Pero los dinosaurios van a desaparecer
In other news…
…let’s talk about the news! I had a short assignment for class to look up and summarize an article so it got me to reading some Argentine news sites and newspapers. My host mom presented me with this (en español), which I found the most interesting and pertains to my last post about ESMA. Here is a similar story I found on an English site.
An amendment that would declassify U.S. intelligence documents about the Argentine military dictatorship lost in a vote of 214–194 on Friday, frustrating human rights groups and marking the fourth time since 2008 that such a measure has failed in U.S. Congress.
Republican Rep. Mike Rogers argues that U.S. intelligence is too preoccupied with Al Qaeda operations at the moment and that “The topic of Argentina can wait. It has already waited for 25 years. A few more years won’t make a difference.” Needless to say, these comments infuriated the Mothers and Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo, many of whom are approaching old age and “waiting” simply won’t be an option any more. Meanwhile, Maurice Hinchey who presented the bill, argues that these intelligence documents would help immensely in identifying the desparacidos and their children. I just find it so ironic that while the U.S. hunts for Al Qaeda the Argentinians search for answers, both wanting justice served to those guilty of killing thousands of its citizens. Why should one problem dominate the importance of another? sigh….Ladies and gentlemen, here we have an example of U.S. imperialism at its finest. At least this issue is being brought up on “our” soil again and I hope the Congress continues to push for this information as Mothers are able to keep esperanza.
While I’m on the topic, I’ll share two more articles pertaining to human rights and the security of Buenos Aires from The Argentine Independent, an English news source that I find to be very good. Both are interesting, I’m running out of time and I can’t go into detail right now on them but I suggest you read!
http://www.argentinaindependent.com/currentaffairs/newsfromargentina/a-work-in-progress-human-rights-in-argentina-/
http://www.argentinaindependent.com/currentaffairs/analysis/fear-and-loathing-in-buenos-aires-/
This is very good, you all should read this.
History of Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo
Children Who Disappeared or Who Were Born in Captivity
The drama of children who disappeared in our country, the Argentine Republic, is one of the consequences of the National Reorganization Process enforced by the military dictatorship, which ruled the country between 1976 and 1983.
These children are the children of our children, who have also disappeared. Many babies were kidnapped with their parents, some after their parents were killed, and others were born in clandestine detention centers where their mothers were taken after having been sequestered at different states of their pregnancies.
We, the babies’ grandmothers, tried desperately to locate them and, during these searches, decided to unite. Thus, in 1977, the non-governmental organization called Abuelas (Grandmothers) de Plaza de Mayo was established, dedicated specifically to fighting for the return of our grandchildren. We also relentlessly investigated our children’s and grandchildren’s disappearances, in hopes of finding them.
As mothers our search is two-folded because we are demanding the restitution of our grandchildren while simultaneously searching for these children’s parents, our sons and daughters.
From the moment that our children (often with our grandchildren in their wombs) disappeared, we visited every court, office, orphanage, day care center, and so on, to locate them. We appeared before the courts, the successive military governments, the Supreme Court, and the ecclesiastical hierarchies, never obtaining a positive result. We finally directed our claim to international organizations such as the United Nations and the Organization of American States, again to no avail.
In 1977 we began our struggle with the claim for 13 children’s restitutions. As of August 2004, over 400 children have been recorded as missing. However, we know that there are approximately 500 kidnapped children. In many cases, their relatives did not declare such kidnappings, either due to ignorance of the ability to do so or because they did not know that the mothers were pregnant at the time of their disappearance.
The disappeared children were deprived of their identity, their religion, and their right to live with their family, in order words, all of the rights that are nationally and internationally recognized as their universal human rights.
Our demand is concrete: that the children who were kidnapped as a method of political repression be restored to their legitimate families.
