after his son went to his house to take him to the last day of the trial. Family members have said Lopez may have gone into hiding out of fear.
“Lopez’s disappearance has us worried,” Buenos Aires provincial minister of government Florencio Randazzo, told Identidad radio. “Everything makes us believe his disappearance had something to do with (the trial).”
The sentencing of Etchecolatz, a former provincial police commissioner who ran clandestine detention centers, was one of the first since Argentina’s amnesty laws for former members of the military were scrapped by the Supreme Court last year.
Thousands ‘disappeared’
The trial was held in La Plata, the capital of Buenos Aires province, 35 miles south of Argentina’s capital, also called Buenos Aires.
“This is the first disappeared person (from the dictatorship years) who disappears (again) in democracy, and we are looking into the worst. It’s a very serious thing for democracy,” said Provincial Gov. Felipe Sola.
The word “disappeared” refers to thousands of leftists who were taken into police custody and never seen again, under the 1976-1983 military regime.
“There are fears that he may have been abducted by people connected with the former military government because of his involvement in the trial, and as a warning to potential witnesses in similar future trials,” Amnesty International said in a statement.
Police investigators are interviewing people who visited Etchecolatz in jail, and using dogs to search areas where people were tortured during the military regime.
The government of President Nestor Kirchner has pressed for resolution of human rights issues, such as trials of dirty war criminals like Etchecolatz.
